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'flthe Jnidlectual
AND
NEW JERUSALEM MAGAZINE.
No. 254.]
'
FEBRUARY 1, 1875.
[Vol. XXII.
LIKE AND UNLIKE.
There are many things in this world that appear to he alike, and
some that are even supposed to be identical, which are yet very differ
ent from, and some of them even opposite to, each other. Charity and
benevolence are often confounded, but are by no means the same.
Although not in their nature antagonistic, they are not unfrequently
opposite in their results. Charity aims at the real and even the ever
lasting good of its objects, benevolence only consults their apparent
good, and not only leaves the eternal out of consideration, but often so
acts as to make the temporal hostile to it. Parental love and fondness
are not unfrequently mistaken for each other, or rather fondness is
sometimes mistaken for love. Yet they are far from being the same.
Love, like charity, constantly aims at the real good of the objects of
its affection and regard, and so treats them as to secure, as far as it can,
their true and lasting welfare. Fondness seeks its satisfaction in the
gratification of its own and of its objects’ feelings and desires, and
often sacrifices their true interests by ministering to their appetites and
passions.
Zeal and anger are not always distinguished, yet they are not only
different but opposite in their origin, in their nature, and in their
tendency. Zeal is the warmth of love, anger is the fire of hatred.
“ Externally zeal appears like anger, but inwardly they are different.
The differences are these. The zeal of a good love is like a heavenly
flame, which in no case bursts forth upon another, but only defends
itself against a wicked person. But the zeal of an evil love is like an
�54
Like and Unlike.
infernal flame, which of itself bursts forth and rushes on, and desires
to consume another. The zeal of a good love burns away, and is
allayed when the assailant ceases to assault; but the zeal of an evil
love continues, and is not extinguished. This is because the internal
of him who is in the love of goodness is in itself mild, soft, friendly and
benevolent; wherefore when his external, with a view of defending
itself, is fierce, harsh, and haughty, and thereby acts with rigour, still
it is tempered by the good in which he is internally. It is otherwise
with the evil. With them the internal is unfriendly, without pity,
harsh, breathing hatred and revenge, and feeding itself with their
delights ; and although it is reconciled, still these evils lie concealed as
fire in the wood under the embers; and these fires burst forth after
death, if not in this world.” (C. L. 365.) There are two lessons we
may learn from this outward similarity between the two essentially
different feelings of zeal and anger. We must not regard all warmth of
feeling which we meet with in debate, when a speaker is vindicating
his own opinions, or refuting or even declaiming against those of others,
as of necessity so much as allied to anger. Nor must we suppose that
a still more fiery denunciation of wrong and vindication of right has
any necessary relationship with wrath. There is a generous indigna
tion, which is sometimes called righteous anger; but such indignation
or anger is only zeal. It has in it no hatred except against evil. It
desires the welfare even of those who do the evil against which it is
directed. The angels, we are told, have indignation, but their indigna
tion “ is not of anger but of zeal, in which there is nothing of evil,
and which is as far removed from hatred or revenge, or from the spirit
of returning evil for evil, as heaven is from hell, for it originates in
good.” (A. C. 3839.) Another lesson we learn from the outward
similarity between zeal and anger has respect to God.
He is a zealous
God. And His Divine zeal, although it is the fire of infinite love, to a
certain class of His creatures has the appearance, and from that ap
pearance has in Scripture assumed the name, of anger and even of
wrath and vengeance. “ The zeal of the Lord, which in itself is love
and pity, appears to the evil as anger; for when the Lord out of love
and mercy protects His own in heaven, the wicked are indignant and
angry against the good, and rush into the sphere where Divine good
and Divine truth are, and attempt to destroy those who are there, and
■ in this case the Divine truth of the Divine good operates upon them,
and makes them feel such torments as exist in hell; hence they attri
bute to the Divine Being wrath and anger, whereas in Him there is
nothing at all of anger or of evil, but pure clemency and mercy.
Wrath and anger are attributed to the Lord, but they belong to those
who are in evil, or are angry against the Divine.” (A. C. 8875.) How
needful, then, the Lord’s exhortation—“ Judge not according to the
appearance, but judge righteous judgment.”
�55
SKETCH OF THE SCIENCE OF PSYCHOLOGY
BASED ON SCRIPTURE AND REASON.
BY THE LATE REV. W. WOODMAN.
Chap. V.—The Relation of the Soul and Body—continued.
We now come to the final question, which, though last, is not least
in importance : “ What is the use of the material body in relation to
the soul?” or, “What is the ground, in the divine economy, of the
necessity of man being born into the natural world 1 ” That such a
necessity exists must be inferred from the fact: for Divine Wisdom
does nothing in vain. No provision which exists is superfluous.
Hence there must be an adequate reason for the phenomenon.
In the preceding chapter it was explained that, without an inert or
reactive basis, creation itself would have been impossible, and that the
creative energies would have dissipated themselves without result. It
was also shown by reference to those phenomena of the other world, of
which the Scriptures supply intimations, that the substances of that
world have an inherent activity which results in continual change,
many of the scenes described in the prophets and the Apocalypse being
like the shifting scenes of a drama. That objects and scenery of a
permanent character exist there is unquestionable, but, as will be
shown in a future part of this work, their continuance is due to their
connection with states derived from the fixedness of this world. Such
Would be the character of the human soul, had it not been provided,
in order to its preserving a permanent identity, that the spirit should
be allied to the inert substances of the world of nature, thence to
derive a kind of limbus—a selvidge, or fringe-work of fixedness, which
forms a substratum or fulcrum to the spiritual activities, and serves,
like the cutaneous integument of the body, to hold all its parts in their
connection.
The rudiment of this is laid at conception, and becomes actual at birth,
so soon as the material organization has been animated from the outer
world, by the inhalation of the external atmosphere. Life thus brought
down to the extreme verge of our nature—in other words, the influx of
life from which the embryo lived thus uniting itself with the afflux of
life from without—-the connection of the soul with the body, which
previously had been potential, now becomes actual.
Still, the base thus formed in the child, though real, is rudimentary,
and receives its full development in after life, the body then serving as
�56
Sketch of the Science of Psychology.
a plane into which the mental activities are determined, and where, by
being embodied in corresponding acts, they become fixed in actual life.
This explains why in the Scriptures so great an emphasis is placed on
works, and why we are to be judged according to the deeds done in th®
body. It is for this reason that the Lord insists on the doing of His
precepts as the foundation on which alone our spiritual house can
stand.
The importance of this subject affords a sufficient apology for
adducing a few of the more prominent instances in which this doctrine
is enforced, such as the following : “ Blessed are the dead which die in
the Lord from henceforth'; yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest
from their labours, and their works do follow them ” (Rev. xiv. 13).
l( Blessed are they that do His commandments, that they may have right
to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city ”
(Rev. xxii. 14). “ Not every one that saith unto Me, Lord, Lord, shall
enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he who doeth the will of My
Father which is in heaven” (Matt. vii. 21). “ He that hath My com
mandments, and doeth them, he it is that loveth Me” (John xiv. 21).
“ Herein is My Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit: so shall ye
be My disciples ” (John xv. 5). “ Say ye to the righteous, It shall
be well with him; for they shall eat the fruit of their doings ” (Isa. iii.
10). And these are but a small fraction of the texts which bear on
the point.
The ground of these strong injunctions is obviously because love
together with faith, unless embodied in act, evaporate in mere senti
mentality. “ If,” as the Apostle James truly observes, “ a brother or
sister be naked, or destitute of daily food, and one of you say unto
them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye
give them not those things which are needful to the body, what doth
it profit?” (chap. ii. 15, 16.) It is as profitless to him who contents
himself with the sentiment as to the object of it; it is equally desti
tute of fruit in the one case as in the other. In the act all purposes of
the will, with all the mental powers, both intellectual and affectional,
are concentrated. They are simultaneously present, and require a
consistency in the deed, whilst they leave their indelible impress on
the spirit.
It is not however to be inferred that there is any efficacy in mere
deeds. Actions, however pious or beneficent in their outward form,
when not the result of genuine religious principle, are destitute of
spiritual vitality. They are either formal or hypocritical—either like
�Sketch of the Science of Psychology.
57
a lk»dy without a soul, or a whited sepulchre, the receptacle of dead
Bien’s hones and all uncleanness. A mere act, considered abstractedly
from motive, is simply mechanical. It is qualified by the motive out of
which it springs; and the same act performed by different persons
may differ in all its essential characteristics, and indeed does so in
the degree in which the respective purposes and ends contemplated in
the performance of it respectively vary. In the mutual relation there
fore which the one bears to the other the inward motive impresses on
the deed its peculiar character, whilst this solidifies and renders
permanent the principles of thought and affection whence it springs.
It is also a fact, of which every one on reflection may convince him
self, that the principles of the mind, by derivation, become principles
of the body also. This is illustrated in the impress of the mental
characteristics on the countenance. I do not allude to those transitory
changes which are produced by the passing emotions; principles per
manently established within the soul imprint a lasting image of them
selves on the expression of the face.1
That there are instances where the secret workings of the soul are
sedulously concealed from observation is fully conceded; but this is
the result of long education of the features to conceal the real senti
ments of the mind, and simulate others which it does not feel.
It is an abnormal condition, and may be regarded as an exception,
which rather serves to prove the rule than furnish an argument against
it. Moreover, viewed in its essential character, the image of hypocrisy
will be found stamped on every one of its forms, although not so easily
detected by the external senses.2
The impress of the mental principles derived into the bodily
organization is not however confined to the face, although this is, par
1 The author witnessed a remarkable instance of this in comparing the portrait
of a gentleman taken at one period with the original some years afterwards, dur
ing which time a change had taken place in his religious sentiments. The like
ness was evidently an excellent one. Every feature was a perfect reproduction,
as far as to the general contour of the living face then preseent, but the expression
of the two was vastly different. That of the former, though not harsh, was cold
and rigid ; that of the latter beamed with benevolence and sympathy. A change
such as this could only be due to a correspondent change in the arrangement of
the interior fibres which underlie the surface, and which, as explained in the text,
primarily receive the impressions of the mental activities.
2 The author, and doubtless many who read these pages, has found how often
the impression spontaneously produced on first seeing an individual proves to be
the correct one. Even deceit, notwithstanding the consummate art resorted to for
the purpose of concealing the true sentiments, will thus frequently crop out.
/
�58
Sketch of the Science of Psychology.
excellence, the index of the mind. The manual dexterity acquired hy
practice in the more delicate operations of art or mechanics, rests on
the same ground. The soul not only thus educates its material
organism from the minutest fibres of which it is composed to its more
concrete organs, but a lasting impression is left upon them, a disposing
of the minute parts, whereby the operations are capable of almost
spontaneous reproduction ; many of the manual processes requiring no
ordinary skill being carried on without the effort of reflection. The
body has thus a species of automatic action, whence use becomes a
second nature. The retentive faculty of the organism of the im
pressions its activities may have received is most strikingly illustrated
by the circumstance, that what has been acquired in early youth, when
both mind and body are most plastic, is nevertheless so indelibly
fixed as never during life to be obliterated, but are capable of repro
duction at any subsequent period so long as our frame retains its
normal powers.
If this is the case with operations which lie relatively on the surface,
much more with the principles that stir the profounder depths of our
being. Manual dexterity, and even intellectual aptitude, may exist
independently of moral or spiritual character ; but that which springs
from the fountain of the life’s love, acting from a far deeper ground,
will exercise a proportionately more powerful influence; the inmost
motives, whatever their character, will inevitably transform the
whole organism inhabited by it into a perfect image of themselves,
and form a substratum, so to speak, on which the others rest.
It is then for this reason that the soul in its first stage is allied with
a material vesture; and that the natural universe has been created to
supply the elements necessary to form this external covering, and to
furnish a plane whereon these ultimate activities may be developed to
their utmost extent.
In the soul and body, then, are collated all the arcana of created
existence, and communication established with both worlds, so that
each may contribute its wealth to the human subject. The spiritual
supplies the active energies of his being, the material, the reactive base,
by means of which these become fixed and permanent. The lowest
being thus brought into the closest relationship with the highest, the
conditions are supplied for realizing the action of that law whereby
all true operation proceeds from first principles by ultimates into
intermediates. At birth there are only the two extremes, the soul and
a mere corporeity. The former, operating through the latter, rears the
�Shelch of the Science of Psychology.
59
mental superstructure lying between. The first plane rests on the
bodily senses; through these, by instruction, science is formed, and
the moral sentiments superadded; and if man becomes the subject of
& new birth, the centre of a new series is formed, a spiritual super
structure crowns the edifice. The soul is thus like a many-storied
house, rising from the lowest natural plane till it reaches the verge of
the spiritual, which, when formed and developed, brings it into com
munion and conjunction with the Supreme. In all these stages the
operation of the same law may be discovered. The principles and.
purposes formed within the mind acquire a mental consistency and
permanence only as they are determined to act. And whilst this im
parts a fixity to them, it also provides a solid mental basis for the
development and perfection of the religious life within.1
1 Three objections may possibly arise in some minds. It may appear that the
arguments employed in this chapter favour the conclusion that the existence of the
body is indispensable to the full exercise of the mental functions, and that at its
dissolution the soul is deprived of an essential element necessary to such exercise.
In the second place, it may seem as though those who died in infancy must lack
the full development of the natural base, and consequently remain imperfect.
The third difficulty which may probably suggest itself relates to the existence of
angels created such. On the first two points I must request the reader to suspend
his judgment till a future portion of this work, when they will more properly come
Under the full consideration they demand. As regards the third, I must beg
permission to remark that much misapprehension prevails on the subject. There
certainly is no direct intimation in the Scriptures of any existences being so
Created, and the doctrine rests entirely on inference, and this from passages con
fessedly obscure. The direct testimony of Holy Writ is fatal to the hypothesis.
A detailed account of the order of creation is given in the Book of Genesis from
th® “beginning :”—“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”
Th® process continued, in an ascending series, till it culminated in man, with
which, and the subordinating of all inferior beings to his dominion and control,
God, we are told, “ ended all His work which He had made.” It is unnecessary to
observe that not the slightest reference occurs to the creation of angels. As to
fallen angels the declaration that ‘ ‘ God saw everything that He had made, and,
behold, it was very good,” precludes the idea of such being then in existence.
Moreover, it is not possible rationally to conceive of a being higher than an
image and likeness of God save God Himself. There can be no relation closer
than that of an image and likeness to the original of which it is the copy save
identity, which it would be a misnomer to call relationship, and, in the case
under consideration, would involve the idea of a transfusion of the Deity—an idea
revolting to every Christian sentiment. In addition to this, where angels are
mentioned as having appeared to the patriarchs, and there is no record of such
an event prior to the time of Abraham, they are called “men.” The three who
visited Abraham, and the two who sojourned with Lot, are so called (Gen. xviii.
2 i xix. 10). So also the angel of the Lord that appeared to Manoah and his wife
(Judges xiii.). The angels that appeared at the Lord’s sepulchre, likewise, are so
�6o
EMERSON.
i.
The time was when our American consins were so completely our
imitators that it was only in the matter of Slaveholding and Con
stitution we could say they were distinct with a difference. Cooper
wrote novels after Scott; Washington Irving followed Goldsmith;
Bryant imitated the best things in Wordsworth and Byron; Prescott
walked upon the shadow of Robertson. In arts, science, and agricul
ture, it was the same : we made the Americans their tools, and
composed their manuals;—they were content to use them after our
fashion.
But this state of things had to cease. Territorial annexation
excited a spirit of innovation generally. Then first arose Emerson
with his Transcendentalism; a clock remarkable for its inexactitude
and its whirr in striking followed ; the Poughkeepsie Seer next dawned
upon the indefinable side of the Western horizon; finally, Walt Whit
man made his appearance. The clock has been replaced by a more
reliable chronometer; the Harmonial Philosopher has been overshot
by innumerable experts, mediumistic, thaumaturgic and clairvoyant;
Whitman’s song has been left to die away uncared for beneath the
overwhelming chorus of healthier and less inartistic singers; but
Emerson still remains unaffected by the Zeit-Geist.
In joyous
styled (Mark xvi. 5 ; Luke xxiv. 4 ; compare also John xx. 12), whilst the angel
attendant on John, whose glory was so transcendent that John would have fallen
before him in worship, declared that he was his fellow servant, of the apostles, and
of his brethren the prophets, and of them that kept the sayings of that book
(Rev. xxii. 9). As to the devil ever having been an angel of light, it is directly
contradicted by the declaration of our Lord, that “he was a murderer from the
beginning. ” From the direct testimony of Scripture, and from every rational con
sideration, the conclusion that both angels and internals are from the human
race appears inevitable. The portion of the Second Epistle of Peter, and of that
of Jude, where they speak of the angels who left their first estate, are often
quoted. But, surrounded as they admittedly are with the greatest obscurity, and
their meaning being a matter of conjecture, to urge them in opposition to the
clearly expressed statements on the other side, would be an inversion of all
legitimate reasoning. Similar remarks are applicable to the other texts usually
believed to favour the popular doctrine, as the poetical reference in Job to the
morning stars, and the sons of Gfod singing together at the laying of the corner
stone of the earth, the falling of Lucifer in Isaiah, etc. ; so far as their sense can be
intelligibly gathered, they are entirely irrelevant to the matter in point. On
this subject, however, the reader is referred to Noble’s Appeal.
�Emerson.
6i
severity, dreamy smartness, sagacious mother-wit, and subtle thought,
ha has steadily held his own amongst our Transatlantic brethren
during over forty years of literary activity, and still remains the most
American of Americans;—an incessant protestor against social stag
nation, servility, covetousness, heartlessness, and that conventional
superficiality which—in the domain of thought—brings us everywhere
face to face with mere s^m-dilettantes “peeping into microscopes
and turning rhymes, as a boy whistles to keep his courage up
“men who grind and grind in the mill of a truism, and nothing comes
■out but what was put in.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson was born at Boston in the year 1803,
and in early manhood—after graduating at Harvard—was ordained
an Unitarian minister.
An objection to the Sacramental Rite sub
sequently arose in his mind, and gradually widened into difficulties
ending only with the resignation of his pastorate. He then betook
himself to farming at Concord, near the spot where the first soldier
fell at the beginning of the War of Independence. There he has
spent most of his time since—his winter lecturing in Boston excepted.
Erom 1836 until now public attention has been attracted to him at
intervals either by a new course of lectures or by a new book.
“Nature,” “Essays and Orations,” “Representative Men,” “Poems,”
“The Conduct of Life,” “Society and Solitude,” “English Traits,”—
such are his principal literary works. He has also written largely in
the North American Review. Of his works not literary, it may be
briefly stated that Moncure Conway credits him with having so
Completely unsettled the minds of numbers of American thinkers some
years ago, that the Brook Farm Community, and certain other forms
of Harmonism, sprang out of the agitation j1 while J. R. Lowell—
speaking of the late War of Emancipation—says that “to Emerson
more than to all other causes together, did the young martyrs of our
civil war owe the sustaining strength of thoughtful heroism that is so
touching in every record of their lives.”2 What have been the prin
cipal causes of this success ? Is this success overrated ?
When Emerson—speaking of Goethe’s extraordinary knowledge of
human nature—said that this man seemed to see through every pore
of his skin, he used a remark equally applicable to himself. In this
lies the chief secret of his popularity. Another reason of his success
fe, that finding his countrymen were sinking their individuality before
1 In introduction to Passages from Nath. Hawthorne’s Note-Books, p. ii.
2 Vide My Study Windows, p. 280.
�Ó2
Emerson.
the demands of business, creedism and fashion, he had the courage
and tact to shame them into the admission of the fact. He showed
them they were the slaves of an idea that could but degrade. There
was a smooth mediocrity, a squalid contentment, that unmanned men.
How mean—he would say—to go blazing a gaudy butterfly in fashion
able or political saloons, the fool of society, the fool of notoriety, a
topic for newspapers, a piece of the street, and forfeiting the real
prerogative of the russet coat, the privacy and the true warm heart of
the citizen!
11 The babe by its mother lies bathed in joy ;
Glides its hours uncounted, the sun is its toy—
Shines the peace of all being, without cloud, in its eyes,
And the sum of the world in soft miniature lies,
But man crouches and blushes ; absconds and conceals ;
He creepeth and peepeth, he palters and steals.
Infirm, melancholy, jealous, glancing around,
An oaf, an accomplice, he poisons the ground.”
«
The world is his who can see through its pretension, he would say;—
why be timid and apologetic and no longer upright? Why dwarf
thyself beneath some great decorum, some fetish of a government,
some ephemeral trade, or war, or man ?
Addressing the leaders of thought, he showed them how com
pletely they had failed to meet the reasonable expectations of man
kind.
“Men looked when all feudal straps and bandages were
snapped asunder, that nature-—too long the mother of dwarfs—
should reimburse itself by a brood of Titans, who should laugh and
leap in the continent, and run up the mountains of the West with
the errand of genius and love : instead of this you are at best but
timid, imitative, tame —in painting, sculpture, poetry, fiction,
eloquence, there is grace without grandeur, and even that is not new,
but derivative. The great man makes the great thing. They are the
kings of the world who give the colour of the present thought to all
nature and all art, and persuade men by the cheerful serenity of
their carrying the matter, that this thing which they do is the apple
which the ages have desired to pluck, now at last ripe, and inviting
nations to the harvest.”
Young America won inspiration from his words, and lent itself
willingly to his teaching. His method was a sort of galvanic one,
and produced a like result. Little new was introduced into the
system,—the individual was led to feel himself. Stay at home in
thy own soul, Emerson would say,—are not Greece, Palestine, Italy,
�Emerson.
63
and ttte islands there in as far as the genius and active principle of
each and all is concerned? In silence, in steadiness, in severe
abstraction, hold by thyself. Add observation to observation. Be
patient of neglect, patient of reproach, and bide the fitting time 5
thou shalt see truly at last. The day is always his who works in it
with, serenity and great aims. As the world was plastic fluid in the
hands of God, so it is ever to so much of His attributes as we bring to
it: to ignorance it is flint.
Place not thy faith upon externals. The
sources of nature are in thy own mind if the sentiment of duty he
there. All thy strength, courage, hope, comes from within. Man is
spirit, and not a mere fleshly appetency. “ Every spirit builds itself
,a house; and beyond its house a world; and beyond its world a
heaven. What we are that only can we see. All that Adam had,
all that Caesar could, you have, 0 countrymen, and can do. Adam
called his house heaven and earth; Caesar called his house Rome ;
you perhaps call yours a cobbler’s trade, a hundred acres of ploughed
land, or a scholar’s garret. Yet line for line and point for point,
your dominion is as great as theirs, though without their fine names.
Build therefore your own world ! ” But build wisely. Trust your
intuitions rather than custom, conventionality and the rule of the
mart. They pass ; God is ; so is your personality and yours. Trust
God with this and knowledge is yours; for “ the heart which aban
dons itself to the Supreme Mind finds itself related to all its works,
and will travel a royal road to particular knowledges and powers. In
ascending to this primary and aboriginal sentiment we have come from
our remote station on the circumference instantaneously to the centre
of the world, where—as in the closet of God—-we see causes and
anticipate the universe which is but a slow effect.”
This was news for Young America, already made conscious that
“the ways of trade were grown selfish to the borders of theft, and
supple to the borders of fraud.” Not without a need came the
warning voice—
“What boots thy zeal,
0 glowing friend,
That would indignant rend
The northland from the south ?
Wherefore ! to what good end ?
Boston Bay and Bunker Hill
Would serve things still!
Things are of the snake.
The horseman serves the horse,
�64
Emerson.
' The neatherd serves the neat,
The merchant serves the purse,
The eater serves his meat.
’Tis the day of the chattel,
Web to weave and corn to grind ;
Things are in the saddle
And ride mankind.”
By Essays on Friendship, Prudence, Worship, Love, and other
subjects, Emerson sought to spiritualize man’s thoughts once more.
What a discovery these Essays must have proved to some only
half-enslaved traditionalist! There is that on “ Love,” for instance :
to learn that the “ foolish passion,” as one eminent divine called Love,
did really not only establish marriage, unite man to his race and
pledge him to domestic and civic relations, but did also carry him
with new sympathy into nature, did enhance the power of the senses,
did open the imagination, add to his character heroic and sacred attri
butes, and finally did secure to the true mind a personal conviction
that the purification of the intellect and heart from year to year is
the real marriage, foreseen and prepared from the first, and wholly
above their consciousness ! To think that all mankind love a lover ;
that love is a celestial rapture falling out of heaven to inheaven
humanity,—the remembrance of its visions outlasting all other
remembrances and remaining a wreath of flowers on the oldest brows!
“No man ever forgot the visitations of that power to his heart and
brain which created all things new; which was the dawn in him
of music, poetry and art; which made the face of nature radiant
with purple light, the morning and night varied enchantments; when
a single tone of one voice could make the heart bound, and the
most trivial circumstance associated with one form is put in the amber
of memory; when he became all eye when one was present, and all
memory when one was gone; when no place was too solitary and
none too silent for him who has richer company and sweeter conver
sation in his new thoughts than any old friends, though best and
purest, can give him;—for the figures, the motions, the words of
the beloved object are not like other images, written in water, but as
Plutarch says ‘ enamelled in fire.’ ”
And then the satisfaction some young Caleb would experience in
being told what he had previously learnt but could not shape into
words j—namely, that beauty is the flowering of virtue and that we
cannot approach it. “ Its nature is like opaline doves’-neck lustres,
hovering and evanescent. Herein it resembles the most excellent
�Emerson.
65
things, which all have this rainbow • character, defying all attempts
at appropriation and usethat like the statue it is then beautiful
when it begins to be incomprehensible,—when it is passing out of
criticism,—that it is not you, but your radiance one loves!
One will search far to find a more exquisite and manly piece of
thought than where Emerson in this Essay tells how, by conversa
tion with that which is in itself excellent, magnanimous, lovely and
just, the lover comes to a warmer love of these nobilities and a
Quicker apprehension of them. “ Then he passes from loving them
in one to loving them in all, and so is the one beautiful soul only the
door through which he enters to the society of all true and pure souls.
In the particular society of his mate he attains a clearer sight of
any spot, any taint, which her beauty has contracted from this
World, and is able to point it out, and this with mutual joy that
they are now able, without offence, to indicate blemishes and
hindrances in each other, and give to each all help and comfort in
curing the same. And, beholding in many souls the traits of the
divine beauty, and separating in each soul that which is divine
from the taint which it has contracted in the world, the lover ascends
to the highest beauty, to the love and knowledge of the Divinity, by
Steps in this ladder of created souls.” No wonder, if, after realisinosuch perceptions as these, Emerson persistently declaimed against that
“ subterranean prudence” which only too generally presides at
marriages “ with words that take hold of the upper world, whilst one
eye is prowling in the cellar, so that its gravest discourse has a
Savour of hams and powdering tubs.” Such thoughts as these are of
no mere ephemeral character.
But it is by his Transcendentalism, or Idealistic Philosophy, that
the character of this man’s mind is best discerned. Setting out
with the conviction that we must so far trust the perfection of the
creation as to believe that whatever curiosity the .'order of things
has awakened in our mind the order of things can satisfy, Emerson
shows that, philosophically considered, the universe is composed of
Nature and the Soul,—Nature being the Not-Me. Sensual objects
Conform to the premonitions of Reason and reflect the conscience;
thus every natural process is a version of a moral sentence. Nature
consequently exists for Uses ;—for Commodity, or the advantages of
sense ; Beauty, or eesthetical satisfactions ; Language, or the expres
sion of thought; and Discipline, or the education of the Understanding
and Reason. A proper appreciation of these excellences would
�66
Emerson.
lead us to see all things as continually hastening back to Unity. Our
globe as seen by God is a transparent law, not a mass of facts. We
may not implicitly believe our senses.
Nature conspires with spirit
to emancipate us.
The materialist respects sensible masses j the
idealist has another measure,—the Rank which things themselves take
in his consciousness. Mind is the only reality; of this men and all
other natures are better or worse reflectors. Matter does not exist :
Nature is an appendix of the Soul. Not that the sensuous fact is
denied, but that this is looked upon as a sequel or completion of a
spiritual fact. This manner of looking at things transfers every
object in nature from an independent and anomalous position
without into the consciousness.
All that you call the world__he
told his disciples—is the shadow of that substance which you are__
the perpetual creation of the powers of thought. The mould is
invisible, but the world betrays the shape of the mould. Seen in the
light of thought, the world always is phenomenal; and virtue
subordinates it to the mind. Idealism sees the world in God.
“If a man is at heart just, then in so far he is God ; the safety
of God, the immortality of God, the majesty of God, do enter
into that man with justice,” from which words one understands how
possible it is that a man should raise his hat to—himself, <£ Transcen
dentalism,” says Emerson 11 is the Saturnalia or excess of faith.”
Such Idealism, we further learn, beholds the whole circle of persons
and things, of actions and events, of country and religion, not as
painfully accumulated, atom after atom, act after act, in an aged
creeping Past; hut as one vast picture which God paints on the
instant eternity, for the contemplation of the soul.
“ The great Pan
of old, who was clothed in a leopard skin to signify the beautiful
variety of things, and the firmament his coat of stars,—was but a
representative of thee, 0 rich and various man ! thou palace of sight
and sound, carrying in thy senses the morning and the night and the
unfathomable galaxy; in thy brain the geometry of the City of God ;
in thy heart the bower of love and the realms of right and wrong.”
From these facts Emerson would lead us to see that the universal
essence—which is not wisdom, or love, or beauty, 'or power, but all
in one and each entirely—is that for which all things exist, and that
by which they are.
Spirit creates.
Behind nature, throughout
nature, spirit is present. One and not compound; it does not act
upon us from without, that is, in space and time, but spiritually, or
through ourselves. In other words, the Supreme Being does not build
�Emerson.
67
tip nature around us, but puts it forth through us, as the life of
the tree puts forth new branches and leaves through the pores of the
oli As a plant upon the earth, so a man rests upon the bosom of
God; he is nourished by unfailing fountains, and draws at his need
inexhaustible power.
In all this Emerson refuses to recognize the doctrine of Discrete
Degrees, and, as a consequence, he is committed—like Professor
Tyndall—to that confusion of thought which accepts life in its activity
in nature, as Life Itself in God.
He interprets its law of action
there, as if this life in such action were the Primal Law-Maker.
He takes the stream, of influences for the source and calls it God.
K The world, ” he says, “ proceeds from the same spirit as the body of
man. It is a remoter and inferior incarnation of God,—a projection
of God into the unconscious.” The Transcendentalist thus has no
difficulty in believing in one kind of miracle,—the perpetual
Openness of the human mind to new influx of light and power.
He has his Millenarianism too.
“ As far as you conform your life
to the pure idea in your mind,” says Emerson, “ that will unfold its
great proportions. A correspondent revolution in things will attend
the influx of the spirit. So fast will disagreeable appearances, swine,
spiders, snakes, pests, madhouses, prisons, enemies, vanish ; they are
temporary, and shall be no more seen. The sordor and filths of nature
tike sun shall dry up and the wind exhale. As, when the summer
comes from the south, the snow-banks melt and the face of the earth
becomes green before it, so shall the advancing spirit create its
ornaments along its path, and carry with it the beauty it visits and
the song which enchants it. It shall draw beautiful faces, warm
hearts, wise discourse and heroic acts around its way, until evil is
no more seen. The kingdom of man over nature, which cometh not
with observation—a dominion such as now is beyond his dream of
God—he shall enter without more wonder than the blind man feels
who is gradually restored to perfect sight.”
Erom thoughts like these numbers of young men won a sort of
rehabilitation for their intellect. They were without an ideal;
Emerson showed them one,—his own : a manhood scholarly, poetical,
individualistic, meditative, spontaneous. True, he was not always
understood, nor perhaps understandable : but this with youth is a
small matter if there be a truth-like shimmering splendour there. It
is said that certain of the auditory on one occasion were so stunned
with a flow of pretty incomprehensibilities from Emerson, that a
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Life Immediate and Mediate.
friend suggested that they should stand on their heads the remainder
of the lecture, and see if that course would lead to a better understand
ing of this new Franklin declaiming in Orphic phrase. Young
America listened, read, and believed it believed.
But Old America and the America of Middle Age ? These have not
remained with Emerson, for Emerson failed to satisfy their heart
wants ! That volume which begins with the command of the Eternal
Father, Let there be Light / and which closes with the proclamation
of an Everlasting Gospel and the revelation of an unending New
ITeaven and Earth, “ and there shall be no night there,” for “ the Lamb
is the Light thereof”—that volume was to Transcendentalism a sealed
book, for Emerson and his followers scorned to look to the Lord
Jesus, the only breaker of those seals. As the individual ripens away
from early manhood, and his experience of the depth of his inherent
corruptions becomes more vivid and intense, it is not Idealism will
assure him of a Divine Father who is “ a very present help in time
of trouble yet it is towards Him faith then looks for hearthold.
LIFE IMMEDIATE AND MEDIATE.
There is one only source of life, that is God. He is the sole vivifying,
animating, and sustaining cause of everything that lives. God in
Himself is substantial life, He being self-essent and self-existent.
Life from God, however, which is the life and support of every finite
existence, is not substantial, it is an active force. Were it substantial
it would be God from God, or God from Himself, which is an obvious
absurdity. If the proceeding life from God were substantial, then,
inasmuch as it exists only in what is finite, the Infinite would be
literally in the finite, which is an impossibility.
Of the Infinite
finite beings cannot by any means form an idea : after stretching the
thought to its utmost possible limit, nothing but what is finite is com
prehended, and all that can be said in respect to the Infinite is, that it
is not there, what is perceived is only finite, and therefore is no part
of the Infinite. The Infinite having no finite limit, it is not an object
of finite thought, it is consequently incomprehensible ; all we can know
respecting it is from revelation ; and it is there declared, that we may
believe and adore it as the origin of life, and the producer of all that
is good. It must ever be remembered that influx is a descent of life
from the spiritual to the natural world, or rather from God, through
the spiritual world to man; and also that there is no influx of sub
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69
stance. This is of the utmost importance, and must never be forgotten.
Substance does not flow from God, nor from one plane to another ; all
the degrees of the created universe are retained in their places, and in
their relative positions, never being removed, nor any part of them,
which would not be the case if influx were substantial. By that
retention of the various degrees of substance, both spiritual and natural
order is preserved throughout the whole, and all confusion is thereby
prevented.
Pure heat and light from the spiritual sun is what is meant by im
mediate life. Immediate life pervades all things, and it is the operation
of the immediate life in the disposal and arrangement of things which
is called the Divine Providence. It is the cause of all order, and pre
serves it both in the spiritual and in the natural worlds ; and it is pre
sent in all things as their indispensable sustainer. ' It is consequently
by immediate life that the distinction between the heavens is main
tained, by which the angels are formed into societies, or by which
classifications are effected—which is one of the greatest blessings of
Providence, and without which heaven would not be a place of
happiness. It is also by immediate life that representatives exist in
one heaven from another, and by which they correspond to each. It
is also the cause of days and nights and the seasons in this world.
Immediate life is also the cause of all the involuntary motions in man
in both soul and body ; by it the heart propels the blood, the lungs
respire, and all the other viscera perform their functions. It is like
wise by immediate life that diseases are removed, and the body is
restored to health, and by which man is strengthened and refreshed
during sleep. Immediate life is the very life of mediate life ; therefore
where there is mediate life there is also immediate, mediate life being
the immediate clothed, and without which clothing the influx of life
would be altogether imperceptible. Indeed, what is done by mediate
life is but little in comparison with what is done by immediate life.
(A. C. 7004.)
Immediate life is life unaffected by human or angelic mediums. It
is not only life as it proceeds from the spiritual sun, in which state it
is too intense to be received even by the highest angels ; but it is also
that life as it is mercifully accommodated to angelic reception by
divinely appointed accommodated mediums ; by these its intensity is
diminished and its ardency tempered. These mediums are spiritual
atmospheres. But these do not render it mediate ; it is still immediate
life notwithstanding its having passed through and been tempered by
these media.
Life as it flows from the spiritual sun is absolute, having no
specific form, no moral or human quality ; it is also undefinable and
F
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Life Immediate and Mediate.
indeterminate. It creates a form, vivifies it, and assumes a nature
therein; it also receives a quality in such forms as possess voluntary
power, and as mankind, and the life is thereby rendered mediate.
Life as a proceeding from God being absolute and undefined, no idea
of it can be formed but as heat and light proceeding from the sun,
which can scarcely be called an idea, inasmuch as heat and light apart
from substantial existences arc never made manifest.
When considering the different kinds of life, we are not to confound
the life which man lives with the life
which he lives. The life by
which man lives is immediate; but the life which he lives, whilst it
implies both immediate and mediate, is itself neither, but voluntary life.
It is a remarkable fact, that the life of man, or of any other living
thing, can be seen only in the existence of that thing; for this obvious
reason, it is neither more nor less than the thing itself living. The
life of man is the life which he lives, and not the vivifying force by
which he is animated; this latter is the same in all things. Man’s
voluntary life is that particular mode which life assumes, or which is
given to it by his free determination, which is in all cases peculiar to
the man himself; hence there are as many lives, or modes of life, as
there are men. When we think of the life of man, we are necessitated
to associate therewith the idea of the man himself. For example—
when we think of him speaking, his speaking is not anything apart
from himself as a subject; the same with regard to the act of walking,
for whether he be talking or walking there is nothing but himself as a
substantial form, both these being actions of the man, they are only
the man acting; and whether acting or not, he is nothing more than
himself as substantial form. It is the same with any particular organ
or limb as it is with the aggregate; the foot when walking, or the
hand when manipulating, is simply a foot or a hand; walking being
the foot acting, and manipulating being the hand acting, and nothing'
more; action adding nothing to either, but, as said, the action of any
thing is only the thing acting. It is likewise the same with the
sentient organs of the body and their sensations; each sensation
being nothing more than the organ’s own consciousness of some varia
tion which has been produced in itself. For instance, sight is not
anything apart from the eye, but it is simply the eye seeing, and
whether seeing or not seeing, it is neither more nor less than an eye.
This affirmation will, no doubt, be a paradox to those who have been
accustomed to think of the life of man as something which flows into
him, and also to those who believe that influx is substantial. But the
life which flows into man is not substantial, nor is it his life; his life
does not enter into him at all, but comes out of him only; it originates
in his will, and proceeds thence to the extremities of his body, where
�Life Immediate and Mediate.
71
it terminates in action. This life is simply the exercise of man’s in
ternal aij^l external capabilities, or those of his mind and body, and it
must be obvious that such exercise is only those capabilities in action ;
and what are capabilities in action more than the capabilities them
selves ? A capability is the power which is peculiar to an organ, and
which is inherent therein; it is grounded in its form, and is made to
exist by the presence and action of immediate life. There are in man
two kinds of organs, and although each possesses its own peculiar
capability, yet the process of life in each is different, yea, opposite,
from the other; one being from without to within, and the other
from within to without; the former is sensitive, the latter motive
the former commences in the organs of sensation, and terminates in
the memory; the latter commences in the will, and terminates in the
actions of the body. The former is involuntary, the latter is voluntary.
This latter process is what is meant by wm’s K/e; it is so because it
is from man’s will, commencing with his determinations, and is con
tinued through his nerves and muscles into external action. For what
is done by this process he is responsible. Now, the will and its
capability to determine are a one; we may think of the will existing
as a substantial form without the capability, but we cannot think of
the capability of determining existing apart from the will; because it
is only the will’s power to determine. When the will’s capability of
acting is brought into action, it is by the will’s own effort, and the de
termination is nothing more than the will determining its own power
to the production of some effort. As it is with any one organ so it is
with their aggregate, or with the whole man; therefore, as the action
of an organ is only the organ acting, so the action of a man is only the
man acting, and as the man is substantial so is his action; not action
alone, there being no such thing, but action in the sense of its being
a subject acting. This view of the life of man, or of man living, will
account for certain remarks made by Swedenborg, which, without this
understanding of action or living, must appear extraordinary and
anomalous, and which have proved to some of the students of his
writings most perplexing, viz., that affections, perceptions, and
thoughts, “are actually and really the subjects themselves which undergo
changes according to the influences which affect them ” (D. L. W. 42).
Notwithstanding all this, the influx of life is not substantial, but
it is the result of a proceeding living force from the source of life.
Some have actually concluded that the influx of life is substantial,
and, as a consequence, have arrived at the notion, that the life of each
individual is a spark struck off from the Divinity; that each one
possesses in himself literally what is divine; and that God has no
personality, but is infinitesimally divided amongst all His creatures, and
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Life Immediate and Mediate.
therefore that He is universally diffused. These, however, are mere
hallucinations, altogether apart from the truth; and the more they
are indulged in, the further will they lead the mind from an under
standing of the true nature of life.
Mediate life is life together with the mode it has assumed in living
subjects in the spiritual world; it proceeds from those subjects, and
is continued to others who are recipients, and by which they are
affected. It is not influx by reason of its flowing to man ; as it flows
to him it is only afflux, and it becomes influx only when it flows
him. The influx of which we are now treating is that which takes
place with man. Besides this there is a general influx which flows
from a superior to an inferior heaven, and from the spiritual into the
natural world, into homogeneous substances, and arranges them into
an agreement with itself, producing such things and states as corre
spond, and which are called correspondences.
Life becomes mediate only by virtue of flowing through conscious
living beings who possess quality, good or evil. Those mediums are
good and evil spirits in the spiritual world. In consequence of life
passing through such mediums, it is brought under the denomination
of “mediate life.” Hence mediate life always possesses a quality,
being good or evil in agreement with the quality of the spirits through
which it has passed. Life is therefore properly called mediate only
when it is in such a condition. But still the flow of mediate life to
man is not, strictly speaking, influx ■ that alone being influx which
flows into him. Mediate life when it flows to man is only afflux.
When man is first made conscious of its presence, it is only objective,
and can be inspected, approved, or disapproved, at discretion, accord
ing to the free determination of his will, and it is only when it is
approved and accepted that it becomes influx. Although this distinc
tion between afflux and influx is not commonly pointed out, it must
be evident to every thinking mind that such a distinction exists.
That such is the case will be clear from the fact that evil influence
comes to the good as well as to the wicked, and that good influence
comes to the wicked as well as to the good; but still such influence
does not give to either a quality, which it would do if it flowed into
them; it simply flows to them, and is thereby a/flux, and if it sub
sequently flow’s into them, it is by their own approval and reception,
when, and not before, it is //¿flux. Respecting the difference between
afflux and influx Swedenborg is silent; still he makes use of phrases
which imply both. In A. C. he frequently uses the words “flow
in into,” which can mean only afflux and influx; by flowing in
he means flowing to, or afflux; and by flowing into, influx. He
also speaks of God flowing into man, and of His being received or
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73
ejected; His flowing into also in this case means afflux, and His being
received, influx. The Scriptures are in some parts very explicit on
the difference between afflux and influx, anc? without naming the
Words, clearly point out the two fluxes, and also the difference between
them ; as for instance—“ Behold I stand at the door and knock; if any
man hear My voice and open the door,” etc. (Rev. iii. 20). The stand
ing at the door and knocking is evidently afflux, and His going in,
when the door is opened, is influx. Afflux only gives man an
opportunity to accept or reject, but influx yields a blessing.
Mediate life as it comes to man may be more properly styled
influence than influx. It may be called influence for a most obvious
reason; thus, when it flows to man it operates upon the forms in his
memory, and excites them, and arranges them into an agreement with
the state of the spirit or spirits whence the influence came, and that
arrangement is perceived by man in himself as the presence of such
spirits, whatever may be their qualities.
When influence comes from spirits to man, so far is it from giving
him a quality, that it may be made the means of his receiving an
opposite quality; for by evil influence his own evils are excited and
made to appear, which might otherwise have remained quiescent and
latent; and, when seen, they may be opposed and subdued; and so
far as that is done, he is elevated out of them, and is at the same time
brought into an opposite state of goodness.
Inasmuch as life does not become mediate by reason of flowing
through spirits, but by reason of what is assumed in them, it has been
a question as to whether the idea of mediate life ought not to be con
fined to that which is derived from the medium; that is, its quality,
good or evil, for take away its quality, and all sense of mediate life is
gone, nor would man be conscious of its presence; yet life is the
active principle, without which there could be neither influx nor
afflux. This being so, it would appear, that the word mediate life
involves the idea of an active principle to operate and assume, and
also the state which is assumed; and although there is a clear distinc
tion between the two, yet neither alone, but both together, constitute
mediate life.
We may here, without digression, introduce a correlative idea.
Previously to the development of man’s interior degrees by regenera
tion, he has communication only with spirits in the world of spirits
(H. H. 600), but afterwards with angels. But, notwithstanding this,
he is not sensible of his communication with spirits in the world of
spirits, nor can he be unless his spiritual senses be opened; his
evidence of such communication is affectional and mental: this is so
because his consciousness is on one plane and they are on another, or
<
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Life Immediate and Mediate.
he is in the natural world whilst they are in the spiritual ; they are
consequently inhabitants of different worlds. This being the case,
were it not for influx existing between the two worlds, and between
spirits and men, they could not communicate at all. Spirits do not
communicate with man from their voluntary principles, nor are they,
when in their normal states, conscious of such communication any
more than man is conscious of his communication with them (H. H.
249, 292). Why, it may be asked, cannot spirits in their normal
states consciously communicate with man in this world ? It is because
the two worlds which they inhabit are so different from each other as
to have nothing in common ; those who are in one cannot see, hear,
taste, smell, or feel anything that is in the other. Of this, so far as
man in this world is concerned, we have continual evidence, and as it
is with the inhabitants of one world, so it is with those of the other.
The communication which exists between the two worlds cannot be
sensibly perceived, but must be effected by an internal way. The
only ordinary communication is effected by influx, and such communi
cation is not felt. That communication is effected by the spheres of
spirits, which flow from them spontaneously, therefore without their
power of direction. Those spheres act upon all who are near to them,
and they are the means of associating or dissociating the inhabitants
of that world ; with those who are like-minded they effect conjunction,
but with those who are dissimilar as to state, they cause disjunction
and separation ; they are also the cause of distances in that world.
Spheres originate and terminate on the same plane—they never leave
the plane on which they originate ; they extend, but neither ascend
nor descend : and inasmuch as spirits and men exist upon distinct and
altogether different planes, the spheres of spirits cannot be made
manifest to man in this world.
The spheres of spirits do not affect men as they affect the spirits who
are on the same plane; spirits are.affected as to their bodies as well as
to their minds, because there are spheres from both their minds and
their bodies, and being on the same plane, they are affected as to both ;
but it is not so with men. The spheres of spirits affect the degrees in
others which are similar to those in the spirits themselves in whom
they originate, and from whom they proceed. There is a sphere from
each degree, internal as well as external ; the sphere from the spirit’s body
affects the bodies of other spirits, and they are sensibly perceived ; the
sphere from their understandings affect the understandings of others,
and the sphere from their wills affect the wills of others—not the
will as a capability, or the power of determination, but the will as a
substantial subject, the subject of the power to determine. But men
existing in a discrete degree below that of the spirits, their spheres
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75
cannot affect them ; communication must therefore be effected in
another way. That way is as follows. Although man, whilst he is ii.
this world, is conscious only in the world, still he has in his constitu
tion degrees which are of the substances of the spiritual world, and
although whilst he is in this world he has no consciousness in them,
still they may be affected by what is on their plane, and are so affected
by the spirit’s spheres ; which affection is carried down by descendi-ng
life to man’s conscious degrees where it becomes inwardly manifested.
That descending life, together with its assumed state, is what is called
influx. The spheres of spirits which affect man’s spirit originate in
their vital parts—their wills and understandings, which contain
their qualities as to good or evil, and proceeding thence carry with
them these qualities ; and inasmuch as the sphere affects that degree
of man’s spirit which is on the same plane as that of the spirit whence
the sphere proceeded, it is manifested as an affection of the mind,
good or evil according to the quality of the spirit whence it emanated.
This is the ordinary communication which exists between spirits and
men in this world ; it therefore follows, that spirits are not conscious of
such communication, much less are they conscious of the particular
individuals with whom they are held in connection.
However,
whether they possess such consciousness or not, and whatever be their
qualities, their spheres proceed to and act upon man’s spirit ; nor can
they prevent it, neither can man avoid feeling the effects thereof, for
he feels them from the same necessity that the body feels whatever acts
upon- its skin. But, notwithstanding the mind being necessitated to
perceive the effects of spirits’ spheres, both good and evil, yet he is
not necessitated to yield to either, but receives or rejects them as a
matter of free choice. That to which he gives preference, and receives
into his will and thought, from afflux becomes influx, and he becomes
one with it in quality, and is conjoined with the spirits in which it
originated. Yet, we must observe that man’s quality is not from those
spheres, nor from the spirits whence they proceed, but it is from his
own free choice of good or evil. This is the way in which the first
human quality, whether good or evil, originated; it is the way in which
both angels and devils have acquired theirs, and in no other way could
human quality of any kind have been acquired. If man had originally
waited for evil influences from others, or from any extraneous source,
in order that he might procure for himself a quality, it is clear, that
he would never have procured one, because there then were no such
influences. Human quality originates only in man, each man origi
nating his own, just as the first evil was originated, whatever may be
the circumstances by which he is environed. We conclude that life
is a living force, and that it exists in two conditions ; firstly, as a pro-
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The Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes.
ceeding of spiritual heat and light from the sun of heaven; that this
passes through spiritual atmospheres, as accommodating mediums, by
■which it is tempered and made receptive by the highest and most per
fect human beings, viz., the celestial angels. That proceeding, even
when accommodated by those divinely appointed mediums, is imme
diate life. .That same proceeding, by entering into angels and spirits,
and also devils, assumes their qualities, and thereby becomes mediate
life. The proceeding life does not become mediate life by passing
through the accommodating mediums, but by passing through living,
voluntary mediums, which contain angelic or infernal qualities, which
are spirits in the spiritual world ; it therefore comes to man as good
or evil influence. There is always this distinction between immediate
and mediate life, the former enters man without his consent or his
consciousness, and without his power of interference; but of the latter
he is conscious, and he can interfere with it, and does so interfere,
it not being able to enter into him without his consent and reception.
By immediate life man is endued with capabilities, and by mediate
life he is furnished with objects on which these capabilities can be
exercised, by which under the influence of his free-will he forms
in himself a state which, in the future life, becomes the ground of
his everlasting happiness or misery.
S. S.
THE MIRACLE OF MULTIPLYING THE LOAVES
AND FISHES.
Addressed
to the
Sick and Aged
Matt.
in a
Union Workhouse.
xv. 32-39.
Our attention was drawn on a previous occasion to our Lord’s cure of
the lame, the blind, the dumb and the maimed, of which the account is
given in the preceding verses. By such wonderful cures the Lord
Jesus Christ proved to those who were willing to be convinced that
He was God as wrell as man. But so condescending was He to our
fallen and unbelieving state, that though the miracle of performing
such cures was enough to convince any teachable spirit that the Lord
was God, He yet added another equally wonderful proof of the truth
of St. John’s declaration, that “without Him was not anything made
that was made,” by showing that He could multiply food also, so that
seven loaves and a few little fishes fed four thousand men, besides
women and children. When we think how few could get a meal off
the same quantity of food when distributed by human hands, we see
that it was only One who could create food that could have fed so great
a multitude. When we were talking about the cure of those who
were sick of various diseases, you may remember that I told you, that
one lesson which we had to learn from it was, that we were to go to
Jesus Christ for the cure not only of our bodily ailments, but of what
is far more to be dreaded, the sickness of our souls. And the miracle
of feeding so many has a lesson for us too. Jesus says, “ Man shall not
�Modem Science and Revelation.
77
live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the
mouth of God.” He says also, “ If any man thirst, let him come unto
Me and drink.” When we are sick we do not feel much appetite, but
a« our health returns our desire for food comes back; and so it is with
out souls. So long as we do not wish to live according to our Lord’s
commandments, we do not desire to be taught what we ought to do,
we have no appetite for the bread which cometh down from Heaven,
and will not drink of the “ Water of Life.” But when we have truly
come to Him, asking Him to take away our sins, and to give us a
“new heart and a right spirit,” then we desire to be all that He would
have us to be, and are constantly thinking, when any difficulty arises,
“I wonder what I ought to do?” Under the influence of such
thoughts we go to God in prayer, to ask Him to teach us, and we read
God’s Holy Word that we may learn His will. Then He sends His
Holy Spirit, to show us what our duty is, and so we are fed by Him.
It may be only a few words, or a short verse, but it is enough to feed
the soul. It is like a grain of mustard seed, which springeth up into a
great tree, or ‘‘'like a little leaven, that leavens the whole lump.” For,
suppose we feel angry with any one who has done us harm and desire
to revenge ourselves, we open the Bible, and see, “ Forgive your
enemies,” “ do good to them that hate you.” “ Render not evil for
evil,” or “ railing for railing.” Then we begin to hesitate, and perhaps
another text comes to our help, “ For if ye forgive not men their
trespasses, neither shall your Father in Heaven forgive you your
trespasses.” What a dreadful thought that is ! If we are not forgiven
then we cannot go to Heaven, and if we do not go there, there is only
other place. Oh, awful thought! Shall we sacrifice the hope of
eternal happiness for the sake of saying a few angry words, or doing
an unkind thing, which will give neither us nor our fellow-creatures
any real pleasure ? Then perhaps we remember having heard at church,
or read for ourselves, “ Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain
mercy.” There is something in that word “Blessed” that seems so
attractive ! It is not only that we shall be forgiven, but we shall be
made happy into the bargain. Well, we think, it is only a little sacrifice
that I am required to make, and the gain is more than eternity can
tell, so I will pray to God to help me to forgive this time. Ah, now
we taste heavenly food, good affections flow into our hearts from the
Lord, and wTe not only feel the blessedness of “ the merciful,” but the
blessedness of “ the meek,” and of “ the poor in spirit; ” and so you see
how heavenly food is multiplied. Well may we pray, “ Lord, ever
more give us this Bread.”
M. S. B.
MODERN SCIENCE AND REVELATION.
The faculty of observation and the desire of knowing are the two im
portant principles which impart to the mind its progressive tendency.
Glancing back into the remote ages of the past, we can conceive
primaeval man calling these powers into exercise in recording his
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Modern Science and Revelation.
conceptions of the world and its phenomena. His notions of things
would be at first crude and wanting in accuracy. He would perceive
that the day was divided between light and darkness, and this he
would observe to be caused by the sun. Tracing that luminary from
its rising to its time of setting, and noting that the same phenomenon
was repeated from day to day, he would conclude that the sun moves
in an orbit around the earth. Also observing the position of the
fixed stars, he would infer from their apparent movement in the
direction of the sun that the whole sidereal heavens revolves around
the earth. Then following the bent of his inherent desire to know,
he would extend his investigation to the planets and their movements.
Successive observations of the phenomena of nature in her several de
partments would bring to his mind a considerable increment of facts.
The classification and arrangements of these facts under various heads
would form the first crude indications of the natural sciences. Suc
ceeding generations of thinkers, while making use of the records of
men who had gone before, and taking them as the basis of ex
tended observations, would, although perpetuating some of the errors
of previous observers, discern and correct many of their faults. Thus
the sciences are the recorded experiences of thinking minds in
dealing with nature. In their infancy the sciences are necessarily the
repositories of much that is erroneous and fallacious. The conceptions
of the Chaldeean astronomers cannot be compared with the discoveries
of a Herschel or a Newton. The anatomical deductions of Hippocrates
are extremely crude when placed side by side with the learned dis
quisitions of a Carpenter or a Huxley. Ideas which at one period
seemed to bear the impress of truth are shown to be more or less un
sound by thinkers of later times.
Subsequently to the investigations of Copernicus the world was
considered as a plane, and the stars were conceived to be fixed in the
revolving vault of the heavens. But that philosopher, about 1500 a.d.,
satisfied himself that the planets, including the earth, revolve around
the sun. In 1610 this hypothesis was confirmed by Galileo by the
aid of his newly invented telescope. This was the beginning of a new
era in the science of astronomy. But it was also the signal for the
commencement of a conflict between speculative minds and the digni
taries of the Romish Church. Galileo proved to a demonstration that
the earth revolves around the sun, and that the sun has no orbital
movement. Theologians, because of certain expressions in the Bible
implying the contrary, discredited this discovery, and maintained that
it had no foundation in fact. But the march of thought was irre
sistible, and the Church was powerless to arrest its onward progress.
Theologians could not then conceive, nor are they willing to accept the
conclusion to-day, that the Bible deals exclusively with man’s spiritual
nature, and does not lay down canons and laws of natural science. In
stead of receiving the Bible and the laws of nature as each pointing
upward to a Divine Author, instead of perceiving that there is no con
tradiction between the revealed Word and the truths of creation, because
each has a distinct mission to fulfil, they opposed the apparent truths of
�Modern Science and Revelation.
79
the Word to the rigid demonstrations of science. A similar conflict was
engendered in recent times when geology first threw light upon the
history of life upon the globe. That science made rapid strides. De
posited in the various strata which form the earth’s crust were dis
covered fossil remains of forms of life which have long since
become extinct. Numerous races of creatures it was seen had lived
and died. Low forms of life had been succeeded by higher and more
complicated organisms. Gigantic creatures had formed their homes on
the land and in the ocean, whose skeletons, preserved in the strata of
the earth’s crust, enable the geologist to read in the pages of the Stone
Book the history of periods long anterior to the existence of man;
while fossilized remains of vegetable life indicate that vast areas of
the earth’s surface were once covered by plants which attained to
enormous proportions, which, subsequently disappearing, formed our
coal-beds that lie far below the surface of the globe.
Thus investiga
tions and discoveries which geologists have made lead them to the
conclusion that the earth and its life-forms have arrived at their present
condition through countless ages. And the facts of astronomy also
prove that the vast cycles of time during which the universe has been in
existence surpass human powers of comprehension.
But how have these deductions been met by theologians ? Instead
of giving up the position of a literal interpretation of the early
chapters of Genesis as untenable, they have endeavoured to harmonize
the records of science with the higher truths of revelation by methods
that have excited derision and contempt. Before geology gained a
firm footing amongst thinking minds, it was generally believed that the
universe had existed only 6000 years, and that its creation had occupied
but six days. When it was rigidly shown that creation was an orderly
development embracing myriads of ages, some other mode of explain
ing the narrative in Genesis was looked for, and at length those who
professed to believe in a close literal conception of the word so far de
parted from their position as to call the days of creation not days, but
ages—unfortunately, however, the Sabbath is mentioned as the seventh
day, and therefore by that supposition the first Sabbath was not a period
of twenty-four hours, but an age. Again, a difficulty was found in the
Scripture narrative that light was created before the sun. It has been
suggested that the difficulty may be overcome by supposing a subtle
luminous vapour to have pervaded all space prior to the creation of the
greater luminary of heaven. Such an hypothesis is altogether un
tenable in the face of the fact that the sun is the sole source of light
to its planets.
But in thus endeavouring to reconcile the Bible
narrative with the facts of science, theologians have placed a con
struction upon the account in Genesis for which there is no justifica
tion ; for if it is to be taken literally, its letter ought not to be
departed from, nor must it be subjected to the gratuitous interpreta
tion of every capricious mind. The facts of science have suffered
nothing in this conflict of opinions; but the Bible, by the bigoted
zeal of its professed expositors, has been brought into contempt.
But the reasonable aspect of the question is one which should not
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Modern Science and Revelation.
"be rejected without consideration. The facts of science are discover
able by man’s powers of observation and reason. The book of nature
is intimately connected with his mortal part; as such he may read and
study it, and discover in its pages unmistakeable indications of the
Divine author. But the Bible relates to his immortal part, and he
may, if he will, discover in it those spiritual laws and truths which
can reach us by revelation alone. Nature is the effect of God’s creative
power, the Bible is the expression of His infinite wisdom. The laws
of nature and the revelations of the Word having the same Divine
source, there can be no contradiction between them. When therefore
theologians are met by facts which invalidate a literal interpretation
of a certain portion of the Word, they should be prepared to look for
the deeper and purer sense of its spirit. Dr. Whewell says, “ The
meaning which any generation puts upon the phases of Scripture
depends more than is at first sight supposed upon the philosophy of
the time. Hence, when men imagine that they are contending for
revelation they are in fact contending for their own interpretation of
revelation, unconsciously adapted to what they believe to be rationally
probable. And the new interpretation which the new philosophy
requires, and which appears to the older school to be a fatal violence
done to the authority of religion, is accepted by their successors without
the dangerous results which were apprehended. At the present day
we can hardly conceive how reasonable men should have imagined
that religious reflections on the stability of the earth, and the beauty
and use of the luminaries which revolve around it, would be interfered
with by its being seen that this rest and motion are apparent only.
Those who adhere tenaciously to the traditionary or arbitrary mode
of understanding Scriptural expressions of physical events are always
strongly condemned by succeeding generations, and are looked upon
with pity by the more serious and considerate, who know how weak
and vain is the attempt to get rid of the difficulty by merely
denouncing the new tenets as inconsistent with religious belief.”1
Truly so. The Bible is the word of the Highest; and not in its
letter, but in its spirit must we seek for evidences of its divinity and
its power. And in the first chapter of Genesis, beneath the un
scientific form of the letter, we trace the development of the spiritual
side of our nature from the commencement of the re-creative work of
regeneration until we attain the beauty and perfection of the heavenly
state. The Bible is the Word of God, and He has told us that His
words “are spirit and life.” Let us then receive His revelation in
this sense, and while we search for its spirit, grow strong by its life
giving power.
In the learned disquisition recently given to the world by a pro
found philosopher this sentence appears :—“ Abandoning all disguise,
the confession that I feel bound to make before you is, that I pro
long the vision backward across the boundary of the experimental
evidence, and discern in that matter, which we in our ignorance, and
notwithstanding our professed reverence for its Creator, have hitherto
1 Indications of the Creator, p. 52, 2d ed.
�Modern Science and Revelation.
81
covered with opprobrium, the promise and potency of every form and
quality of life.”1 Does this conception land us in materialism? We
think not. It is the statement of a belief which may be true or false.
It contains no direct denial of a Creator, and as an hypothesis is ex
ceedingly plausible. The transcendentalism of Kant annihilated matter
and established a universe of ideas in the place of creation. But if,
With Tyndall, we view matter as the repository of power, which gives
v the promise of every form and quality of life,” we have but “ to pro
long our vision backward ” beyond the region of matter to see in the
Divine the source of that power, by virtue of which matter is enabled
to give the “ promise of every form and quality of life.”
It is a generally received hypothesis that matter is formed of atoms.
On the assumption of the truth of this theory it has been said that
“ they are the manufactured articles which, formed by the skill
of the Highest, produce by subsequent interaction all the pheno
mena of the natural world.” Dalton first established the atomic
hypothesis in reference to chemical combinations. It is found that
in a given compound the elements combine in a certain definite
and invariable ratio. Take water as an example. It can be shown
by experiment that two volumes of hydrogen always combine with
one volume of oxygen. Assuming the existence of atoms, it is evident
that two atoms of the hydrogen element combine with one atom
of the oxygen element. That atoms by combining in various pro
portions form compounds differing from each other is plainly shown
in the well-known nitrogen series. Whatever we touch or see in the
three kingdoms of nature bears testimony to the fact that “ atoms by
their interaction produce all the phenomena of nature.” But now the
question arises : Do atoms contribute to these results by any inherent
power of their own, independently of the Creator? Every natural
phenomenon, we are told, rests on a cause, but atoms by their “ inter
action produce natural phenomena;” are atoms then the primary cause of
their own effects? Atoms, we say, form by their interaction the
endless variety of compounds and substances in nature under the rule
of certain laws, from which it should seem they have no power to
■deviate. And it may be urged that new variations from established
forms are continually being produced both in the animal, vegetable,
and mineral kingdoms. But evidently atoms produce these effects
in obedience to certain conditions, or else if by their own free choice,
why were not these results forthcoming earlier? When a plant
Strikes out into varieties it does so by the operation of agencies
external to itself—a change in the conditions of soil or climate, or
the forced impregnation of its ovaries by the pollen of another plant.
A seed is placed in the ground, it germinates, develops, and assumes
the exquisite symmetry and beauty of the lily. Atoms have here been
built up, and have by their interaction produced leaves and flowers.
But before this building operation could proceed, certain external
conditions were necessary. A force exterior to the special atoms which
formed the lily came into play. That force is heat. Heat produces
1 Professor Tyndall’s Address in Nature.
�Modern Science and Revelation.
motion, and motion causes interaction of atoms. Suppose the seed
hermetically sealed in a glass tube, and, in absence of the necessary
conditions of soil and moisture, and of the main condition heat, and
no life movement would be observed. Given then soil, moisture, and
light, still in the absence of heat a seed fails' to germinate. Again,
admitting for a moment that all life-forms originated in a monad,
throw back your gaze into the bygone ages, and note that protoplasmic
substance—that combination of atoms lying on the solitary shore of
the unpeopled world, where no sound arises but the surging of the
waves upon the bare and solid granite, and the sweep of the wind
across the desert of the world, yet lifeless as the tomb. This monad
develops into a symmetrical form—it moves—there is the first trace
of life—there is the first species—the progenitor of all future existences.
But why did not that monad remain motionless as the rock upon
which it lay? Undoubtedly its movement was produced by the
agency of heat and light, forces external to itself. Here heat was
evidently a necessary condition. Now the grand source of heat is the
sun ; if the heat of that body could be withheld—all other conditions
remaining the same—we are justified in supposing that all life would
cease, consequently that all “interaction of atoms” would be suspended.
But the sun is composed of atoms. And it is maintained that heat is
an effect of motion. If, as we have endeavoured to show, no inter
action of special atoms can take place but by the agency of forces
exterior to them, so cannot motion be maintained as a condition of
heat in the atoms of the sun apart from external power or force.
Here we reach the barrier which the physicist cannot pass. Are we
to hesitate here? We think not. We conceive that we must transfer
ourselves to a region of causes beyond the domain of experiment.
Here we are aware the philosopher will be unwilling to follow. Still
we cannot lose sight of the fact that the interaction of atoms—and the
whole universe is the result of that interaction—is an effect, the cause
of which cannot be sought in the atoms themselves. We therefore
affirm that this cause is the power of the Divine operating through the
medium of a world which we call spiritual. Truly the nature of this
world cannot be demonstrated by experiment, but the evidences of revela
tion are powerful upon the characteristics of this spiritual region. The
Bible is that revelation. The proof of its being a revealed book is found
in the soundness of the chain of spiritual meaning which runs through
its letter. This spiritual sense shows, to a demonstration that the
letter of the Word has been framed according to a law as rigid and
plausible as the law of multiple proportions or the “interaction of
atoms.” Where then science ends we maintain that revelation steps
in to fill up the void, to conduct us into the world of primary causes
and to usher us into the presence of the Creator.
Another question which has occupied the minds of scientific men in
recent times, is the origin and development of life upon the globe.
And in the pursuit of this subject some of the finest minds have been
engaged. Theologians conclude that the positions which have been
taken up by our great scientific thinkers upon this question, militate
�Modern Science and Revelation.
83
against the teaching of the Word and the immortality of the soul.
We have shown that the literal interpretation of the first chapter of
Genesis is an unwarrantable assumption. However, therefore, life may
have originated upon the world, or what was the nature of man’s
beginning, can in no way affect the Biblical account of the origin of life,
seeing that it is an allegory investing spiritual truth of the highest
character. Now life originated upon the world in some mode; if
there is life on the planets, and we believe there is, it must have
originated on them in a similar mode. There may have been a
“ primordial substance ” as the first life germ—we cannot say; and
wre may deduce the origin of life from many forms or one form, yet
still the “ question will be inevitably asked,” as a learned professor has
said, “ How came that form there ? ” Thus again we are carried past
the “interaction of atoms,” and either landed in impenetrable mystery
or placed at the feet of the Divine.
That there has been a successive development in animal and vege
table forms, from lower to higher, is clearly established by the facts of
geology. This development has mainly been the result of external
conditions. Whether, in the case of the animal kingdom, this develop
ment proceeded in an increasing ratio from lower to higher, until a form
fittingly organized to be the seat of reason and the soul was produced,
we perhaps shall never be able to ascertain. It seems plain almost to
demonstration that there is a discrete degree between man and animals.
There are certainly low types of the human race which seem to be
closely allied with the ape tribe. An ape, however, has never yet in
the memory .of man, by any species of progress, or by the most happy
combination of circumstances, assumed the form and capabilities of the
very lowest specimen of the human family. In the case of the human
race, civilization has caused a continuous upward movement. The vast
hordes of barbarians that at one period roamed through the forests of
Europe have been supplanted by races of a more refined type of mind.
The brain of the Papuan, we are told, is not nearly so large as the brain
of a European. Consequently the apparatus for recording his experi
ences, and hence for the development of his mind, is imperfect. Under
the refining influences of civilization that defect would undoubtedly
disappear from the race, and the Papuan would ultimately be
capable of achieving the same wonderful results as the European.
Man differs from an animal especially in the capability which he
possesses of developing his mind to an unlimited extent; no bonds
can be set to the knowledge which his mind is adapted to grasp
ahd retain. So far as we at present know, no process of develop
ment has yet brought about the same result in animals even of
the highest order. The doctrine of the “survival of the fittest”
is as true in the case of man as in that of animals. Many races
of men have disappeared, and beings of finer parts have survived.
But this “survival of the fittest” we cannot conceive to militate
against the doctrine of the soul’s immortality. The more perfect the
instrument, the more accurate the results.
Hence the higher the
development of the body, the more perfect the action of the soul, and
�«4
Modern Science and Revelation.
therefore the greater its achievements. But it is asked what is it that
survives when sensation ceases in the body? We can find but one
answer. And that is, that the soul, the seat of sensation, has quitted
its tenement. Still we apprehend that it ean be proved indirectly
that the soul continues to exist. Using an illustration which has
recently been cited. Suppose a telegraph clerk is surrounded by his
instruments, he can communicate with a hundred places, and thus prove
his existence. But a thunderstorm arises, his instruments are dis
arranged, he is still in his room, but he cannot inform any one that
survives. Supposing the wires of his instruments to correspond to
the organs of sensation in man, and suppose a break occurs—an
accident resulting in death—he can no longer directly communicate
the fact of his existence to those around him. He knows he exists
equally as the clerk. But the one is as incapable of proving the fact
as the other, when we restrict the one to his wires and the other to
his nerves. But the clerk can prove his existence in other ways, it
may be said. So also can the soul, if we seek for our proof beyond the
region of nerves and crude experiment.
There are powerful evidences of design in creation. And design argues
an intelligent cause. The flower has exquisite organs adapted for
reproducing its species, but the faculty of foreseeing ends and providing
for their attainment is not an attribute of atoms. The end is attained
by the interaction of atoms, but they have no power of deviating from
that end, and they submit to influences beyond them. The “ survival
of the fittest ” is a doctrine substantially true. But there is an end to
be gained by this “survival,” and that end seems to be the most com
plete happiness of the fittest. This seems so in man’s case. Civiliza
tion brings its blessings, and will bring them more abundantly as man,
in the development of his more sacred faculties, is fitted to receive
them. Divine blessings reach us through media; the more perfect
these media in all departments of nature the richer and more
abundant the blessings. We therefore conceive it no unimportant
feature in the design of creation that the “fittest” survive.
But if design points to intelligence, where may we look for the
origin of things ? All nature when devoutly studied points silently
upward to an infinitely wise God. This is the conclusion at which we
must inevitably arrive. Creation is an effect, it cannot be the cause
of its own effect. Creation is also finite and limited in time. It
must therefore have a cause neither finite nor limited in time. While
then we thus trace upward from the creature to the Creator, and stand
in the presence of Him whose “ ways are not our ways, and whose
thoughts are not our thoughts,” let us bow the head and reverently adore.
Reverting again to the “ survival of the fittest,” we remark that this
doctrine is as true in mental as in animal life. In some departments
of thought this goes on more rapidly than in others. Development in
scientific truth has been rapid, but growth in clearness and purity of
theological thought has been slow. Scarcely a step has been made in
a forward direction since the time of the Fathers. The Bible is
acknowledged to be in great part utterly incomprehensible. The
�Correspondence,
8$
march of thought continues, and still theologians are found far behind
Hence it arises that in many minds biblical truth fades and scientific
truth survives. But as the mind becomes fitted to receive spiritual
truth of a higher order than that previously accepted, it is supplied by
to orderly revelation. Modes of interpretation of the Word that once
found implicit and ready assent are no longer tenable. Old creeds fail
to satisfy reflecting and intelligent minds. But a clearer light is
breaking in upon the field of theological thought, and by this light
we perceive the Word to have unmistakeable indications of a divine
origin; we perceive that it is an inexhaustable fountain, adequate to
supply and enrich all minds with the life-giving streams of its
spirit. In the new theology there is a consistency and clearness
which former systems have wanted; while the spiritual world and
the soul are dealt with philosophically and rationally. In con
clusion, we believe that no danger to religion can arise from the
advance of scientific thought, but rather from attempted resistance to
that advance by theologians. As the human mind grows in strength
by the influence of civilization and education, it leaves the traditions
and errors of former generations, and searches by the light of reason
for purer truths. There is a deep longing amongst men for more light
upon the divine Word and the immortal life. Wherever this light
breaks forth let us fearlessly receive it. For be assured that as the
falling leaves of autumn are swept away by the gale, so will error in
our conceptions of nature and of God be borne by the coming ages
into the oblivion of the past, and truth alone will survive.
L T.
(tarrspimtaix
MAURITIUS.
(To the, Editor of the Intellectual Repository.}
Port Louis, Mauritius, "Elth, September 1874.
Reverend and Dear Sir,—At the last meeting of our Society (that of the
New Jerusalem Church here) one of our members brought under notice a
Review in the August number of the Repository. This review comments
upon three publications of our president, Mr. Edmond de Ghazal.
A short conversation arose on the subject, and the undersigned were de
puted to write to you respecting it.
We thank you sincerely for the friendly terms in which you allude to
Mr. de Chazal’s publications, and we feel much gratified that any efforts
here to spread the truth should be noticed in your periodical, but there are
two or three errors in the reviewer’s account of our Society that we feel
bound to bring under your notice, feeling assured that they are involuntary,
and result from the circumstance that we have not such frequent and full
communication with the Church in other lands as we ought to have.
The errors we allude to are the following : After speaking of the efforts
of our Society to procure a minister, and of the difficulties it experienced in
this attempt, the writer proceeds thus :—“ They succeeded at last in obtain
ing one, unknown however to the Church in this country and in America.
G
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Correspondence.
He had belonged successively to the Greek and Roman Catholic Church,
but he seems to have pursued an eccentric course. He did not remain long
with them ; and we have since found him in India, in America, and recently
in Australia.” This statement is incorrect. The person alluded to, that is
Mr. Bugnion, never was our minister, and never conducted a single one of
our services, as we did not consider him to be a thorough New Churchman,
though possibly he -wishes to be received as such. It is quite unnecessary
for us to enter at any length into his history, but a few words on the subject
are perhaps required. We understand that he came to Mauritius in 1858
in connection with the Independents. He did not however agree with them
for any length of time, and towards the end of 1859 a separation ensued,
into the merits of which it is needless for us to enter. After this, it is true,
that he and his family received hospitality from Mr. de Chazal, but he
never was treated in any way by that gentleman as a minister of the New
Church or of our Society, of which he was never a member, for Mr.
Bugnion’s religious ideas and the manner in which he proclaimed them
were on many points unacceptable to our president and to our Society.
Mr. Bugnion formed a congregation of his own, to which he preached for
some time, then left for Europe, returned here, made a short stay, and then
proceeded to India, where he remained for about four years. After this he
travelled in America and Europe, and came back to Mauritius towards the
end of 1871. Here he renewed his relations with his former congregation,
but he never had anything to do with our Society either as a minister or
member. Towards the end of last year he went to Australia, where he still
is. As to the supposed fact of his having belonged at one time to the
Roman Catholic Church, we never heard of it, and we do not think it is
correct. We think it quite unnecessary for us to enter into further details
as to Mr. Bugnion’s act. We may however mention one which has in
duced our president not only not to consider Mr. Bugnion as a New
Churchman, but also to decline any social intercourse with him ; we allude
to his unwarrantable assumption of the title of Bishop. The Rev. J.
Bayley, to whom Mr. de Chazal wrote at the time, can, we believe, give you
more precise information on this subject should you desire it.
Another error we wish to point out is one contained in these words :
« Since the Bishop left Mauritius the service we believe has been conducted
by Mr. de Chazal; and we hope that, in their peculiar circumstances, he
exercises all the functions of a minister.” The truth is, that ever since our
Society has been founded Mr. de Chazal has conducted our monthly
services, and when he is unavoidably absent Mr. Lesage or Mr. G. Mayer
replaces him, quite irrespective of Mr. Bugnion’s presence in or absence
from this island. We use the term “monthly,” because, owing to our being
scattered over different parts of the island, we cannot meet oftener. On
-other Sundays each head of a family leads the services for his own people.
We have thought it necessary to trouble you with these details, since we
do not wish to pass in the Church as a Society that has had for its minister
a person whose writings bear, as you say, “evident traces of Harrisism and
Spiritism.”
We cannot, Mr. Editor, conclude a letter addressed to the organ of the
New Church in England without expressing our satisfaction at the steady
progress of the New Church ideas which we find recorded in its pages, and
our admiration of the ability with which these views are therein pro
claimed. We are also glad to see from the reviews it contains that many
interesting and instructive New Church works are published from time to
time.—We beg to remain your faithful brothers in the New Church,
T. H. Ackroyd.
P. E. de Chazad, Secretary.
�Review.
87
[We have also received a long letter from Mr. Bugnion, vindicating him
self from some charges which some of his friends had informed him our
reviewer had made against him. The only “ charge ” made against him was,
that “ his liturgy bears evident traces of Harrisism and Spiritism.” As this
is a simple fact, which Mr. Bugnion does not deny, but only endeavours to
justify, his letter, which does not deserve insertion, needs no reply.]
Sancta Ccena : or, the Holy Supper, explained on the Principles
taught BY Emanuel Swedenborg. By the Rev. Augustus Clissold,
M.A. London : Longmans, Green & Co.
The need of clearer and more worthy views on the subject of the Holy
Supper than are held in Christendom at the present day is made very
evident by the author in his preface. According to one writer “ the ordi
nance (considered as a sacrifice) is an absolute mystery. It involves a
paradox or apparent contradiction ; a seeming incompatibility of terms ; in
short, a mystery, whatever the exact nature and limits of that mystery may
be supposed to be. It remains a divinely stated paradox, irreconcilable by
man ; a mystery utterly beyond his power to clear up, and such it must
ever be.” The Holy Supper being represented by the Passover, involves
the law that by death alone can death be undone. “How this should be, in
what sense one death can act upon another death, so as to do away with it,
or with any of its consequences, we are absolutely devoid of faculties for
comprehending.”
And thus the Feast of the Christian Passover, which was intended to feed
the souls of the faithful with the flesh and blood of a Living and Divine
Body, becomes at best a mysterious ceremonial.
In the work itself the author shows the true nature and use of the Sacra
ment. “ The two fundamental ideas in the Holy Supper are, first of all,
that of The Word, whether living or written ; and secondly, that which the
Word effects, namely, the conjunction of the church on earth with the
church in heaven.” He had first pointed out the Scripture doctrine re
specting the Word, that from the beginning, before He was made flesh,
our Lord was the Word, mediating between the Father and all creatures.
But there is a written Word as well as a Living Word, and the written Word
is also called the Word of God. As being the Word of God there is a sense
in it in which the Word of God written mediates between the Father and
all creatures. This being the case, the written Word of God is like the
Living Word of God, the medium of communication between the Father
and the Church. Not that there are two Mediators, but One only; inas
much as the written Word mediates between God and man, only in virtue
of the Living or Eternal Word being in it ; and as such the written Word
is itself the medium by which we have life from the Eternal Word.
As the Word is the medium of conjunction between God and man, and
the Holy Supper is also said to be such a medium, what is the nature of
the relation and connection between them ? By extracts from Swedenborg
enlarged and simplified by his own commentary, the author presents the
subject in great clearness and beauty. “ It is not by any figure of speech
that the Living Word and the written Word are both spoken of as one, and
are both called the Word of God ; but because the Word of God written is
�88
Review.
the same essentially as the Word of God spoken, and the Word of God
spoken is the same essentially with the Word made flesh, and speaking.
It is in consequence of this essential identity that the history of the Word
of God written corresponds to that of the Word made flesh.” The Word
as the Divine Wisdom descends from God through all the heavens to the
earth, and becomes accommodated to the apprehensions of angels and men.
In its inmost it is Divine, in its intermediate it is celestial and spiritual, in
its ultimate it is natural. But the Eternal Word also descended through
all the heavens, and finally assumed a natural humanity on earth, when He
became incarnate for the redemption and salvation of the human race.
“The inmost sense of the Word,” says Swedenborg, “treats solely of the
Lord, describing all the states of the glorification of His Humanity, that is,
of its union with the essential Divinity ; and likewise all the states of the
subjugation of the hells, and the reducing to order all things therein as well
as in the heavens. Thus in the inmost sense is described the Lord’s whole
life upon earth, and thereby the Lord is continually present with angels.
Therefore the Lord alone is in the inmost part of the Word, and the
divinity and sanctity of the Word is thence derived.” This blending of the
Eternal Word with the written Word is the ground of their both being
described in Scripture by the same language, and of their both being the
mediums of the conjunction of man with God, and of God with man.
The author shows not only that there is a correspondence between the
written and the Eternal Word, but that they both suffer and are glorified
together. The Lord assumed a material humanity as the Word assumed
itself with a literal sense. But the Lord is believed to be still clothed with
such a body. For a Christian writer observes, “How it can be that a real
substantial Presence of Christ is possible on our altars while yet He abides
in the natural substance of His flesh and blood at the right hand of His
Father ; or how bread and wine, remaining in their natural substances,
become associated with a new and Divine substance, is not given us to
know.” The Lord’s humanity being thus supposed to be merely natural,
and the written Word being supposed to be also merely literal, how can the
Holy Supper be understood as other than a lifeless ceremonial ? “ In order
to a right understanding of the sacrament of the Holy Supper, the first
thing requisite is a right understanding of the doctrine of the Incarnation,
or of the Word made flesh.” This doctrine the author presents in a very
lucid aspect, bringing out in bold relief the New Church view of the Lord’s
glorification, w’hich shows that the Lord’s humanity became Divine, without,
however, ceasing to be human, so that His flesh and blood are necessarily
Divine, and therefore living and lifegiving. When the subject is viewed
in its true light, it will be seen that the Lord is actually and intimately
present in His Holy Supper; and that, as the most sacred solemnity of
worship, it is the means of bringing the Lord and the worshipper into the
closest connection, and the medium of conjunction between them.
This very meagre outline of the book will, wre trust, induce the members
of the Church to read it for themselves ; for although evidently designed
for the clergy of the Church of England, it will afford much to instruct and
delight those who already know in part. The author is too well known,
and his labours are too highly appreciated, to require or even to admit of
any approbation or recommendation from us.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
The Intellectual Repository and New Jerusalem Magazine. Vol. XXII, No. 254, February 1, 1875
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: [London]
Collation: 88 p. ; 23 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Rev. W. Woodman - - an unsigned article on Ralph Waldo Emerson -- Modern science and revelation. Earlier Title: Intellectual Repository for the New Church, later Title: New Church Magazine.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
[s.n.]
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1904
Identifier
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G5300
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
[Unknown]
Subject
The topic of the resource
Periodicals
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The Intellectual Repository and New Jerusalem Magazine. Vol. XXII, No. 254, February 1, 1875), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
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English
Conway Tracts
New Jerusalem Church
-
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PDF Text
Text
Mr. Edward Fordham Flower.
The subject of this sketch was born in 1805, at Marden Hall,
Hertfordshire. His father, Mr. Richard Flower, an ardent agri
culturist, and a politician of the old school, shared the then not un
common alarm with regard to the future of England at the conclu
sion of the Napoleonic Wars, and in the year 1817, he sold his
property, and emigrated to Illinois. Edward Flower was then a
lad of twelve, and had already markedly developed the strong
affection for dumb animals which in later years led him to make such
strenuous exertions on their behalf. Accustomed to horses from his
earliest childhood, his experience in the Far West gave him that
complete knowledge of the animal which is not so frequently attained
in civilized states. The settler in the back woods is more at home in
the saddle than on his feet, and young Flower frequently passed whole
days in cross country rides, with his horse for his sole companion. He
returned to England at the age of nineteen, and one of the first
things that struck him was the different manner of treating horses to
that which he had been used to; but he had not then either the
means or position to bring before the public his views on this matter.
Mr, Flower, in 1827, married and settled at Stratford-on-Avon,
and in 1828 he opened a brewery, which was so successful that after
thirty years he was able to retire and leave the business to his sons.
His popularity in the town was evidenced by his having four times
held the office of Mayor, the last occasion being in 1864, the year of
the famous Shakespeare Tercentenary. In this celebration Mr. Flower
took the most earnest interest, and indeed to his personal exertions
�68
Mr. Edward Fordham Flower.
and very considerable pecuniary assistance no small share of the
splendid success achieved was mainly due.
It is, however, principally as the indefatigable advocate of the
horse, that Mr. Flower’s name will recur to the minds of our readers.
His letters, pamphlets, and speeches on the senseless and cruel gag
bearing-rein would fill a thick volume. He has been ridiculed, con
demned, argued with; but he holds his ground with the steadiness of
purpose that has always characterised him throughout his life. It has
even been said that he was a novice on the subject, whereas probably
no man in England understands horses better. His perseverance, and
the obvious truth of his allegations against the gag-bit and bearing
rein, have enlisted on his side not only the vast majority of veterinary
surgeons, and a large number of fashionable owners of carriages, but
also many of the leading whips of the day. At the second turn out of
the Four-in-Hand Club, last year, eleven out of thirty-two drags were
driven without the aid of this barbarous instrument of torture, and since
agitation was first commenced there has been a yearly diminution of
horses in the park afflicted with the obnoxious gag and rein. In thus
contending for his dumb friends, Mr. Flower cannot at least be
charged with self-seeking, for he is working for those who cannot
recompense again, and his own feeling in the matter is expressed by
the remark, made both in public and private, that all he wishes for is
success ; and he should be not only content but proud to be re
membered simply as the man who abolished the bit and gag-bearing-
rein.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Mr Edward Fordham Flower
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: [s.l.]
Collation: [67]-68 p. ; 22 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Tear at bottom of page. Author and name of magazine in which the item appeared are unknown. Edward Fordham Flower was an English brewer and author who campaigned for a Shakespeare memorial theatre and against cruelty to animals. The article deals with the inappropriate use of harness in tight-bearing reins and the use of gag-bits.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
[s.n.]
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1904
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
G5456
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
[Unknown]
Subject
The topic of the resource
Animal rights
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Mr Edward Fordham Flower), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Animal Welfare
Conway Tracts
Edward Flower Fordham
Horses
-
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PDF Text
Text
�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
The extinction of war, poverty, and infectious diseases: containing essays on Home rule and federation; Can war be suppressed?; State remedies for poverty; and The extinction of infectious diseases by a Doctor of Medicine [George R. Drysdale].
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Drysdale, George
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 157 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Printed by A. Bonner, Chancery Lane, E.C. Sold by R. Forder, Stonecutter St. E.C.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Geo. Standring
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1904
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
G4999
Subject
The topic of the resource
Social problems
Health
Poverty
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The extinction of war, poverty, and infectious diseases: containing essays on Home rule and federation; Can war be suppressed?; State remedies for poverty; and The extinction of infectious diseases by a Doctor of Medicine [George R. Drysdale].), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
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application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Home Rule
Home Rule-Ireland
Infectious Diseases
Malthusianism
Poverty
War
War;Poverty
-
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53f91bbe02696b2ae0353c9678365106
PDF Text
Text
PROGRAMME OF THE MUSIC
TO BE SUNG IN THE
Jnnitaorg jBtrbice,
AT THE
FREE CHRISTIAN
CHURCH,
KENTISH TOWN,
ON SUNDAY, JUNE 19, 1864.
The Sermons for the occasion will be Preached
By the REV. M. D. CONWAY, of Boston, America.
SUBJECTS:
In the Morning (at 11 o’clock^—“ CHRIST-POWER.”
In the Evening (at half-past six o’clock)—“ SCEPTICISM.”
COLLECTIONS WILL
I-!'’. .
MADE AT
BE
.. •
;
/.
EACH
: J ,
” ’
SERVICE;
,
The Church being supported entirely by Voluntary Contributions.
�—Writer fljc jfirst.
Rlartung
Ei,iza FlowejZ.
INTRODUCTION.
(4th Chap. St. John, 23rd. and 24th verses.)
God is a Spirit; and they that worship Him must worship
Him in spirit and in truth.
The Father seeketh such to worship Him.
ANTHEM. From “ The Hymn of Praise."
Mendelssohn.
I waited for the Lord; He inclined unto me: He heard my
complaint.
()! blest are they that hope and trust in the Lord.
During the Collection.
AVE VERUM.
I
. ,.OT
•r
- _
MozabiJ^/1
'
Father, source of ev’ry blessing,
Tune my heart to grateful lays;
Streams of mercy never ceasing,
Call for endless songs of praise.’
f
J
’
By Thy hand restored—defended,
Safe this life thus far I’ve come:
Safe, O Lord, when life is ended,
Bring me to my heav’nly honie:' V.-srA’) -A
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Programme of the music to be sung in the church anniversary service, at the Free Christian Church, Kentish Town, on Sunday June 19 1864
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 2 p. ; 19 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
Publisher
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Cassell & Co.
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1904
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G5701
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Free Christian Church, Kentish Town
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Music
Church
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<img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /><br /><span>This work (Programme of the music to be sung in the church anniversary service, at the Free Christian Church, Kentish Town, on Sunday June 19 1864), identified by </span><span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk">Humanist Library and Archives</a></span><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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application/pdf
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Text
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English
Christianity
Conway Tracts
Moncure Conway
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JOHN STUART MH
(photographed, by permission,
from the statue on
bankmenT)
W
17, JOHNSON"
£.C.
�THE
RATIONALIST PRESS ASSOCIATION
[Founded 1899.]
(Limited).
Chairman—GEORGE JACOB HOLYOAKE.
Honorary Associates:
M. Berthelot
Paul Carus, Ph.D.
Edward Clodd
Stanton Coit, Ph.D.
W. C. Coupland, D.Sc., M.A.
F. J. Furnivall, M.A., Ph.D., D.Litt.
F. J. Gould
Prof. Ernst Haeckel
/
Leonard Huxley
Prof. W. C. van Manen
Eden Phillpotts
J. M. Robertson
W. R. Washington Sullivan
Prof. Ed. A. Westermarck
Thomas Whittaker
Bankers:
The London City and Midland Bank, Ltd., Blackfriars Branch, London, S.E.
A tiditors:
Messrs. Woodburn Kirby, Page, & Co., Chartered Accountants, I, Laurence Pountney Hill,
London, E.C.
Secretary and Registered Offices:
Charles E. Hooper, 5 and 6, Johnson’s Court, Fleet Street, London, E.C.
All who approve of the publication, in a cheap and popular form, of works
such as the present Reprint can help to produce them, and can join in a systematic
propaganda for encouraging free inquiry and sober reflection, and repudiating
irrational authority.
These are the objects of the R. P. A. (The Rationalist Press
Association, Ltd.).
The Members of this Association have banded themselves
\ together, not with any view to commercial gain, but solely to promote sound
masoning and the growth of reasoned truth, as essential to the welfare and
•ess of humanity.
Should these aims commend themselves to your judgment,
quid apply at once for full particulars to
The Secretary,
R. P. A., Ltd.,
5 and 6, Johnson’s Court, Fleet Street,
London, E.C.
�gV>58
bJMS
NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY
NATURE
THE
UTILITY OF RELIGION
AND
THEISM
BY
JOHN STUART MILL
[issued for the rationalist press association, limited]
WATTS & CO.,
17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.
1904
��INTRODUCTORY NOTICE
The three following Essays on Religion
were written at considerable intervals of
time, without any intention of forming a
consecutive series, and must not there
fore be regarded as a connected body of
thought, excepting in so far as they
exhibit the Author’s deliberate and ex
haustive treatment of the topics under
consideration.
The two first of these three Essays
were written between the years 1850 and
1858, during the period which intervened
between the publication of the Princi
ples of Political Economy and that of
the work on Liberty; during which
interval three other Essays—on Justice,
on Utility, and on Liberty—were also
composed. Of the five Essays written
at that time, three have already been
given to the public by the Author.
That on Liberty was expanded into the
now well-known work bearing the same
title. Those on Justice and Utility were
afterwards incorporated, with some altera
tions and additions, into one, and pub
lished under the name of Utilitarianism.
The remaining two—on Nature and on
the Utility of Religion—are now given
to the public, with the addition of a third
—on Theism—which was produced at a
much later period.
In these two first
Essays indications may easily be found I
of the date at which they were composed;
among which indications may be noted
the absence of any mention of the works
of Mr. Darwin and Sir Henry Maine in
passages where there is coincidence of
thought with those writers, or where
subjects are treated which they have
since discussed in a manner to which
the Author of these Essays would cer
tainly have referred had their works been
published before these were written.
The last Essay in the present volume
belongs to a different epoch; it was
written between the years 1868 and
1870, but it was not designed as a sequel
to the two Essays which now appear
along with it, nor were they intended to
appear all together. On the other hand,
it is certain that the Author considered
the opinions expressed in these different
Essays as fundamentally consistent.
The evidence of this lies in the fact that
in the year 1873, after he had completed
his Essay on Theism, it was his intention
to have published the Essay on Nature
at once, with only such slight revision as
might be judged necessary in preparing
it for the press, but substantially in its
present form. From this it is apparent
that his manner of thinking had under
gone no substantial change. Whatever
discrepancies, therefore, may seem to
�4
INTRODUCTORY NOTICE
remain, after a really careful comparison
between different passages, may be set
down either to the fact that the last
Essay had not undergone the many
revisions which it was the Author’s habit
to make peculiarly searching and
thorough ; or to that difference of tone,
and of apparent estimate of the relative
weight of different considerations, which
results from taking a wider view, and
including a larger number of considera
tions in the estimate of the subject as a
whole, than in dealing with parts of it
only.
The fact that the Author intended to
publish the Essay on Nature in 1873 is
sufficient evidence, if any is needed,
that the volume now given to the public
was not withheld by him on account of
reluctance to encounter whatever odium
might result from the free expression of
his opinions on religion. That he did
not purpose to publish the other two
Essays at the same time was in accord
with the Author’s habit in regard to the
public utterance of his religious opinions.
For at the same time that he was pecu
liarly deliberate and slow in forming
opinions, he had a special dislike to the
utterance of half-formed opinions. He
declined altogether to be hurried into
premature decision on any point to which
he did not think he had given sufficient
time and labour to have exhausted it to
the utmost limit of his own thinking
powers. And, in the same way, even
after he had arrived at definite conclu
sions, he refused to allow the curiosity
of others to force him to the expression
of them before he had bestowed all the
elaboration in his power upon their
adequate expression, and before, there
fore, he had subjected to the test of
time, not only the conclusions them
selves, but also the form into which he
had thrown them. The same reasons,
therefore, that made him cautious in the
spoken utterance of his opinion in pro
portion as it was necessary to be at once
precise and comprehensive in order to
be properly understood, which in his
judgment was pre-eminently the case in
religious speculation, were the reasons
that made him abstain from publishing
his Essay on Nature for upwards of
fifteen years, and might have led him
still to withhold the others which now
appear in the same volume.
From this point of view it will be seen
that the Essay on Theism has both
greater value and less than any other of
the Author’s works. The last consider
able work which he completed, it shows
the latest state of the Author’s mind, the
carefully balanced result of the delibera
tions of a lifetime. On the other hand,
there had not been time for it to undergo
the revision to which from time to time
he subjected most of his writings before
making them public. Not only there
fore is the style less polished than that of
any other of his published works, but
even the matter itself, at least in the
exact shape it here assumes, has never
undergone the repeated examination
which it certainly would have passed
through before he would himself have
given it to the world.
Helen Taylor.
�CONTENTS
PAGE
-
-
-
•
•
7
UTILITY OF RELIGION
-
-
•
•
-
34
THEISM
-
-
-
•
-
57
•
- •
-
-
•
5«
61
-
-
62
NATURE -
-
-
-
PART I.
57
INTRODUCTION
THEISM
THE EVIDENCES OF THEISM
-
•
ARGUMENT FOR A FIRST CAUSE
-
-
-
67
70
THE ARGUMENT FROM MARKS OF DESIGN IN NATURE -
72
ARGUMENT FROM THE GENERAL CONSENT OF MANKIND
THE ARGUMENT FROM CONSCIOUSNESS
-
-
PART II.
ATTRIBUTES -
-
-
-
■
•
•
75
•
•
-
83
-
•
•
9°
PART III.
IMMORTALITY
-
-
■
PART IV.
REVELATION
-
-
-
PART V.
GENERAL RESULT
102
��NATURE
“Nature,” “natural,” and the group of
words derived from them, or allied to them
in etymology, have at all times filled a
great place in the thoughts and taken a
strong hold on the feelings of mankind.
That they should have done so is not sur
prising when we consider what the words,
in their primitive and most obvious
signification, represent; but it is unfor
tunate that a set of terms which play so
great a part in moral and metaphysical
speculation should have acquired many
meanings different from the primary
one, yet sufficiently allied to it to admit
of confusion. The words have thus
become entangled in so many foreign
associations, mostly of a very powerful
and tenacious character, that they have
come to excite, and to be the symbols
of, feelings which their original meaning
will by no means justify, and which
have made them one of the most copious
sources of false taste, false philosophy,
false morality, and even bad law.
The most important application of the
Socratic Elenchus, as exhibited and im
proved by Plato, consists in dissecting
large abstractions of this description;
fixing down to a precise definition the
meaning which as popularly used they
merely shadow forth, and questioning
and testing the common maxims and
opinions in which they bear a part. It
is to be regretted that among the
instructive specimens of this kind of
investigation which Plato has left,
and to which subsequent times have
been so much indebted for whatever
intellectural clearness they have attained,
he has not enriched posterity with a dia
logue irepi <f>v(r€(D<s. If the idea denoted
by the word had been subjected to his
searching analysis, and the popular
commonplaces in which it figures had
been submitted to the ordeal of his
powerful dialectics, his successors pro
bably would not have rushed, as they
speedily did, into modes of thinking and
reasoning of which the fallacious use of
that word formed the cornerstone; a
kind of fallacy from which he was him
self singularly free.
According to the Platonic method,
which is still the best type of such in
vestigations, the first thing to be done
with so vague a term is to ascertain
precisely what it means. It is also a
rule of the same method that the mean
ing of an abstraction is best sought for
in the concrete—of an universal in the
particular. Adopting this course with
the word “ nature,” the first question
must be, what is meant by the “ nature ”
of a particular object, as of fire, of
water, or of some individual plant or
animal? Evidently the ensemble or
aggregate of its powers or properties :
the modes in which it acts on other
things (counting among those things the
senses of the observer), and the modes
in which other things act upon it; to
which, in the case of a sentient being,
�8
NATURE
must be added its own capacities of
feeling, or being conscious. The nature
of the thing means all this; means its
entire capacity of exhibiting phenomena.
And since the phenomena which a thing
exhibits, however much they vary in
different circumstances, are always the
same in the same circumstances, they
admit of being described in general
forms of words, which are called the
laws of the thing’s nature. Thus it is a
law of the nature of water that, under
the mean pressure of the atmosphere
at the level of the sea, it boils at 2120
Fahrenheit.
As the nature of any given thing is
the aggregate of its powers and pro
perties, so Nature in the abstract is the
aggregage of the powers and properties
of all things. Nature means the sum of
all phenomena, together with the causes
which produce them; including not only
all that happens, but all that is capable
of happening; the unused capabilities
of causes being as much a part of the
idea of Nature as those which take
effect. Since all phenomena which have
been sufficiently examined are found to
take place with regularity, each having
certain fixed conditions, positive and
negative, on the occurrence of which it
invariably happens, mankind have been
able to ascertain, either by direct
observation or by reasoning processes
grounded on it, the conditions of the
occurrence of many phenomena; and
the progress of science mainly consists
in ascertaining those conditions. When
discovered they can be expressed in
general propositions, which are called
laws of the particular phenomenon, and
also, more generally, Laws of Nature.
Thus the truth, that all material objects
tend towards one another with a force
directly as their masses and inversely as
the square of their distance, is a law of
nature. The proposition, that air and
food are necessary to animal life, if it be,
as we have good reason to believe, true
without exception, is also a law of
nature, though the phenomenon of
which it is the law is special, and not,
like gravitation, universal.
Nature, then, in this, its simplest,
acceptation, is a collective name for all
facts, actual and possible; or (to speak
more accurately) a name for the mode,
partly known to us and partly unknown,
in which all things take place. For the
word suggests, not so much the multi
tudinous detail of the phenomena, as
the conception which might be formed
of their manner of existence as a mental
whole, by a mind possessing a complete
knowledge of them : to which concep
tion it is the aim of science to raise
itself, by successive steps of generalisa
tion from experience.
Such, then, is a correct definition of
the word “ nature.” But this definition
corresponds only to one of the senses
of that ambiguous term. It is evidently
inapplicable to some of the modes in
which the word is familiarly employed.
For example, it entirely conflicts with
the common form of speech by which
Nature is opposed to Art, and natural
to artificial. For, in the sense of the
word “nature” which has just been
defined, and which is the true scientific
sense, Art is as much Nature as any
thing else; and everything which is
artificial is natural—Art has no inde
pendent powers of its own : Art is but
the employment of the powers of Nature
for an end. Phenomena produced by
human agency, no less than those which
as far as we are concerned are spon
taneous, depend on the properties of the
elementary forces, or of the elementary
�NATURE
substances and their compounds. The
united powers of the whole human race
could not create a new property of
matter in general, or of any one of its
species. We can only take advantage
for our purposes of the properties which
we find. A ship floats by the same laws
of specific gravity and equilibrium as a
tree uprooted by the wind and blown
into the water. The corn which men
raise for food grows and produces its
grain by the same laws of vegetation by
which the wild rose and the mountain
strawberry bring forth their flowers and
fruit. A house stands and holds to
gether by the natural properties, the
weight and cohesion of the materials
which compose it: a steam engine works
by the natural expansive force of steam,
exerting a pressure upon one part of a
system of arrangements, which pressure,
by the mechanical properties of the
lever, is transferred from that to another
part where it raises the weight or removes
the obstacle brought into connection with
it. In these and all other artificial opera
tions the office of man is, as has often
been remarked, a very limited one : it
consists in moving things into certain
places. We move objects, and, by doing
this, bring some things into contact
which were separate, or separate others
which were in contact; and, by this
simple change of place, natural forces
previously dormant are called into action,
and produce the desired effect. Even
the volition which designs, the intelli
gence which contrives, and the muscular
force which executes these movements,
are themselves powers of Nature.
It thus appears that we must recognise
at least two principal meanings in the
word “ nature.” In one sense, it means
all the powers existing in either the outer
or the inner world and everything which
9
takes place by means of those powers.
In another sense, it means, not everything
which happens, but only what takes
place without the agency, or without the
voluntary and intentional agency, of man.
This distinction is far from exhausting
the ambiguities of the word ; but it is
the key to most of those on which im
portant consequences depend.
Such, then, being the two principal
senses of the word “nature,” in which of
these is it taken, or is it taken in either,
when the word and its derivatives are
used to convey ideas of commendation,
approval, and even moral obligation ?
It has conveyed such ideas in all
ages. Naturum sequi was the funda
mental principle of morals in many of
the most admired schools of philosophy.
Among the ancients, especially in the
declining period of ancient intellect and
thought, it was the test to which all
ethical doctrines were brought. The
Stoics and the Epicureans, however irre
concilable in the rest of their systems,
agreed in holding themselves bound to
prove that their respective maxims of
conduct were the dictates of nature.
Under their influence the Roman jurists,
when attempting to systematise jurispru
dence, placed in the front of their expo
sition a certain Jus Naturale, “quod
natura,” as Justinian declares in the
Institutes, “ omnia animalia docuit
and as the modern systematic writers,
not only on law but on moral philosophy,
have generally taken the Roman jurists
for their models, treatises on the so-called
Law of Nature have abounded; and
references to this Law as a supreme rule
and ultimate standard have pervaded
literature. The writers on International
Law have done more than any others to
give currency to this style of ethical
speculation; inasmuch as, having no
�io
NATURE
positive law to write about, and yet
being anxious to invest the most ap
proved opinions respecting international
morality with as much as they could of
the authority of law, they endeavoured
to find such an authority in Nature’s
imaginary code. The Christian theology
during the period of its greatest ascen
dancy opposed some, though not a com
plete, hindrance to the modes of thought
which erected Nature into the criterion
of morals, inasmuch as, according to the
creed of most denominations of Chris
tians (though assuredly not of Christ),
man is by nature wicked. But this very
doctrine, by the reaction which it pro
voked, has made the deistical moralists
almost unanimous in proclaiming the
divinity of Nature, and setting up its
fancied dictates as an authoritative rule
of action. A reference to that supposed
standard is the predominant ingredient
in the vein of thought and feeling which
was opened by Rousseau, and which has
infiltrated itself most widely into the
modern mind, not excepting that portion
of it which calls itself Christian. The
doctrines of Christianity have in every
age been largely accommodated to the
philosophy which happened to be pre
valent, and the Christianity of our day
has borrowed a considerable part of its
colour and flavour from sentimental
deism. At the present time it cannot
be said that Nature, or any other
standard, is applied as it was wont to
be, to deduce rules of action with
juridical precision, and with an attempt
to make its application co-extensive with
all human agency. The people of this
generation do not commonly apply prin
ciples with any such studious exactness,
nor own such binding allegiance to any
standard, but live in a kind of confusion
of many standards ; a condition not pro
pitious to the formation of steady moral
convictions, but convenient enough to
those whose moral opinions sit lightly on
them, since it gives them a much wider
range of arguments for defending the
doctrine of the moment. But though
perhaps no one could now be found who,
like the institutional writers of former
times, adopts the so-called Law of
Nature as the foundation of ethics, and
endeavours consistently to reason from
it, the word and its cognates must still
be counted among those which carry
great weight in moral argumentation.
That any mode of thinking, feeling, or
acting, is “ according to nature ” isusually accepted as a strong argument
for its goodness. If it can be said witb
any plausibility that “ nature enjoins ”
anything, the propriety of obeying the
injunction is by most people considered
to be made out; • and, conversely, the
imputation of being contrary to nature
is thought to bar the door against any
pretension, on the part of the thing so*
designated, to be tolerated or excused;
and the word “ unnatural ” has not ceased
to be one of the most vituperative
epithets in the language. Those whodeal in these expressions may avoid
making themselves responsible for any
fundamental theorem respecting the
standard of moral obligation, but they
do not the less imply such a theorem,
and one which must be the same in sub
stance with that on which the more
logical thinkers of a more laborious age
grounded their systematic treatises on
Natural Law.
Is it necessary to recognise in these
forms of speech another distinct mean
ing of the word “nature”? Or can they
be connected, by any rational bond of
union, with either of the two meanings
already treated of? At first it may
�NATURE
seem that we have no option but to
admit another ambiguity in the term.
All inquiries are either into what is or
into what ought to be: science and
history belonging to the first division ;
art, morals, and politics to the second.
But the two senses of the word “ nature ”
first pointed out agree in referring only
to what is. In the first meaning, Nature
is a collective name for everything which
is. In the second, it is a name for
everything which is of itself, without
voluntary human intervention. But the
employment of the word “nature ” as a
term of ethics seems to disclose a third
meaning, in which Nature does not
stand for what is, but for what ought to
be, or for the rule or standard of what
ought to be. A little consideration, how
ever, will show that this is not a case of
ambiguity; there is not here a third
sense of the word. Those who set up
Nature as a standard of action do not
intend a merely verbal proposition;
they do not mean that the standard,
whatever it be should be called Nature;
they think they are giving some informa
tion as to what the standard of action
really is. Those who say that we ought
to act according to Nature do not mean
the mere identical proposition that we
ought to do what we ought to do. They
think that the word “nature” affords some
external criterion of what we should do;
and if they lay down as a rule for what
ought to be, a word which in its proper
signification denotes what is, they do so
because they have a notion, either clearly
or confusedly, that what is constitutes
the rule and standard of what ought
to be.
The examination of this notion is the
object of the present Essay. It is pro
posed to inquire into the truth of the
doctrines which make Nature a test of
11
right and wrong, good and evil, or which
in any mode or degree attach merit or
approval to following, imitating, or obey
ing Nature. To this inquiry the fore
going discussion respecting the meaning
of terms was an indispensable introduc
tion. Language is, as it were, the
atmosphere of philosophical investiga
tion, which must be made transparent
before anything can be seen through it
in the true figure and position. In the
present case it is necessary to guard
against a further ambiguity, which, though
abundantly obvious, has sometimes mis
led even sagacious minds, and of which
it is well to take distinct note before pro
ceeding further. No word is more
commonly associated with the word
“nature” than “law”; and this last word
has distinctly two meanings, in one of
which it denotes some definite portion
of what is, in the other of what ought to
be. We speak of the law of gravitation,
the three laws of motion, the law of
definite proportions in chemical combi
nation, the vital laws of organised beings.
All these are portions of what is. We
also speak of the criminal law, the civil
law, the law of honour, the law of
veracity, the law of justice ; all of which
are portions of what ought to be, or of
somebody’s suppositions, feelings, or
commands respecting what ought to be.
The first kind of laws, such as the laws
of motion and of gravitation, are neither
more nor less than the observed uni
formities in the occurrence of pheno
mena ; partly uniformities of antecedence
and sequence, partly of concomitance.
These are what, in science, and even in
ordinary parlance, are meant by laws of
nature. Laws in the other sense are the
laws of the land, the law of nations, or
moral laws ; among which, as already
noticed, is dragged in, by jurists and
�12
NATURE
publicists, something which they think ■ modes of acting are so in exactly the
proper to call the Law of Nature. Of , same degree. Every action is the
the liability of these two meanings of i exertion of some natural power, and its
the word to be confounded there can be : effects of all sorts are so many pheno
no better example than the first chapter mena of nature, produced by the powers
of Montesquieu, where he remarks that and properties of some of the objects of
the material world has its laws, the nature, in exact obedience to some law
inferior animals have their laws, and or laws of nature. When I voluntarily
man has his laws; and calls attention to use my organs to take in food, the act,
the much greater strictness with which and its consequences, take place accord
the first two sets of laws are observed ing to laws of nature : if instead of food
than the last; as if it were an inconsis I swallow poison, the case is exactly the
tency, and a paradox, that things always same. To bid people conform to the
are what they are, but men not always laws of nature when they have no power
what they ought to be. A similar con but what the laws of nature give them—
fusion of ideas pervades the writings of when it is a physical impossibility for
Mr. George Combe, from whence it has them to do the smallest thing otherwise
overflowed into a large region of popular than through some law of nature, is an
literature, and we are now continually absurdity. The thing they need to be
reading injunctions to obey the physical told is what particular law of nature they
laws of the universe, as being obligatory should make use of in a particular case.
in the same sense and manner as the When, for example, a person is crossing
moral. The conception which the a river by a narrow bridge to which there
ethical use of the word “nature ” implies, is no parapet, he will do well to regulate
of a close relation if not absolute iden his proceedings by the laws of equilib
tity between what is and what ought to rium in moving bodies, instead of con
be, certainly derives part of its hold on forming only to the law of gravitation
the mind from the custom of designat and falling into the river.
ing what is by the expression “ laws of
Yet, idle as it is to exhort people to
nature,”while the same word “law” is also do what they cannot avoid doing, and
used, and even more familiarly and em absurd as it is to prescribe as a rule of
phatically, to express what ought to be.
right conduct what agrees exactly as
When it is asserted, or implied, that well with wrong, nevertheless a rational
Nature, or the laws of Nature, should be rule of conduct may be constructed out
conformed to, is the Nature which is of the relation which it ought to bear
meant Nature in the first sense of the to the laws of nature in this widest
term, meaning all which is—the powers acceptation of the term. Man neces
and properties of all things? But in sarily obeys the laws of nature, or in
this signification there is no need of a other words the properties of things ; but
recommendation to act according to he does not necessarily guide himself by
nature, since it is what nobody can them. Though all conduct is in con
possibly help doing, and equally whether formity to laws of nature, all conduct is
he acts well or ill. There is no mode not grounded on knowledge of them,
of acting which is not conformable to and intelligently directed to the attain
Nature in this sense of the term, and all ment of purposes by means of them.
�Though we cannot emancipate ourselves
from the laws of nature as a whole, we
can escape from any particular law of
nature, if we are able to withdraw our
selves from the circumstances in which
it acts. Though we can do nothing
except through laws of nature, we can
use one law to counteract another.
According to Bacon’s maxim, we can
obey nature in such a manner as to
command it. Every alteration of cir
cumstances alters more or less the laws
of nature under which we act; and by
every choice which we make either of
ends or of means we place ourselves to a
greater or less extent under one set of
laws of nature instead of another. If,
therefore, the useless precept to follow
nature were changed into a precept to
study nature; to know and take heed of
the properties of the things we have
to deal with, so far as these properties
are capable of forwarding or obstructing
any given purpose; we should have
arrived at the first principle of all intelli
gent action, or rather at the definition of
intelligent action itself. And a confused
notion of this true principle is, I doubt
not, in the minds of many of those who
set up the unmeaning doctrine which
superficially resembles it. They per
ceive that the essential difference
between wise and foolish conduct con
sists in attending, or not attending, to
the particular laws of nature on which
some important result depends. And
they think that a person who attends to
a law of nature in order to shape his
conduct by it may be said to obey
it, while a person who practically dis
regards it, and acts as if no such law
existed, may be said to disobey it: the
circumstance being overlooked, that
what is thus called disobedience to a law
of nature is obedience to some other,
or perhaps to the very law itself,
example, a person who goes into
powder-magazine either not knowing, or
carelessly omitting to think of, the ex
plosive force of gunpowder, is likely to
do some act which will cause him to be
blown to atoms in obedience to the very
law which he has disregarded.
But, however much of its authority the
“ Naturam sequi ” doctrine may owe to
its being confounded with the rational pre
cept “Naturum observare,” its favourers
and promoters unquestionably intend
much more by it than that precept. To
acquire knowledge of the properties of
things, and make use of the knowledge
for guidance, is a rule of prudence, for
the adaptation of means to ends ; for
giving effect to our wishes and intentions,
whatever they may be. But the maxim
of obedience to Nature, or conformity to
Nature, is held up not as a simply pruden
tial but as an ethical maxim; and by
those who talk of jus natura, even as a
law, fit to be administered by tribunals
and enforced by sanctions. Right action
must mean something more and other
than merely intelligent action; yet no
precept beyond this last can be con
nected with the word “ nature ” in the
wider and more philosophical of its
acceptations. We must try it, therefore,
in the other sense, that in which Nature
stands distinguished from Art, and de
notes, not the whole course of the pheno
mena which come under our observation,
but only their spontaneous course.
Let us, then, consider whether we can
attach any meaning to the supposed
practical maxim of following Nature, in
this second sense of the word, in which
Nature stands for that which takes place
without human intervention. In Nature
as thus understood is the spontaneous
course of things, when left to themselves,
�14
NA TURE
the rule to be followed in endeavouring
to adapt things to our use ? But it is
evident at once that the maxim, taken in
this sense, is not merely, as it is in the
other sense, superfluous and unmeaning,
but palpably absurd and self-contradic
tory. For while human action cannot
help conforming to Nature in the one
meaning of the term, the very aim and
object of action is to alter and improve
Nature in the other meaning. If the
natural course of things were perfectly
right and satisfactory, to act at all would
be a gratuitous meddling, which, as it
could not make things better, must make
them worse. Or if action at all could be
justified, it would only be when in direct
obedience to instincts, since these might
perhaps be accounted part of the spon
taneous order of Nature; but to do any
thing with forethought and purpose
would be a violation of that perfect
order. If the artificial is not better than
the natural, to what end are all the arts
of life? To dig, to plough, to build, to
wear clothes, are direct infringements of
the injunction to follow nature.
Accordingly it would be said by every
one, even of those most under the in
fluence of the feelings which prompt the
injunction, that to apply it to such cases
as those just spoken of would be to
push it too far. Everybody professes to
approve and admire many great triumphs
of Art over Nature: the junction by
bridges of shores which Nature had
made separate, the draining of Nature’s
marshes, the excavation of her wells, the
dragging to light of what she has buried
at immense depths in the earth; the
turning away of her thunderbolts by
lightning rods, of her inundations by
embankments, of her ocean by break
waters. But to commend these and
similar feats is to acknowledge that the
ways of Nature are to be conquered, not
obeyed; that her powers are often
towards man in the position of enemies,
from whom he must wrest, by force and
ingenuity, what little he can for his own
use, and deserves to be applauded when
that little is rather more than might be
expected from his physical weakness in
comparison to those gigantic powers.
All piaise of Civilisation, or Art, or Con
trivance, is so much dispraise of Nature ;
an admission of imperfection which it is
man’s business and merit to be always
endeavouring to correct or mitigate.
The consciousness that whatever man
does to improve his condition is in so
much a censure and a thwarting of the
spontaneous order of Nature, has in all
ages caused new and unprecedented
attempts at improvement to be generally
at first under a shade of religious sus
picion ; as being in any case uncompli
mentary, and very probably offensive to
the powerful beings (or, when polytheism
gave place to monotheism, to the allpowerful Being) supposed to govern the
various phenomena of the universe, and
of whose will the course of nature was
conceived to be the expression. Any
attempt to mould natural phenomena to
the convenience of mankind might easily
appear an interference with the govern
ment of those superior beings; and
though life could not have been main
tained, much less made pleasant, without
perpetual interferences of the kind, each
new one was doubtless made with fear
and trembling, until experience had
shown that it could be ventured on with
out drawing down the vengeance of the
Gods. The sagacity of priests showed
them a way to reconcile the impunity of
particular infringements with the main
tenance of the general dread of encroach
ing on the divine administration. This
�NATURE
was effected by representing each of the
principal human inventions as the gift
and favour of some god. The old reli
gions also afforded many resources for
consulting the Gods, and obtaining their
express permission for what would other
wise have appeared a breach of their
prerogative. When oracles had ceased,
any religion which recognised a revela
tion afforded expedients for the same
purpose. The Catholic religion had the
resource of an infallible Church, autho
rised to declare what exertions of human
spontaneity were permitted or forbidden ;
and in default of this the case was always
open to argument from the Bible whether
any particular practice had expressly or
by implication been sanctioned. The
notion remained that this liberty to con
trol Nature was conceded to man only
by special indulgence, and as far as
required by his necessities; and there
was always a tendency, though a dimin
ishing one, to regard any attempt to
exercise power over nature beyond a
certain degree and a certain admitted
range as an impious effort to usurp divine
power and dare more than was permitted
to man. The lines of Horace in which
the familiar arts of shipbuilding and
navigation are reprobated as vetitum
nefas indicate even in that sceptical age
a still unexhausted vein of the old senti
ment. The intensity of the correspond
ing feeling in the Middle Ages is not a
precise parallel, on account of the super
stition about dealing with evil spirits with
which it was complicated; but the im
putation of prying into the secrets of the
Almighty long remained a powerful
weapon of attack against unpopular
inquirers into nature ; and the charge of
presumptuously attempting to defeat the
designs of Providence still retains enough
of its original force to be thrown in as a
15
make-weight along with other objections
when there is a desire to find fault with
any new exertion of human forethought
and contrivance. No one, indeed, asserts
it to be the intention of the Creator that
the spontaneous order of the creation
should not be altered, or even that it
should not be altered in any new way.
But there still exists a vague notion that,
though it is very proper to control this
or the other natural phenomenon, the
general scheme of nature is a model for
us to imitate; that with more or less
liberty in details, we should on the whole
be guided by the spirit and general con
ception of nature’s own ways ; that they
are God’s work, and as such perfect; that
man cannot rival their unapproachable
excellence, and can best show his skill
and joiety by attempting, in however
imperfect a way, to reproduce their like
ness ; and that, if not the whole, yet some
particular parts of the spontaneous order
of nature, selected according to the
speakers predilections, are in a peculiar
sense manifestations of the Creator’s
will—a sort of finger-posts pointing out
the direction which things in general,
and therefore our voluntary actions, are
intended to take. Feelings of this sort,
though repressed on ordinary occasions
by the contrary current of life, are ready
to break out whenever custom is silent,
and the native promptings of the mind
have nothing opposed to them but
reason; and appeals are continually
made to them by rhetoricians, with the
effect, if not of convincing opponents,
at least of making those who already
hold the opinion which the rhetorician
desires to recommend, better satisfied
with it. For in the present day it pro
bably seldom happens that anyone is per
suaded to approve any course of action
because it appears to him to bear an
�i6
NA TURE
analogy to the divine government of the
world, though the argument tells on him
with great force, and is felt by him to be
a great support, in behalf of anything
which he is already inclined to approve.
If this notion of imitating the ways
of Providence as manifested in Nature
is seldom expressed plainly and downrightly as a matter of general applica
tion, it also is seldom directly contra
dicted. Those who find it on their path
prefer to turn the obstacle rather than to
attack it, being often themselves not
free from the feeling, and in any case
afraid of incurring the charge of impiety
by saying anything which might be held
to disparage the works of the Creator’s
power. They, therefore, for the most
part, rather endeavour to show that they
have as much right to the religious argu
ment as their opponents, and that, if the
course they recommend seems to conflict
with some part of the ways of Providence,
there is some other part with which it
agrees better than what is contended for
on the other side. In this mode of
dealing with the great a priori fallacies,
the progress of improvement clears away
particular errors while the causes of
errors are still left standing, and very
little weakened by each conflict; yet by
a long series of such partial victories
precedents are accumulated, to which
an appeal may be made against these
powerful prepossessions, and which
afford a growing hope that the misplaced
feeling, after having so often learnt to
recede, may some day be compelled to
an unconditional surrender. For, how
ever offensive the proposition may appear
to many religious persons, they should
be willing to look in the face the unde
niable fact that the order of nature, in so
far as unmodified by man, is such as no
being, whose attributes are justice and
benevolence, would have made with the
intention that his rational creatures
should follow it as an example. If made
wholly by such a Being, and not partly
by beings of very different qualities, it
could only be as a designedly imperfect
work, which man, in his limited sphere,
is to exercise justice and benevolence in
amending. The best persons have always
held it to be the essence of religion that
the paramount duty of man upon earth
is to amend himself; but all except
monkish quietists have annexed to this
in their inmost minds (though seldom
willing to enunciate the obligation with
the same clearness) the additional reli
gious duty of amending the world, and
not solely the human part of it, but the
material—the order of physical nature.
In considering this subject it is neces
sary to divest ourselves of certain pre
conceptions which may justly be called
natural prejudices, being grounded on
feelings which, in themselves natural
and inevitable, intrude into matters with
which they ought to have no concern.
One of these feelings is the astonishment,
rising into awe, which is inspired (even
independently of all religious sentiment)
by any of the greater natural phenomena.
A hurricane; a mountain precipice;
the desert; the ocean, either agitated or
at rest; the solar system, and the great
cosmic forces which hold it together;
the boundless firmament, and to an edu
cated mind any single star—excite feel
ings which make all human enterprises
and powers appear so insignificant that,
to a mind thus occupied, it seems in
sufferable presumption in so puny a
creature as man to look critically on
things so far above him, or dare to
measure' himself against the grandeur of
the universe. But a little interrogation
of our own consciousness will suffice to
�NATURE
convince us that what makes these
phenomena so impressive is simply their
vastness. The enormous extension in
space and time, or the enormous power
they exemplify, constitutes their sub
limity ; a feeling in all cases, more allied
to terror than to any moral emotion.
And though the vast scale of these
phenomena may well excite wonder, and
sets at defiance all idea of rivalry, the
feeling it inspires is of a totally different
character from admiration of excellence.
Those in whom awe produces admiration
may be aesthetically developed, but they
are morally uncultivated. It is one of
the endowments of the imaginative part
of our mental nature that conceptions of
greatness and power, vividly realised,
produce a feeling which, though in its
higher degrees closely bordering on pain,
we prefer to most of what are accounted
pleasures. But we are quite equally
capable of experiencing this feeling
towards maleficent power; and we never
experience it so strongly towards most of
the powers of the universe as when we
have most present to our consciousness
a vivid sense of their capacity of inflict
ing evil. Because these natural powers
have what we cannot imitate, enormous
might, and overawe us by that one attri
bute, it would be a great error to infer
that their other attributes are such as we
ought to emulate, or that we should be
justified in using our small powers after
the example which Nature sets us with
her vast forces. For how stands the
fact? That, next to the greatness of
these cosmic forces, the quality which
most forcibly strikes every one who does
not avert his eyes from it is their perfect
and absolute recklessness. They go
straight to their end, without regarding
what or whom they crush on the road.
Optimists, in their attempts to prove
17
that “whatever is, is right,” are obliged
to maintain, not that Nature ever turns
one step from her path to avoid tramp
ling us into destruction, but that it would
be very unreasonable in us to expect
that she should. Pope’s “ Shall gravita
tion cease when you go by ? ” may be a
just rebuke to any one who should be
so silly as to expect common human
morality from nature. But if the ques
tion were between two men, instead of
between a man and a natural phenome
non, that triumphant apostrophe would be
thought a rare piece of impudence. A
man who should persist in hurling stones
or firing cannon when another man
“ goes by,” and having killed him should
urge a similar plea in exculpation,
would very deservedly be found guilty of
murder.
In sober truth, nearly all the things
which men are hanged or imprisoned
for doing to one another are nature’s
every-day performances. Killing, the
most criminal act recognised by human
laws, Nature does once to every being
that lives ; and, in a large proportion of
cases, after protracted tortures sUch as
only the greatest monsters whom we
read of ever purposely inflicted on their
living fellow-creatures. If, by an arbi
trary reservation, we refuse to account
anything murder but what abridges a
certain term supposed to be allotted to
human life, nature also does this to all
but a small percentage of lives, and does
it in all the modes, violent or insidious,
in which the worst human beings take
the lives of one another. Nature impales
men, breaks them as if on the wheel,
casts them to be devoured by wild
beasts, burns them to death, crushes
them with stones like the first Christian
martyr, starves them with hunger, freezes
them with cold, poisons them by the
c
�iS
NATURE
quick or slow venom of her exhalations,
and has hundreds of other hideous
deaths in reserve, such as the ingenious
cruelty of a Nabis or a Domitian never
surpassed. All this Nature does with
the most supercilious disregard both of
mercy and of justice, emptying her
shafts upon the best and noblest indif
ferently with the meanest and worst;
upon those who are engaged in the
highest and worthiest enterprises, and
often as the direct consequence of the
noblest acts; and it might almost
be imagined as a punishment for them.
She mows down those on whose exist
ence hangs the well-being of a whole
people, perhaps the prospect of the
human race for generations to come,
with as little compunction as those
whose death is a relief to themselves, or
a blessing to those under their noxious
influence. Such are Nature’s dealings
with life. Even when she does not
intend to kill, she inflicts the same
tortures in apparent wantonness. In the
clumsy provision which she has made
for that perpetual renewal of animal life,
rendered necessary by the prompt termi
nation she puts to it in every individual
instance, no human being ever comes
into the world but another human being
is literally stretched on the rack for hours
or days, not unfrequently issuing in
death. Next to taking life (equal to it
according to a high authority) is taking
the means by which we live ; and Nature
does this too on the largest scale and
with the most callous indifference. A
single hurricane destroys the hopes of a
season ; a flight of locusts, or an inun
dation, desolates a district; a trifling I
chemical change in an edible root
starves a million of people. The waves
of the sea, like banditti, seize and appro
priate the wealth of the rich and the little
all of the poor with the same accompani
ments of stripping, wounding, and killing
as their human antitypes. Everything,
in short, which the worst men commit
either against life or property is perpe
trated on a larger scale by natural agents.
Nature has Noyades more fatal than
those of Carrier; her explosions of fire
damp are as destructive as human
artillery; her plague and cholera far
surpass the poison-cups of the Borgias.
Even the love of “ order,” which is
thought to be a following of the ways of
Nature, is in fact a contradiction of them.
All which people are accustomed to
deprecate as “disorder” and its conse
quences is precisely a counterpart of
Nature’s ways. Anarchy and the Reign
of Terror are overmatched in injustice,
ruin, and death by a hurricane and a
pestilence.
But, it is said, all these things are for
wise and good ends. On this I must
first remark that whether they are so or
not is altogether beside the point. Sup
posing it true that, contrary to appear
ances, these horrors, when perpetrated by
Nature, promote good ends, still, as no
one believes that good ends would be
promoted by our following the example,
the course of Nature cannot be a proper
model for us to imitate. Either it is
right that we should kill because nature
kills; torture because nature tortures ;
ruin and devastate because nature does
the like; or we ought not to consider at
all what nature does, but what it is good
to do. If there is such a thing as a
reductio adabsurdum, this surely amounts
to one. If it is a sufficient reason for
doing one thing, that nature does it, why
not another thing ? If not all things,
why anything ? The physical govern
ment of the world being full of the things
which when done by men are deemed
�NATURE
the greatest enormities, it cannot be
religious or moral in us to guide our
actions by the analogy of the course of
nature. This proposition remains true,
whatever occult quality of producing
good may reside in those facts of nature
which to our perceptions are most
noxious, and which no one considers it
other than a crime to produce artifici
ally.
But, in reality, no one consistently
believes in any such occult quality. The
phrases which ascribe perfection to the
course of nature can only be considered
as the exaggerations of poetic or devo
tional feeling, not intended to stand the
test of a sober examination. No one,
either religious or irreligious, believes
that the hurtful agencies of nature, con
sidered as a whole, promote good pur
poses, in any other way than by inciting
human rational creatures to rise up and
struggle against them. If we believed
that those agencies were appointed by a
benevolent Providence as the means of
accomplishing wise purposes which could
not be compassed if they did not exist,
then everything done by mankind which
tends to chain up these natural agencies
or to restrict their mischievous operation,
from draining a pestilential marsh down
to curing the toothache, or putting up an
umbrella, ought to be accounted im
pious ; which assuredly nobody does
account them, notwithstanding an under
current of sentiment setting in that
direction which is occasionally percep
tible. On the contrary, the improve
ments on which the civilised part of man
kind most pride themselves consist in
more successfully warding off those
natural calamities which, if we really
believed what most people profess to
believe, we should cherish as medicines
provided for our earthly state by infinite
19
wisdom. Inasmuch, too, as each genera
tion greatly surpasses its predecessors in
the amount of natural evil which it
succeeds in averting, our condition, if
the theory were true, ought by this time
to have become a terrible manifestation
of some tremendous calamity, against
which the physical evils we have learnt
to overmaster had previously operated
as a preservative. Any one, however,
who acted as if he supposed this to be
the case would be more likely, I think,
to be confined as a lunatic than rever
enced as a saint.
It is undoubtedly a very common fact
that good comes out of evil, and when it
does occur it is far too agreeable not tofind people eager to dilate on it. But, in
the first place, it is quite as often true of
human crimes as of natural calamities.
The fire of London, which is believed to
have had so salutary an effect on the
healthiness of the city, would have pro
duced that effect just as much if it had
been really the work of the furor
papisticus ” so long commemorated on
the Monument. The deaths of those
whom tyrants or persecutors have made
martyrs in any noble cause have done a
service to mankind which would not
have been obtained if they had died by
accident or disease. Yet, whatever inci
dental and unexpected benefits may
result from crimes, they are crimes,
nevertheless. In the second place, if
good frequently comes out of evil, the
converse fact, evil coming out of good,
is equally common. Every event, public
or private, which, regretted on its occur
rence, was declared providential at a
later period on account of some unfore
seen good consequence, might be
matched by some other event, deemed
fortunate at the time, but which proved
calamitous or fatal to those whom it
�20
IVA TURE
appeared to benefit. Such conflicts
between the beginning and the end, or
between the event and the expectation,
are not only as frequent, but as often
held up to notice, in the painful cases as
in the agreeable; but there is not the
same inclination to generalise on them ;
or at all events they are not regarded by
the moderns (though they were by the
ancients) as similarly an indication of
the divine purposes : men satisfy them
selves with moralising on the imperfect
nature of our foresight, the uncertainty
of events, and the vanity of human ex
pectations. The simple fact is, human
interests are so complicated, and the
effects of any incident whatever so multi
tudinous, that, if it touches mankind at
all, its influence on them is, in the great
majority of cases, both good and bad.
If the greater number of personal mis
fortunes have their good side, hardly any
..good fortune ever befel any one which
■did not give either to the same or to
some other person something to regret :
and unhappily there are many misfor
tunes so overwhelming that their favour
able side, if it exist, is entirely over
shadowed and made insignificant; while
the corresponding statement can seldom
be made concerning blessings. The
.effects, too, of every cause depend so
much on the circumstances which acci
dentally accompany it that many cases
are sure to occur in which even the total
result is markedly opposed to the pre
dominant tendency: and thus not only
evil has its good and good its evil side,
but good often produces an overbalance
of evil and evil an overbalance of good.
This, however, is by no means the
general tendency of either phenomenon.
On the contrary, both good and evil
naturally tend to fructify, each in its own
kind, good producing good, and evil,
evil. It is one of Nature’s general rules,
and part of her habitual injustice, that
“ to him that hath shall be given, but
from him that hath not shall be taken
even that which he hath.” The ordinary
and predominant tendency of good is
towards more good. Health, strength,
wealth, knowledge, virtue, are not only
good in themselves, but facilitate and
promote the acquisition of good, both of
the same and of other kinds. The person
who can learn easily is he who already
knows much : it is the strong and not
the sickly person who can do everything
which most conduces to health ; those
who find it easy to gain money are not
the poor, but the rich; while health,
strength, knowledge, talents, are all
means of acquiring riches, and riches
are often an indispensable means of
acquiring these. Again, e conveyso, what
ever may be said of evil turning into
good, the general tendency of evil is
towards further evil. Bodily illness
renders the body more susceptible of
disease; it produces incapacity of exer
tion, sometimes debility of mind, and
often the loss of means of subsistence.
All severe pain, either bodily or mental,
tends to increase the susceptibilities of
pain for ever after. Poverty is the parent
of a thousand mental and moral evils.
What is still worse, to be injured or
oppressed, when habitual, -lowers the
whole tone of the character. One bad
action leads to others, both in the agent
himself, in the bystanders, and in
the sufferers. All bad qualities are
strengthened by habit, and all vices and
follies tend to spread.
Intellectual
defects generate moral, and moral, intel
lectual ; and every intellectual or moral
defect generates others, and so on with
out end.
That much applauded class of authors,
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the writers on natural theology, have, I
venture to think, entirely lost their way,
and missed the sole line of argument
which could have made their speculations
acceptable to any one who can perceive
when two propositions contradict one
another. They have exhausted the
resources of sophistry to make it appear
that all the suffering in the world exists
to prevent greater—that misery exists,
for fear lest there should be misery : a
thesis which, if ever so well maintained,
could only avail to explain and justify
the works of limited beings, compelled
to labour under conditions independent
of their own will; but can have no
application to a Creator assumed to be
omnipotent, who, if he bends to a sup
posed necessity, himself makes the
necessity which he bends to. If the
maker of the world can all that he will,
he wills misery, and there is no escape
from the conclusion. The more consis
tent of those who have deemed them
selves qualified to “ vindicate the ways of
God to man ” have endeavoured to avoid
the alternative by hardening their hearts,
and denying that misery is an evil. The
goodness of God, they say, does not
consist in willing the happiness of his
creatures, but their virtue; and the uni
verse, if not a happy, is a just, universe.
But, waving the objections to this scheme
of ethics, it does not at all get rid of the
difficulty. If the Creator of mankind
willed that they should all be virtuous,
his designs are as completely baffled as
if he had willed that they should all be
happy : and the order of nature is con
structed with even less regard to the
requirements of justice than to those of
benevolence. If the law of all creation
were justice and the Creator omnipotent,
then, in whatever amount suffering and
happiness might be dispensed to the
2r
world, each person’s share of them would
be exactly proportioned to that person’s
good or evil deeds ; no human being
would have a worse lot than another,
without worse deserts ; accident or
favouritism would have no part in such
a world, but every human life would be
the playing out of a drama constructed
like a perfect moral tale. No one is able
to blind himself to the fact that the
world we live in is totally different from
this ; insomuch that the necessity of re
dressing the balance has been deemed
one of the strongest arguments for
another life after death, which amounts
to an admission that the order of things
in this life is often an example of injus
tice, not justice. If it be said that God
does not take sufficient account of
pleasure and pain to make them the
reward or punishment of the good or the
wicked, but that virtue is itself the
greatest good and vice the greatest evil,
then these at least ought to be dispensed
to all according to what they have done
to deserve them; instead of which, every
kind of moral depravity is entailed upon
multitudes by the fatality of their birth ;
through the fault of their parents, of
society, or of uncontrollable circum
stances, certainly through no fault of
their own. Not even on the most dis
torted and contrasted theory of good
which ever was framed by religious or
philosophical fanaticism can the govern
ment of Nature be made to resemble the
work of a being at once good and omni
potent.
The only admissible moral theory of
Creation is that the Principle of Good
cinnot at once and altogether subdue the
powers of evil, either physical or moral;
could not place mankind in a world free
from the necessity of an incessant struggle
with the maleficent powers, or make
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NATURE
them always victorious in that struggle,
but could and did make them capable of
carrying on the fight with vigour and
with progressively increasing success.
Of all the religious explanations of the
order of nature, this alone is neither
contradictory to itself nor to the facts
for which it attempts to account. Accord
ing to it, man’s duty would consist, not
in simply taking care of his own interests
by obeying irresistible power, but in
standing forward a not ineffectual auxi
liary to a Being of perfect beneficence ;
a faith which seems much better adapted
for nerving him to exertion than a vague
and inconsistent reliance on an Author
of Good who is supposed to be also the
author of evil. And I venture to assert
that such has really been, though often
unconsciously, the faith of all who have
drawn strength and support of any worthy
kind from trust in a superintending
Providence. There is no subject on
which men’s practical belief is more
incorrectly indicated by the words they
use to express it than religion. Many
have derived a base confidence from
imagining themselves to be favourites of
an omnipotent but capricious and
despotic Deity. But those who have
been strengthened in goodness by rely
ing on the sympathising support of a
powerful and good Governor of the
world have, I am satisfied, never really
believed that Governor to be, in the
strict sense of the term, omnipotent.
They have always saved his goodness at
the expense of his power. They have
believed, perhaps, that he could, if he
willed, remove all the thorns from their
individual path, but not without causing
greater harm to some one else, or frus
trating some purpose of greater importance
to the general well-being. They have
believed that he could do any one thing,
but not any combination of things; that
his government, like human government,
was a system of adjustments and com
promises ; that the world is inevitably
imperfect, contrary to his intention.1
And since the exertion of all his power
to make it as little imperfect as possible
leaves it no better than it is, they cannot
but regard that power, though vastly
beyond human estimate, yet as in itself
not merely finite, but extremely limited.
They are bound, for example, to suppose
that the best he could do for his human
creatures was to make an immense
majority of all who have yet existed be
born (without any fault of their own)
Patagonians, or Esquimaux, or something
nearly as brutal and degraded, but to
give them capacities which, by being
cultivated for very many centuries
in toil and suffering, and after many
of the best specimens of the race
have sacrificed their lives for the
purpose, have at last enabled some
chosen portions of the species to grow
into something better, capable of being
improved in centuries more into
1 This irresistible conviction conies out in the
writings of religious philosophers, in exact pro
portion to the general clearness of their under
standing. It nowhere shines forth so distinctly
as in Leibnitz’s famous Theodicee, so strangely
mistaken for a system of optimism, and, as such,
satirised by Voltaire on grounds which do not
even touch the author’s argument. Leibnitz
does not maintain that this world is the best of
all imaginable, but only of all possible, worlds ;
which, he argues, it cannot but be, inasmuch as
God, who is absolute goodness, has chosen it
and not another. In every page of the work be
tacitly assumes an abstract possibility and impos
sibility, independent of the divine power ; and,
though his pious feelings make him continue to
designate that power by the word “Omnipotence, ’
he so explains that term as to make it mean
power extending to all that is within the limits
of that abstract possibility.
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something really good, of which hitherto
there are only to be foun 1 individual
instances. It may be possible to believe
with Plato that perfect goodness, limited
and thwarted in every direction by the
intractableness of the material, has done
this because it could do no better. But
that the same perfectly wise and good
Being had absolute power over the
material, and made it, by voluntary
choice, what it is; to admit this might
have been supposed impossible to any
one who has the simplest notions of
moral good and evil. Nor can any such
person, whatever kind of religious phrases
he may use, fail to believe that if Nature
and man are both the works of a Being
of perfect goodness, that Being intended
Nature as a scheme to be amended, not
imitated, by man.
But even though unable to believe
that Nature, as a whole, is a realisation
of the designs of perfect wisdom and
benevolence, men do not willingly re
nounce the idea that some part of
Nature, at least, must be intended as an
exemplar, or type; that on some portion
or other of the Creator’s works the
image of the moral qualities which they
are accustomed to ascribe to him must be
impressed ; that if not all which is, yet
something which is, must not only be a
faultless model of what ought to be, but
must be intended to be our guide and
standard in rectifying the rest. It does
not suffice them to believe that what
tends to good'is to be imitated and per
fected, and what tends to evil is to be
corrected: they are anxious for some
more definite indication of the Creator’s
designs; and, being persuaded that this
must somewhere be met with in his
works, undertake the dangerous respon
sibility of picking and choosing among
them in quest of it. A choice which,
except so far as directed by the general
maxim that he intends all the good and
none of the evil, must of necessity be
perfectly arbitrary; and if it leads to any
conclusions other than such as can be
deduced from that maxim, must be,
exactly in that proportion, pernicious.
It has never been settled by any
accredited doctrine what particular de
partments of the order of nature shall be
reputed to be designed for our moral
instruction and guidance ; and accord
ingly each person’s individual predilec
tions, or momentary convenience, have
decided to what parts of the divine
government the practical conclusions
that he was desirous of establishing
should be recommended to approval as
being analogous. One such recommen
dation must be as fallacious as another,
for it is impossible to decide that cer
tain of the Creator’s works are more
truly expressions of his character than
the rest; and the only selection which
does not lead to immoral results is the
selection of those which most conduce
to the general good—in other words, of
those which point to an end which, if the
entire scheme is the expression of a
single omnipotent and consistent will, is
evidently not the end intended by it.
There is, however, one particular
element in the construction of the world
which, to minds on the look-out for
special indications of the Creator’s will,
has appeared, not without plausibility,
peculiarly fitted to afford them ; viz.,
the active impulses of human and other
animated beings. One can imagine such
persons arguing that, when the Author of
Nature only made circumstances, he may
not have meant to indicate the manner
in which his rational creatures were to
adjust themselves to those circumstances;
but that when he implanted positive
�24
AU TURE
stimuli in the creatures themselves,
stirring them up to a particular kind of
action, it is impossible to doubt that he
intended that sort of action to be prac
tised by them. This reasoning, followed
out consistently, would lead to the con
clusion that the Deity intended, and
approves, whatever human beings do;
since all that they do being the conse
quence of some of the impulses with
which their Creator must have endowed
them, all must equally be considered as
done in obedience to his will. As this
practical conclusion wras shrunk from, it
was necessary to draw a distinction, and
to pronounce that not the whole, but
only parts, of the active nature of man
kind point to a special intention of the
Creator in respect to their tonduct.
These parts, it seemed natural to suppose,
must be those in which the Creator’s
hand is manifested rather than the man’s
own; and hence the frequent antithesis
between man as God made him and
man as he has made himself. Since
what is done with deliberation seems
more the man’s own act, and he is held
more completely responsible for it than
for what he does from sudden impulse,
the considerate part of human conduct
is apt to be set down as man’s share in
the business, and the inconsiderate as
God’s. The result is the vein of senti
ment so common in the modern world
(though unknown to the philosophic
ancients) which exalts instinct at the
expense of reason ; an aberration ren
dered still more mischievous by the
opinion commonly held in conjunction
with it, that every, or almost every, feel
ing or impulse which acts promptly with
out waiting to ask questions is an instinct.
Thus almost every variety of unreflecting
and uncalculating impulse receives a
kind of consecration, except those which,
though unreflecting at the moment, owe
their origin to previous habits of reflec
tion : these, being evidently not instinc
tive, do not meet with the favour accorded
to the rest; so that all unreflecting
impulses are invested with authority over
reason, except the only ones which are
most probably right. I do not mean, of
course, that this mode of judgment is
even pretended to be consistently carried
out : life could not go on if it were not
admitted that impulses must be con
trolled, and that reason ought to govern
our actions. The pretension is not to
drive Reason from the helm, but rather
to bind her by articles to steer only in a
particular way. Instinct is not to govern,
but reason is to practise some vague and
unassignable amount of deference to
Instinct. Though the impression in
favour of instinct as being a peculiar
manifestation of the divine purposes has
not been cast into the form of a con
sistent general theory, it remains a stand
ing prejudice, capable of being stirred up
into hostility to reason in any case in
which the dictate of the rational faculty
has not acquired the authority of pre
scription.
I shall not here enter into the difficult
psychological question, what are or are
not instincts : the subject would require
a volume to itself. Without touching
upon any disputed theoretical points, it
is possible to judge how little worthy is
the instinctive part of human nature to
be held up as its chief excellence—as the
part in which the hand of infinite good
ness and wisdom is peculiarly visible.
Allowing everything to be an instinct
which anybody has ever asserted to be
one, it remains true that nearly every
respectable attribute of humanity is the
result not of instinct, but of a victory
over instinct; and that there is hardly
�NA TURE
anything valuable in the natural man
except capacities—a whole world of pos
sibilities, all of them dependent upon
eminently artificial discipline for being
realised.
It is only in a highly artificialised con
dition of human nature that the notion
grew up, or, I believe, ever could have
grown up, that goodness was natural :
because only after a long course of arti
ficial education did good sentiments
become so habitual, and so predominant
over bad, as to arise unprompted when
occasion called for them. In the times
when mankind were nearer to their
natural state, cultivated observers re
garded the natural man as a sort of wild
animal, distinguished chiefly by being
craftier than the other beasts of the field;
and all worth of character was deemed
the result of a sort of taming ; a phrase
often applied by the ancient philosophers
to the appropriate discipline of human
beings. The truth is that there is hardly
a single point of excellence belonging to
human character which is not decidedly
repugnant to the untutored feelings of
human nature.
If there be a virtue which more than
any other we expect to find, and really
do find, in an uncivilised state, it is the
virtue of courage. Yet this is from first
to last a victory achieved over one of the
most powerful emotions of human nature.
If there is any one feeling or attribute
more natural than all others to human
beings, it is fear ; and no greater proof
can be given of the power of artificial
discipline than the conquest which it has
at all times and places shown itself
capable of achieving over so mighty and
so universal a sentiment. The widest
difference no doubt exists between one
human being and another in the facility
or difficulty with which they acquire this
25
virtue. There is hardly any department
of human excellence in which difference
of original temperament goes so far.
But it may fairly be questioned if any
human being is naturally courageous.
Many are naturally pugnacious, or
irascible, or enthusiastic, and these
passions when strongly excited may
render them insensible to fear. But
take away the conflicting emotion, and
fear reasserts its dominion : consistent
courage is always the effect of cultiva
tion. The courage which is occasionally,
though by no means generally, found
among tribes of savages is as much the
result of education as that of the
Spartans or Romans. In all such tribe?
there is a most emphatic direction of the
public sentiment into every channel of
expression through which honour can be
paid to courage and cowardice held up to
contempt and derision. It will perhaps
be said that, as the expression of a senti
ment implies the sentiment itself, the
training of the young to courage pre
supposes an originally courageous people.
It presupposes only what all good
customs presuppose—that there must
have been individuals better than the
rest who set the customs going. Some
individuals, who like other people had
fears to conquer, must have had strength
of mind and will to conquer them for
themselves. These would obtain the
influence belonging to heroes, for that
which is at once astonishing and
obviously useful never fails to be ad
mired : and partly through this admira
tion, partly through the fear they them
selves excite, they would obtain the
power of legislators, and could establish
whatever customs they pleased.
Let us next consider a quality which
forms the most visible and one of the
most radical of the moral distinctions
�26
NA TURE
between human beings and most of the
lower animals ; that of which the absence,
more than of anything else, renders men
bestial—the quality of cleanliness. Can
anything be more entirely artificial ?
Children, and the lower classes of most
countries, seem to be actually fond of
dirt: the vast majority of the human
race are indifferent to it : whole nations
of otherwise civilised and cultivated
human beings tolerate it in some of its
worst forms, and only a very small
minority are consistently offended by it.
Indeed, the universal law of the subject
appears to be that uncleanliness offends
only those to whom it is unfamiliar, so
that those who have lived in so artificial
a state as to be unused to it in any form
are the sole persons whom it disgusts in
all forms. Of all virtues this is the most
evidently not instinctive, but a triumph
over instinct. Assuredly neither cleanli
ness nor the love of cleanliness is natural
to man, but only the capacity of acquir
ing a love of cleanliness.
Our examples have thus far been taken
from the personal, or, as they are called
by Bentham, the self-regarding virtues,
because these, if any, might be supposed
to be congenial even to the uncultivated
mind. Of the social virtues it is almost
superfluous to speak, so completely is
it the verdict of all experience that
selfishness is natural. By this I do not
in any wise mean to deny that sympathy
is natural also ; I believe, on the contrary,
that on that important fact rests the pos
sibility of any cultivation of goodness
and nobleness, and the hope of their
ultimate entire ascendancy. But sym
pathetic characters, left uncultivated and
given up to their sympathetic instincts,
are as selfish as others. The difference
is in the kind of selfishness : theirs is not
solitary but sympathetic selfishness;
rego'isme a deux, a trois, or a quatre; and
they may be very amiable and delightful
to those with whom they sympathise, and
grossly unjust and unfeeling to the rest
of the world. Indeed, the finer nervous
organisations which are most capable of
and most require sympathy have, from
their fineness, so much stronger impulses
of all sorts that they often furnish the
most striking examples of selfishness,
though of a less repulsive kind than that
of colder natures. Whether there ever
was a person in whom, apart from all
teaching of instructors, friends or books,
and from all intentional self-modelling
according to an ideal, natural benevolence
was a more powerful attribute than
selfishness in any of its forms, may
remain undecided. That such cases are
extremely rare every one must admit,
and this is enough for the argument.
But (to speak no further of self-control
for the benefit of others) the commonest
self-control for one’s own benefit—that
power of sacrificing a present desire to a
distant object or a general purpose which
is indispensable for making the actions
of the individual accord with his own
notions of his individual good; even this
is most unnatural to the undisciplined
human being: as may be seen by the
long apprenticeship which children serve
to it; the very imperfect manner in
which it is acquired by persons born to
power, whose will is seldom resisted, and
by all who have been early and much
indulged; and the marked absence of
the quality in savages, in soldiers and
sailors, and in a somewhat less degree in
nearly the whole of the poorer classes in
this and many other countries. The prin
cipal difference, on the point under con
sideration, between this virtue and others,
is that although, like them, it requires
a course of teaching, it is more susceptible
�NA TURE
than most of them of being self-taught.
The axiom is trite that self-control is only
learnt by experience ; and this endow
ment is only thus much nearer to being
natural than the others we have spoken
of, inasmuch as personal experience,
without external inculcation, has a certain
tendency to engender it. Nature does
not of herself bestow this, any more than
other virtues; but nature often ad
ministers the rewards and punishments
which cultivate it, and which in other
cases have to be created artificially for
the express purpose.
Veracity might seem, of all virtues, to
have the most plausible claim to being
natural, since, in the absence, of motives
to the contrary, speech usually conforms
to, or at least does not intentionally
deviate from, fact. Accordingly, this is
the virtue with which writers like
Rousseau delight in decorating savage
life, and setting it in advantageous con
trast with the treachery and trickery of
civilisation. Unfortunately this is a mere
fancy picture, contradicted by all the
realities of savage life. Savages are
always liars. They have not the faintest
notion of truth as a virtue. They have
a notion of not betraying to their hurt,
as of not hurting in any other way,
persons to whom they are bound by
some special tie of obligation; their
chief, their guest, perhaps, or their
friend: these feelings of obligation being
the taught morality of the savage state,
growing out of its characteristic circum
stances. But of any point of honour
respecting truth for truth’s sake they
have not the remotest idea; no more
than the whole East and the greater
part of Europe ; and in the few countries
which are sufficiently improved to have
such a point of honour it is confined to
a small minority, who alone, under any
27
circumstances of real temptation, prac
tise it.
From the general use of the expression
“natural justice,” it must be presumed
that justice is a virtue generally thought
to be directly implanted by Nature. I
believe, however, that the sentiment of
justice is entirely of artificial origin; the
idea of natural justice not preceding but
following that of conventional justice.
The farther we look back into the early
modes of thinking of the human race,
whether we consider ancient times
(including those of the Old Testament)
or the portions of mankind who are still
in no more advanced a condition than
that of ancient times, the more com
pletely do we find men’s notions of
justice defined and bounded by the
express appointment of law. A man’s
just rights meant the rights which the
law gave him : a just man was he who
never infringed, nor sought to infringe,
the legal property or other legal rights of
others. The notion of a higher justice,
to which laws themselves are amenable,
and by which the conscience is bound
without a positive prescription of law, is
a later extension of the idea, suggested
by, and following the analogy of, legal
justice, to which it maintains a parallel
direction through all the shades and
varieties of the sentiment, and from
which it borrows nearly the whole of its
phraseology. The very words justus and
justilia are derived from jus, law.
Courts of justice, administration of
justice, always mean the tribunals.
If it be said that there must be the
germs of all these virtues in human
nature, otherwise mankind would be
incapable of acquiring them, I am ready,
with a certain amount of explanation, to
admit the fact. But the weeds that dis
pute the ground with these beneficent
�28
NATURE
germs are themselves not germs, but
rankly luxuriant growths, and would, in
all but some one case in a thousand,
entirely stifle and destroy the former,
were it not so strongly the interest of
mankind to cherish the good germs in
one another, that they always do so, in
as far as their degree of intelligence
(in this as in other respects still very
imperfect) allows. It is through such
fostering, commenced early, and not
counteracted by unfavourable influences,
that, in some happily circumstanced
specimens of the human race, the most
elevated sentiments of which humanity
is capable become a second nature,
stronger than the first, and not so much
subduing the original nature as merging
it into itself. Even those gifted organisa
tions which have attained the like excel
lence by self-culture owe it essentially to
the same cause; for what self-culture
would be possible without aid from the
general sentiment of mankind delivered
through books, and from the contempla
tion of exalted characters, real or ideal ?
This artificially created, or at least artifi
cially perfected, nature of the best and
noblest human beings is the only nature
which it is ever commendable to follow.
It is almost superfluous to say that even
this cannot be erected into a standard of
conduct, since it is itself the fruit of a
training and culture the choice of which,
if rational and not accidental, must have
been determined by a standard already
chosen.
This brief survey is amply sufficient to
prove that the duty of man is the same
in respect to his own nature as in respect
to the nature of all other things—namely,
not to follow but to amend it. Some
people, however, who do not attempt to
deny that instinct ought to be subordi
nate to reason, pay deference to Nature
so far as to maintain that every natural
inclination must have some sphere of
action granted to it, some opening left
for its gratification. All natural wishes,
they say, must have been implanted for
a purpose: and this argument is carried
so far that we often hear it maintained
that every wish which it is supposed to
be natural to entertain must have a
corresponding provision in the order of
the universe for its gratification; inso
much (for instance) that the desire of an
indefinite prolongation of existence is
believed by many to be in itself a
sufficient proof of the reality of a future
life.
I conceive that there is a radical
absurdity in all these attempts to dis
cover, in detail, what are the designs of
Providence, in order, when they are dis
covered, to help Providence in bringing
them about. Those who argue, from
particular indications, that Providence
intends this or that, either believe that
the Creator can do all that he will or
that he cannot. If the first supposition
is adopted—if Providence is omnipotent,
Providence intends whatever happens,
and the fact of its happening proves that
Providence intended it. If so, every
thing which a human being can do is
predestined by Providence and is a fulfil
ment of its designs. But if, as is the
more religious theory, Providence intends
not all which happens, but only what is
good, then indeed man has it in his
power, by his voluntary actions, to aid
the intentions of Providence; but he
can only learn those intentions by con
sidering what tends to promote the
general good, and not what man has
a natural inclination to; for, limited as,
on this showing, the divine power must
be, by inscrutable but insurmountable
obstacles, who knows that nun could.
�NATURE
have been created without desires which
never are to be, and even which never
ought to be, fulfilled ? The inclinations
with which man has been endowed, as
well as any of the other contrivances
which we observe in Nature, may be the
expression not of the divine will, but of
the fetters which impede its free action;
and to take hints from these for the
guidance of our own conduct may be
falling into a trap laid by the enemy.
The assumption that everything which
infinite goodness can desire actually
comes to pass in this universe, or at
least that we must never say or suppose
that it does not, is worthy only of those
whose slavish fears make them offer the
homage of lies to a Being who, they
profess to think, is incapable of being
deceived and holds all falsehood in
abomination.
With regard to this particular hypo
thesis, that all natural impulses, all
propensities sufficiently universal and
sufficiently spontaneous to be capable of
passing for instincts, must exist for good
ends, and ought to be only regulated,
not repressed; this is of course true of
the majority of them, for the species
could not have continued to exist unless
most of its inclinations had been directed
to things needful or useful for its pre
servation. But unless the instincts can
be reduced to a very small number
indeed, it must be allowed that we have
also bad instincts which it should be the
aim of education not simply to regulate,
but to extirpate, or rather (what can be
done even to an instinct) to starve
by disuse. Those who are inclined to
multiply the number of instincts, usually
include among them one which they call
destructiveness: an instinct to destroy
for destruction’s sake. I can conceive
no good reason for preserving this, any
29
more than another propensity which, if
notan instinct, is very like one—what has
been called the instinct of domination ;
a delight in exercising despotism, in
holding other beings in subjection to our
will. The man who takes pleasure in
the mere exertion of authority, apart
from the purpose for which it is to
be employed, is the last person in whose
hands one would willingly entrust it.
Again, there are persons who are cruel
by character, or, as the phrase is,
naturally cruel; who have a real pleasure
in inflicting, or seeing the infliction of
pain. This kind of cruelty is not mere
hardheartedness, absence of pity or re
morse; it is a positive thing; a par
ticular kind of voluptuous excitement.
The East and Southern Europe have
afforded, and probably still afford,
abundant examples of this hateful pro
pensity. I suppose it will be granted
that this is not one of the natural in
clinations which it would be wrong to
suppress. The only question would be,
whether it is not a duty to suppress the
man himself along with it.
But even if it were true that every one
of the elementary impulses of human
nature has its good side, and may by a
sufficient amount of artificial training be
made more useful than hurtful; how
little would this amount to, when it must
in any case be admitted that without
such training all of them, even those
which are necessary to our preservation,
would fill the world with misery, making
human life an exaggerated likeness of
the odious scene of violence and tyranny
which is exhibited by the rest of the
animal kingdom, except in so far as
tamed and disciplined by man. There,
indeed, those who flatter themselves
with the notion of reading the purposes
of the Creator in his works ought in
�3°
NATURE
consistency to have seen grounds for
inferences from which they have shrunk.
If there are any marks at all of special
design in creation, one of the things
most evidently designed is that a large
proportion of all animals should pass
their existence in tormenting and de
vouring other animals. They have been
lavishly fitted out with the instru
ments necessary for that purpose; their
strongest instincts impel them to it, and
many of them seem to have been con
structed incapable of supporting them
selves by any other food. If a tenth
part of the pains which have been ex
pended in finding benevolent adaptations
in all nature had been employed in
collecting evidence to blacken the
character of the Creator, what scope for
comment would not have been found in
the entire existence of the lower animals,
divided, with scarcely an exception, into
devourers and devoured, and a prey to a
thousand ills from which they are denied
the faculties necessary for protecting
themselves ! If we are not obliged to
believe the animal creation to be the
work of a demon, it is because we need
not suppose it to have been made by a
Being of infinite power. But if imitation
of the Creator’s will as revealed in nature
were applied as a rule of action in this
case, the most atrocious enormities of the
worst men would be more than justified
by the apparent intention of Providence
■that throughout all animated nature the
strong should prey upon the weak.
The preceding observations are far
from having exhausted the almost infinite
variety of modes and occasions in which
the idea of conformity to nature is intro
duced as an element into the ethical
appreciation of actions and dispositions.
I he same favourable prejudgment follows
the word “nature” through the numerous
acceptations in which it is employed as
a distinctive term for certain parts of the
constitution of humanity as contrasted
with other parts. We have hitherto con
fined ourselves to one of these accepta
tions, in which it stands as a general
designation for those parts of our mental
and moral constitution which are sup
posed to be innate, in contradistinction
to those which are acquired; as when
nature is contrasted with education; or
when a savage state, without laws, arts,
or knowledge, is called a state of nature;
or when the question is asked whether
benevolence, or the moral sentiment, is
natural or acquired; or whether some
persons are poets or orators by nature
and others not. But, in another and a
more lax sense, any manifestations by
human beings are often termed natural
when it is merely intended to say that
they are not studied or designedly
assumed in the particular case; as when
a person is said to move or speak with
natural grace; or when it is said that a
person’s natural manner or character is
so and so; meaning that it is so when he
does not attempt to control or disguise
it. In a still looser acceptation, a person
is said to be naturally that which he was
until some special cause had acted upon
him, or which it is supposed he would
be if some such cause were withdrawn.
Thus a person is said to be naturally
dull, but to have made himself intel
ligent by study and perseverance; to be
naturally cheerful, but soured by misfor
tune; naturally ambitious, but kept down
by want of opportunity. Finally, the
word “natural,” applied to feelings or
conduct, often seems to mean no
more than that they are such as are
ordinarily found in human beings ; as
when it is said that a person acted, on
some particular occasion, as it was
�NA TURE
natural to do; or that to be affected in
a particular way by some sight, or sound,
or thought, or incident in life, is perfectly
natural.
In all these senses of the term, the
quality called natural is very often con
fessedly a worse quality than the one
contrasted with it; but whenever its
being so is not too obvious to be
questioned, the idea seems to be enter
tained that by describing it as natural
something has been said amounting to a
considerable presumption in its favour.
For my part, I can perceive only one
sense in which nature, or naturalness, in
a human being, is really a term of praise ;
and then the praise is only negative—
namely, when used to denote the absence
of affectation. Affectation may be de
fined,the effort to appear what one is not,
when the motive or the occasion is not
such as either to excuse the attempt or
to stamp it with the more odious name
of hypocrisy. It must be added that the
deception is often attempted to be
practised on the deceiver himself as well
as on others ; he imitates the external
signs of qualities which he would like to
have, in hopes to persuade himself that
he has them. Whether in the form
of deception or of self-deception, or of
something hovering between the two,
affectation is very rightly accounted a re
proach, and naturalness, understood as
the reverse of affectation, a merit. But
a more proper term by which to express
this estimable quality would be sincerity :
a term which has fallen from its original
elevated meaning, and popularly denotes
only a subordinate branch of the cardinal
virtue it once designated as a whole.
Sometimes also, in cases wheretheterm
“ affectation ” would be inappropriate,
since the conduct or demeanour spoken
of is really praiseworthy, people say, in
disparagement of the person concerned,
that such conduct or demeanour is not
natural to him; and make uncompli
mentary comparisons between him and
some other person, to whom it is natural:
meaning that what in the one seemed
excellent was the effect of temporary
excitement, or of a great victory over
himself, while in the other it is the
result to be expected from the habitu il
character. This mode of speech is not
open to censure, since nature is here
simply a term for the person’s ordinary
disposition, and if he is praised it is not
for being natural, but for being naturally
good.
Conformity to nature has no con
nection whatever with right and wrong.
The idea can never be fitly introduced
into ethical discussions at all, except,
occasionally and partially, into the
question of degrees of culpability. To
illustrate this point, let us consider the
phrase by which the greatest intensity of
condemnatory feeling is conveyed in
connection with the idea of nature—the
word “ unnatural.” That a thing is un
natural, in any precise meaning which
can be attached to the word, is no
argument for its being blamable ; since
the most criminal actions are to a being
like man not more unnatural than most
of the virtues. The acquisition of virtue
has in all ages been accounted a work of
labour and difficulty, while the descensus
Averni, on the contrary, is of proverbial
facility; and it assuredly requires in
most persons a greater conquest over a
greater number of natural inclinations to
become eminently virtuous than tran
scendently vicious. But if an action, or
an inclination, has been decided on
other grounds to be blamable, it may be
a circumstance in aggravation that it is
unnatural—that is, repugnant to some
�32
NA TURE
strong feeling usually found in human
beings ; since the bad propensity, what
ever it be, has afforded evidence of being
both strong and deeply rooted, by having
overcome that repugnance. This pre
sumption, of course, fails if the individual
never had the repugnance; and the
argument, therefore, is not fit to be
urged unless the feeling which is violated
by the act is not only justifiable and
reasonable, but is one which it is
blamable to be without.
The corresponding plea in extenuation
of a culpable act because it was natural,
or because it was prompted by a natural
feeling, never, I think, ought to be
admitted. There is hardly a bad action
ever perpetrated which is not perfectly
natural, and the motives to which are
not perfectly natural feelings. In the
eye of reason, therefore, this is no
excuse, but it is quite “natural” that it
should be so in the eyes of the multi
tude ; because the meaning of the ex
pression is, that they have a fellow
feeling with the offender. When they
say that something which they cannot
help admitting to be blamable is never
theless natural, they mean that they can
imagine the possibility of their being
themselves tempted to commit it. Most
people have a considerable amount of in
dulgence towards all acts of which they
feel a possible source within themselves,
reserving their rigour for those which,
though perhaps really less bad, they can
not in any way understand how it is
possible to commit. If an action con
vinces them (which it often does on very
inadequate grounds) that the person who
does it must be a being totally unlike
themselves, they are seldom particular in
examining the precise degree of blame
due to it, or even if blame is properly
due to it at all. They measure the
degree of guilt by the strength of their
antipathy; and hence differences of
opinion, and even differences of taste,
have been objects of as intense moral
abhorrence as the most atrocious crimes.
It will be useful to sum up in a few
words the leading conclusions of this
Essay.
The word “ nature ” has two principal
meanings : it either denotes the entire
system of things, with the aggregate of all
their properties, or it denotes things as
they would be, apart from human
intervention.
In the first of these senses, the
doctrine that man ought to follow nature
is unmeaning; since man has no power
to do anything else than follow nature ;
all his actions are done through, and in
obedience to, some one or many of
nature’s physical or mental laws.
In the other sense of the term, the
doctrine that man ought to follow nature,
or, in other words, ought to make the
spontaneous course of things the model
of his voluntary actions, is equally
irrational and immoral.
Irrational, because all human action
whatever consists in altering, and all
useful action in improving, the spon
taneous course of nature.
Immoral, because the course of natural
phenomena being replete with every
thing which when committed by human
beings is most worthy of abhorrence, any
one who endeavoured in his actions to
imitate the natural course of things
would be universally seen and acknow
ledged to be the wickedest of men.
The scheme of Nature, regarded in its
whole extent, cannot have had, for its
sole or even principal object, the good of
human or other sentient beings. What
good it brings to them is mostly the
result of their own exertions. What
�NA TURE
soever, in nature, gives indication of
beneficent design proves this benefi
cence to be armed only with limited
power; and the duty of man is to co
operate with the beneficent powers, not
by imitating, but by perpetually striving
33
to amend, the course of nature—and
bringing that part of it over which we can
exercise control more nearly into con
formity with a high standard of justice
and goodness.
D
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
It has sometimes been remarked how
much has been written, both by friends
and enemies, concerning the truth of
religion, and how little, at least in the
way of discussion or controversy, con
cerning its usefulness. This, however,
might have been expected; for the truth,
in matters which so deeply affect us, is
our first concernment. If religion, or
any particular form of it, is true, its
usefulness follows without other proof.
If to know authentically in what order of
things, under what government of the
universe, it is our destiny to live were
not useful, it is difficult to imagine what
could be considered so. Whether a
person is in a pleasant or in an un
pleasant place, a palace or a prison, it
cannot be otherwise than useful to him
to know where he is. So long, therefore,
as men accepted the teachings of their
religion as positive facts, no more a
matter of doubt than their own existence
or the existence of the objects around
them, to ask the use of believing it
could not possibly occur to them. The
utility of religion did not need to be
asserted until the arguments for its truth
had in a great measure ceased to con
vince. People must either have ceased
to believe, or have ceased to rely on the
belief of others, before they could take
that inferior ground of defence without a
consciousness of lowering what they were
endeavouring to raise. An argument
for the utility of religion is an appeal
to unbelievers, to induce them to prac
tise a well-meant hypocrisy; or to semi
believers, to make them avert their eyes
from what might possibly shake their
unstable belief; or finally to persons in
general, to abstain from expressing any
doubts they may feel, since a fabric of
immense importance to mankind is so
insecure at its foundations that men
must hold their breath in its neighbour
hood for fear of blowing it down.
In the present period of history, how
ever, we seem to have arrived at a time
when, among the arguments for and
against religion, those which relate to its
usefulness assume an important place.
We are in an age of weak beliefs, and in
which such belief as men have is much
more determined by their wish to be
lieve than by any mental appreciation of
evidence. The wish to believe does not
arise only from selfish, but often from
the most disinterested, feelings; and,
though it cannot produce the unwaver
ing and perfect reliance which once
existed, it fences round all that remains
of the impressions of early education;
it often causes direct misgivings to fade
away by disuse; and, above all, it induces
people to continue laying out their lives,
according to doctrines which have lost
part of their hold on the mind, and
to maintain towards the world the same,
or a rather more demonstrative, attitude
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
of belief than they thought it necessary
to exhibit when their personal conviction
was more complete.
If religious belief be indeed so neces
sary to mankind as we are continually
assured that it is, there is great reason to
lament that the intellectual grounds
of it should require to be backed by
moral bribery or subornation of the
understanding. Such a state of things
is most uncomfortable, even for those
who may, without actual insincerity,
describe themselves as believers; and
still worse as regards those who, having
consciously ceased to find the evidences
of religion convincing, are withheld from
saying so lest they should aid in doing
an irreparable injury to mankind. It is
a most painful position, to a conscien
tious and cultivated mind, to be drawn
in contrary directions by the two noblest
of all objects of pursuit—truth and the
general good. Such a conflict must
inevitably produce a growing indiffer
ence to one or other of these objects,
most probably to both. Many who
could render giant’s service both to
truth and to mankind, if they believed
that they could serve the one without
loss to the other, are either totally para
lysed, or led to confine their exertions to
matters of minor detail, by the apprehen
sion that any real freedom of speculation,
or any considerable strengthening or
enlargement of the thinking faculties of
mankind at large, might, by making
them unbelievers, be the surest way to
render them vicious and miserable.
Many, again, having observed in others
or experienced in themselves elevated
feelings which they imagine incapable of
emanating from any other source than
religion, have an honest aversion to any
thing tending, as they think, to dry up
the fountain of such feelings. They,
35
therefore, either dislike and disparage all
philosophy, or addict themselves with
intolerant zeal to those forms of it in
which intuition usurps the place of
evidence, and internal feeling is made
the test of objective truth. The whole
of the prevalent metaphysics of the
present century is one tissue of suborned
evidence in favour of religion; often of
Deism only, but in any case involving a
misapplication of noble impulses and
speculative capacities, among the most
deplorable of those wretched wastes of
human faculties which make us wonder
that enough is left to keep mankind
progressive, at however slow a pace. It
is time to consider, more impartially
and therefore more deliberately than is
usually done, whether all this training to
prop up beliefs which require so great
an expense of intellectual toil and in
genuity to keep them standing, yields
any sufficient return in human well
being ; and whether that end would not
be better served by a frank recognition
that certain subjects are inaccessible to
our faculties, and by the application of
the same mental powers to the strength
ening and enlargement of those other
sources of virtue and happiness which
stand in no need of the support or
sanction of supernatural beliefs and in
ducements.
Neither, on the other hand, can the
difficulties of the question be so promptly
disposed of as sceptical philosophers are
sometimes inclined to believe. It is not
enough to aver, in general terms, that
there never can be any conflict between
truth and utility; that, if religion be
false, nothing but good can be the conse
quence of rejecting it. For, though the
knowledge of every positive truth is an
useful acquisition, this doctrine cannot
without reservation be applied to negative
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
truth. When the only truth ascertain
able is that nothing can be known, we
do not, by this knowledge, gain any
new fact by which to guide ourselves;
we are, at best, only disabused of our
trust in some former guide-mark, which,
though itself fallacious, may have pointed
in the same direction with the best indi
cations we have, and if it happens to be
more conspicuous and legible, may have
kept us right when they might have been
overlooked. It is, in short, perfectly
conceivable that religion may be morally
useful without being intellectually sus
tainable ; and it would be a proof of
great prejudice in any unbeliever to deny
that there have been ages, and that there
are still both nations and individuals,
with regard to whom this is actually the
case. Whether it is the case generally,
and with reference to the future, it is the
object of this paper to examine. We
propose to inquire whether the belief in
religion, considered as a mere persuasion,
apart from the question of its truth, is
really indispensable to the temporal wel
fare of mankind; whether the usefulness
of the belief is intrinsic and universal,
or local, temporary, and, in some sense,
accidental; and whether the benefits
which it yields might not be obtained
otherwise, without the very large alloy
of evil, by which, even in the best form
of the belief, those benefits are qualified.
With the arguments on one side of
the question we are all familiar : religious
writers have not neglected to celebrate
to the utmost the advantages both of
religion in general and of their own
religious faith in particular. But those
who have held the contrary opinion have
generally contented themselves with in
sisting on the more obvious and flagrant
of the positive evils which have been en
gendered by past and present forms of
I
religious belief. And, in truth, mankind
have been so unremittingly occupied in
doing evil to one another in the name of
religion, from the sacrifice of Iphigenia
to the Dragonnades of Louis XIV. (not
to descend lower), that for any immediate
purpose there was little need to seek
arguments further off. These odious
consequences, however, do not belong to
religion in itself, but to particular forms
of it, and afford no argument against the
usefulness of any religions except those
by which such enormities are encouraged.
Moreover, the worst of these evils are
already in a great measure extirpated
from the more improved forms of
religion; and as mankind advance in
ideas and in feelings, this process of
extirpation continually goes on: the
immoral or otherwise mischievous con
sequences which have been drawn from
religion are, one by one, abandoned,
and, after having been long fought for as
of its very essence, are discovered to be
easily separable from it. These mis
chiefs, indeed, after they are past, though
no longer arguments against religion,
remain valid as large abatements from its
beneficial influence, by showing that
some of the greatest improvements ever
made in the moral sentiments of man
kind have taken place without it and in
spite of it, and that what we are taught
to regard as the chief of all improving in
fluences has in practice fallen so far
short of such a character that one of the
hardest burdens laid upon the other good
influences of human nature has been
that of improving religion itself. The
improvement, however, has taken place;
it is still proceeding, and for the sake of
fairness it should be assumed to be com
plete. We ought to suppose religion to
have accepted the best human morality
which reason and goodness can work out,
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
37
The first question is interesting to
everybody; the latter only to the best;
but to them it is, if there be any differ
ence, the more important of the two.
We shall begin with the former, as being
that which best admits of being easily
brought to a precise issue.
To speak first, then, of religious belief
as an instrument of social good. We
must commence by drawing a distinction
most commonly overlooked. It is usual
to credit religion as such with the whole
of the power inherent in any system of
moral duties inculcated by education and
enforced by opinion. Undoubtedly
mankind would be in a deplorable state
if no principles or precepts of justice,
veracity, beneficence, were taught
publicly or privately, and if these virtues
were not encouraged, and the opposite
vices repressed, by the praise and blame,
the favourable and unfavourable, senti
ments of mankind. And since nearly
everything of this sort which does take
place takes place in the name of religion ;
since almost all who are taught any
morality whatever have it taught to them
as religion, and inculcated on them
through life principally in that character;
the effect which the teaching produces as
teaching, it is supposed to produce as
religious teaching, and religion receives
the credit of all the influence in human
affairs which belongs to any generally
accepted system of rules for the guidance
and government of human life.
Few persons have sufficiently con
sidered how great an influence this is ;
what vast efficacy belongs naturally to
1 Analysis of the Influence ofNatural Religion any doctrine received with tolerable
on the Temporal Happiness of Mankind. By unanimity as true, and impressed on the
Philip Beauchamp. See Autobiography, pp. 69- mind from the earliest childhood as duty.
71. This work, I believe, is really by George
A little reflection will, I think, lead us to
Grote, the Historian of Greece, and friend and
the conclusion that it is this which is the
fellow-student of Mill. He read and analysed
great moral power in human affairs, and
it in the MS. so early as 1822.—II.T.
from philosophical, Christian, or any
other elements. When it has thus freed
itself from the pernicious consequences
which result from its identification with
any bad moral doctrine, the ground is
clear for considering whether its useful
properties are exclusively inherent in it, or
their benefits can be obtained without it.
This essential portion of the inquiry
into the temporal usefulness of religion
is the subject of the present Essay. It
is a part which has been little treated of
by sceptical writers. The only direct
discussion of it with which I am
acquainted is in a short treatise, under
stood to have been partly compiled from
manuscripts of Mr. Bentham,1 and
abounding in just and profound views;
but which, as it appears to me, presses
many parts of the argument too hard.
This treatise, and the incidental remarks
scattered through the writings of M.
Comte, are the only sources known to
me from which anything very pertinent
to the subject can be made available for
the sceptical side of the argument. I
shall use both of them freely in the
sequel of the present discourse.
The inquiry divides itself into two
parts, corresponding to the double aspect
of the subject; its social, and its in
dividual aspect. What does religion do
for society, and what for the individual ?
What amount of benefit to social
interests, in the ordinary sense of the
phrase, arises from religious belief? And
what influence has it in improving and
ennobling individual human nature ?
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
that religion only seems so powerful be
cause this mighty power has been under
its command.
Consider first the enormous influence
of authority on the human mind. I am
now speaking of involuntary influence;
effect on men’s convictions, on their per
suasion, on their involuntary sentiments.
Authority is the evidence on which the
mass of mankind believe everything
which they are said to know, except facts
of which their own senses have taken
cognisance. It is the evidence on which
even the wisest receive all those truths of
science, or facts in history or in life, of
which they have not personally examined
the proofs. Over the immense majority
of human beings the general concurrence
of mankind, in any matter of opinion, is
all-powerful. Whatever is thus certified
to them they believe with a fulness of
assurance which they do not accord even
to the evidence of their senses when the
general opinion of mankind stands in
opposition to it. When, therefore, any
rule of life and duty, whether grounded
or not on religion, has conspicuously re
ceived the general assent, it obtains a
hold on the belief of every individual,
stronger than it would have even if he
had arrived at it by the inherent force of
his own understanding.
If Novalis
could say, not without a real meaning,
4‘ My belief has gained infinitely to me
from the moment when one other human
being has begun to believe the same,”
how much more when it is not one other
person, but all the human beings whom
one knows of. Some may urge it as an
objection, that no scheme of morality has
this universal assent, and that none,
therefore, can be indebted to this source
for whatever power it possesses over the
mind. So far as relates to the present
age, the assertion is true, and strengthens
the argument which it might at first seem
to controvert; for exactly in proportion
as the received systems of belief have
been contested, and it has become known
that they have many dissentients, their
hold on the general belief has been
loosened, and their practical influence on
conduct has declined; and since this
has happened to them, notwithstanding
the religious sanction which attached to
them, there can be no stronger evidence
that they were powerful not as religion,
but as beliefs generally accepted by man
kind. To find people who believe their
religion as a person believes that fire
will burn his hand when thrust into
it, we must seek them in those Oriental
countries where Europeans do not yet
predominate, or in the European world
when it was still universally Catholic.
Men often disobeyed their religion in
those times, because their human
passions and appetites were too strong
for it, or because the religion itself
afforded means of indulgence to breaches
of its obligations; but, though they dis
obeyed, they, for the most part, did not
doubt. There was in those days an
absolute and unquestioning complete
ness of belief, never since general in
Europe.
Such being the empire exercised over
mankind by simple authority, the mere
belief and testimony of their fellow
creatures; consider next how tremendous
is the power of education; how unspeak
able is the effect of bringing people up
from infancy in a belief, and in habits
founded on it. Consider also that in
all countries, and from the earliest ages
down to the present, not merely those
who are called, in a restricted sense of
the term, the educated, but all, or nearly
all, who have been brought up by parents,
or by any one interested in them, have
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
been taught from their earliest years
some kind of religious belief, and some
precepts as the commands of the
heavenly powers to them and to man
kind. And as it cannot be imagined
that the commands of God are to young
children anything more than the com
mands of their parents, it is reasonable
to think that any system of social duty
which mankind might adopt, even though
divorced from religion, would have the
same advantage of being inculcated from
childhood, and would have it hereafter
much more perfectly than any doctrine
has at present, society being far more
disposed than formerly to take pains for
the moral tuition of those numerous
classes whose education it has hitherto
left very much to chance. Now, it is
especially characteristic of the impres
sions of early education that they possess
what it.is so much more difficult for later
convictions to obtain—command over
the feelings. We see daily how powerful
a hold these first impressions retain over
the feelings even of those who have
given up the opinions which they were
early taught. While, on the other hand,
it is only persons of a much higher
degree of natural sensibility and intellect
combined than it is at all common to
meet with, whose feelings entwine them
selves with anything like the same force
round opinions which they have adopted
from their own investigations later in
life; and even when they do, we may
say with truth that it is because the
strong sense of moral duty, the sincerity,
courage, and self-devotion which enabled
them to do so, were themselves the fruits
of early impressions.
The power of education is almost
boundless : there is not one natural in
clination which it is not strong enough to
coerce, and, if needful, to destroy by
39
disuse. In the greatest recorded victory
which education has ever achieved over
a whole host of natural inclinations
in an entire people—the maintenance
through centuries of the institutions of
Lycurgus—it was very little, if even at
all, indebted to religion : for the Gods
of the Spartans were the same as those
of other Greek States; and though, no
doubt, every State of Greece believed
that its particular polity had at its first
establishment some sort of divine sanc
tion (mostly that of the Delphian oracle),
there was seldom any difficulty in obtain
ing the same or an equally powerful
sanction for a change. It was not
religion which formed the strength of
the Spartan institutions : the root of the
system was devotion to Sparta, to the
ideal of the country or State; which,
transformed into ideal devotion to a
greater country, the world, would be
equal to that and far nobler achieve
ments. Among the Greeks generally
social morality was extremely indepen
dent of religion. The inverse relation
was rather that which existed between
them; the worship of the gods was
inculcated chiefly as a social duty, inas
much as, if they were neglected or
insulted, it was believed that their dis
pleasure would fall not more upon the
offending individual than upon the State
or community which bred and tolerated
him. Such moral teaching as existed in
Greece had very little to do with religion.
The gods were not supposed to concern
themselves much with men’s conduct to
one another, except when men had con
trived to make the gods themselves an
interested party, by placing an assertion
or an engagement under the sanction of a
solemn appeal to them, by oath or vow.
I grant that the sophists and philoso
phers, and even popular orators, did
�40
UTILITY OF RELIGION
their best to press religion into the
service of their special objects, and to
make it be thought that the sentiments
of whatever kind, which they were
engaged in inculcating, were particularly
acceptable to the gods; but this never
seems the primary consideration in any
case save those of direct offence to the
dignity of the gods themselves. For
the enforcement of human moralities
secular inducements were almost exclu
sively relied on. The case of Greece is,
I believe, the only one in which any
teaching, other than religious, has had
the unspeakable advantage of forming
the basis of education; and though
much may be said against the quality of
some part of the teaching, very little can
be said against its effectiveness. The
most memorable example of the power
of education over conduct is afforded
(as I have just remarked) by this excep
tional case; constituting a strong pre
sumption that in .other cases early
religious teaching has owed its power
over mankind rather to its being early
than to its being religious.
We have now considered two powers,
that of authority and that of early educa
tion, which operate through men’s in
voluntary beliefs, feelings, and desires,
and which religion has hitherto held
as its almost exclusive appanage. Let
us now consider a third power which
operates directly on their actions, whether
their involuntary sentiments are carried
with it or not. This is the power of
public opinion; of the praise and blame,
the favour and disfavour, of their fellow
creatures; and is a source of strength
inherent in any system of moral belief
which is generally adopted, whether con
nected with religion or not.
Men are so much accustomed to give
to the motives that decide their actions
more flattering names than justly belong
to them that they are generally quite un
conscious how much those parts of their
conduct which they most pride them
selves on (as well as some which they
are ashamed of) are determined by the
motive of public opinion. Of course,
public opinion for the most part enjoins
the same things which are enjoined by
the received social morality; that
morality being, in truth, the summary of
the conduct which each one of the
multitude, whether he himself observes
it with any strictness or not, desires that
others should observe towards him.
People are therefore easily able to flatter
themselves that they are acting from the
motive of conscience when they are
doing in obedience to the inferior motive
things which their conscience approves.
We continually see how great is the
power of opinion in opposition to con
science; how men “follow a multitude
to do evil ”; how often opinion induces
them to do what their conscience dis
approves, and still oftener prevents them
from doing what it commands. But
when the motive of public opinion acts
in the same direction with conscience,
which, since it has usually itself made the
conscience in the first instance, it for the
most part naturally does; it is then, of
all motives which operate on the bulk of
mankind, the most overpowering.
The names of all the strongest passions
(except the merely animal ones) mani
fested by human nature are each of them
a name for some one part only of the
motive derived from what I here call
public opinion. The love of glory ; the
love of praise; the love of admiration ;
the love of respect and deference ; even
the love of sympathy, are portions of its
attractive power. Vanity is a vituperative
name for its attractive influence generally,
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
when considered excessive in degree.
The fear of shame, the dread of ill repute
or of being disliked or hated, are the
direct and simple forms of its deterring
power. But the deterring force of the
unfavourable sentiments of mankind
does not consist solely in the painfulness
of knowing oneself to be the object of
those sentiments; it includes all the
penalties which they can inflict: ex
clusion from social intercourse and from
the innumerable good offices which
human beings require from one another;
the forfeiture of all that is called success
in life; often the great diminution or
total loss of means of subsistence;
positive ill offices of various kinds,
sufficient to render life miserable, and
reaching in some states of society as far
as actual persecution to death. And
again the attractive or impelling influ
ence of public opinion includes the
whole range of what is commonly meant
by ambition ; for, except in times of law
less military violence, the objects of
social ambition can be attained only by
means of the good opinion and favour
able disposition of our fellow-creatures;
now, in nine cases out of ten, would
those objects be even desired were it not
for the power they confer over the senti
ments of mankind. Even the pleasure
of self-approbation, in the great majority,
is mainly dependent on the opinion of
others. Such is the involuntary influence
of authority on ordinary minds that per
sons must be of a better than ordinary
mould to be capable of a full assurance
that they are in the right, when the world
—that is, when their world—thinks them
wrong ; nor is there, to most men, any
proof so demonstrative of their own
virtue or talent as that people in general
seem to believe in it. Through all depart
ments of human affairs regard for the
4’
sentiments of our fellow-creatures is in
one shape or other, in nearly all
characters, the pervading motive. And
we ought to note that this motive is
naturally strongest in the most sensitive
natures, which are the most promising
material for the formation of great virtues.
How far its power reaches is known by
too familiar experience to require either
proof or illustration here. When once
the means of living have been obtained,
the far greater part of the remaining
labour and effort which takes place on
the earth has for its object to acquire
the respect or the favourable regard of
mankind; to be looked up to, or at all
events not to be looked down upon, by
them. The industrial and commercial
activity which advances civilisation, the
frivolity, prodigality, and selfish thirst of
aggrandisement which retard it, flow
equally from that source. While, as an
instance of the power exercised by the
terrors derived from public opinion, we
know how many murders have been
committed merely to remove a witness
who knew and was likely to disclose
some secret that would bring disgrace
upon his murderer.
Any one who fairly and impartially
considers the subject will see reason to
believe that those great effects on human
conduct which are commonly ascribed
to motives derived directly from religion
have mostly for their proximate cause the
influence of human opinion. Religion
has been powerful not by its intrinsic
force, but because it has wielded that
additional and more mighty power. The
effect of religion has been immense in
giving a direction to public opinion ;
which has, in many most important
respects, been wholly determined by it.
But without the sanctions superadded by
public opinion its own proper sanctions
�42
UTILITY OF RELIGION
have never, save in exceptional charac
ters, or in peculiar moods of mind,
exercised a very potent influence, after
the times had gone by, in which divine
agency was supposed habitually to
employ temporal rewards and punish
ments. When a man firmly believed
that, if he violated the sacredness of a
particular sanctuary, he would be struck
dead on the spot, or smitten suddenly
with a mortal disease, he doubtless took
care not to incur the penalty ; but when
any one had had the courage to defy the
danger, and escaped with impunity, the
spell was broken. If ever any people
were taught that they were under a
divine government, and that unfaithful
ness to their religion and law would be
visited from above with temporal
chastisements, the Jews were so. Yet
their history was a mere succession of
lapses into Paganism. Their prophets
and historians, who held fast to the
ancient beliefs (though they gave them
so liberal an interpretation as to think it
a sufficient manifestation of God’s dis
pleasure towards a king if any evil
happened to his great grandson), never
ceased to complain that their countrymen
turned a deaf ear to their vaticinations ;
and hence, with the faith they held in a
divine government operating by temporal
penalties, they could not fail to anticipate
(as Mirabeau’s father, without such
prompting, was able to do on the eve of
the French Revolution) laculbutegenerate;
an expectation which, luckily for the
credit of their, prophetic powers, was
fulfilled; unlike that of the Apostle John,
who, in the only intelligible prophecy in
the Revelations, foretold to the city of
the seven hills a fate like that of Nineveh
and Babylon; which prediction remains
to this hour unaccomplished. Unques
tionably the conviction which experience
in time forced on all but the very
ignorant, that divine punishments were
not to be confidently expected in a tem
poral form, contributed much to the
downfall of the old religions, and the
general adoption of one which, without
absolutely excluding providential inter
ferences in this life for the punishment
of guilt or the reward of merit, removed
the principal scene of divine retribution
to a world after death. But rewards and
punishments postponed to that distance
of time, and never seen by the eye, are
not calculated, even when infinite and
eternal, to have, on ordinary minds, a
very powerful effect in opposition to
strong temptation. Their remoteness
alone is a prodigious deduction from
their efficacy on such minds as those
which most require the restraint of
punishment. A still greater abatement
is their uncertainty, which belongs to
them from the very nature of the case :
for rewards and punishments adminis
tered after death must be awarded not
definitely to particular actions, but on a
general survey of the person’s whole life,
and he easily persuades himself that,
whatever may have been his peccadilloes,
there will be a balance in his favour at
the last. All positive religions aid this
self-delusion. Bad religions teach that
divine vengeance may be bought off by
offerings or personal abasement; the
better religions, not to drive sinners to
despair, dwell so much on the divine
mercy that hardly any one is compelled
to think himself irrevocably condemned.
The sole quality in these punishments
which might seem calculated to make
them efficacious, their overpowering mag
nitude, is itself a reason why nobody
(except a hypochondriac here and there)
ever really believes that he is in any very
serious danger of incurring them. Even
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
the worst malefactor is hardly able to
think that any crime he lias had it in his
power to commit, any evil he can have
inflicted in this short space of existence,
can have deserved torture extending
through an eternity. Accordingly, re
ligious writers and preachers are never
tired of complaining how little effect
religious motives have on men’s lives and
conduct, notwithstanding the tremendous
penalties denounced.
Mr. Bentham, whom I have already
mentioned as one of the few authors
who have written anything to the purpose
on the efficacy of the religious sanction,
adduces several cases to prove that
religious obligation, when not enforced
by public opinion, produces scarcely any
effect on conduct. His first example is
that of oaths. The oaths taken in courts
of justice, and any others which, from
the manifest importance to society of
their being kept, public opinion rigidly
enforces, are felt as real and binding
obligations. But university oaths and
custom-house oaths, though in a religious
point of view equally obligatory, are in
practice utterly disregarded even by men
in other respects honourable. The uni
versity oath to obey the statutes has
been for centuries, with universal acquies
cence, set at nought; and utterly false
statements are (or used to be) daily and
unblushingly sworn to at the Custom
house by persons as attentive as other
people to all the ordinary obligations of
life—the explanation being that veracity
in these cases was not enforced by
public opinion. The second case which
Bentham cites is duelling; a practice
now in this country obsolete, but in full
vigour in several other Christian coun
tries ; deemed and admitted to be a sin
by almost all who, nevertheless, in obedi
ence to opinion, and to escape from
43
personal humiliation, are guilty of it.
The third case is that of illicit sexual
intercourse, which in both sexes stands
in the very highest rank of religious sins,
yet, not being severely censured by
opinion in the male sex, they have in
general very little scruple in committing
it; while in the case of women, though
the religious obligation is not stronger,
yet, being backed in real earnest by
public opinion, it is commonly effectual.
Some objection may doubtless be
taken to Bentham’s instances, considered
as crucial experiments on the power of
the religious sanction; for (it may be
said) people do not really believe that in
these cases they shall be punished by
God, any more than by man. And this
is certainly true in the case of those
university and other oaths, which are
habitually taken without any intention of
keeping them. The oath, in these
cases, is regarded as a mere formality,
destitute of any serious meaning in the
sight of the Deity; and the most scrupu
lous person, even if he does reproach
himself for having taken an oath which
nobody deems fit to be kept, does not in
his conscience tax himself with the guilt
of perjury, but only with the profanation
of a ceremony. This, therefore, is not a
good example of the weakness of the
religious motive when divorced from
that of human opinion. The point
which it illustrates is rather the tendency
of the one motive to come and go with
the other, so that, where the penalties of
public opinion cease, the religious motive
ceases also. The same criticism, how
ever, is not equally applicable to Ben
tham’s other examples—duelling and
sexual irregularities. Those who do
these acts—the first by the command of
public opinion, the latter with its indul
gence—really do, in most cases, believe
�44
UTILITY OF RELIGION
that they are offending God. Doubtless,
they do not think that they are offending
him in such a degree as very seriously to
endanger their salvation. Their reliance
on his mercy prevails over their dread of
his resentment: affording an exemplifica
tion of the remark already made, that
the unavoidable uncertainty of religious
penalties makes them feeble as a
deterring motive. They are so, even in
the case of acts which human opinion
condemns ; much more with those to
which it is indulgent. What mankind
think venial, it is hardly ever supposed
that God looks upon in a serious light;
at least by those who feel in themselves
any inclination to practise it.
I do not for a moment think of deny
ing that there are states of mind in which
the idea of religious punishment acts
with the most overwhelming force. In
hypochondriacal disease, and in those
with whom, from great disappointments
or other moral causes, the thoughts and
imagination have assumed an habitually
melancholy complexion, that topic,
falling in with the pre-existing tendency
of the mind, supplies images well fitted
to drive the unfortunate sufferer even to
madness. Often, during a temporary
state of depression, these ideas take such
a hold of the mind as to give a per
manent turn to the character ; being the
most common case of what, in sectarian
phraseology, is called conversion. But
if the depressed state ceases after the
conversion, as it commonly does, and
the convert does not relapse, but per
severes in his new course of life, the
principal difference between it and the
old is usually found to be that the man
now guides his life by the public opinion
of his religious associates, as he before
guided it by that of the profane world.
At all events, there is one clear proof how
little the generality of mankind, either
religious or worldly, really dread eternal
punishments, when we see how, even at
the approach of death, when the remote
ness which took so much from their
effect has been exchanged for the closest
proximity, almost all persons who have
not been guilty of some enormous crime
(and many who have) are quite free from
uneasiness as to their prospects in
another world, and never for a moment
seem to think themselves in any real
danger of eternal punishment.
With regard to the cruel deaths and
bodily tortures which confessors and
martyrs have so often undergone for the
sake of religion, I would not depreciate
them by attributing any part of this
admirable courage and constancy to the
influence of human opinion. Human
opinion, indeed, has shown itself quite
equal to the production of similar firm
ness in persons not otherwise distin
guished by moral excellence ; such as
the North American Indian at the stake.
But if it was not the thought of glory in
the eyes of their fellow-religionists which
upheld these heroic sufferers in their
agony, as little do I believe that it was,
generally speaking, that of the pleasures
of heaven or the pains of hell. Their
impulse was a divine enthusiasm—a self
forgetting devotion to an idea : a state of
exalted feeling, by no means peculiar
to religion, but which it is the privilege
of every great cause to inspire; a
phenomenon belonging to the critical
moments of existence, not to the ordi
nary play of human motives, and from
which nothing can be inferred as to the
efficacy of the ideas which it sprung
from, whether religious or any other, in
overcoming ordinary temptations and
regulating the course of daily life.
We may now have done with this
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
branch of the subject, which is, after all,
the vulgarest part of it. The value of
religion as a supplement to human laws,
a more cunning sort of police, an
auxiliary to the thief-catcher and the
hangman, is not that part of its claims
which the more high-minded of its
votaries are fondest of insisting on ; and
they would probably be as ready as any
one to admit that, if the nobler offices
of religion in the soul could be dispensed
with, a substitute might be found for so
coarse and selfish a social instrument as
the fear of hell. In their view of the
matter, the best of mankind absolutely
require religion for the perfection of their
own character, even though the coercion
of the worst might possibly be accom
plished without its aid.
Even in the social point of view, how
ever, under its most elevated aspect,
these nobler spirits generally assert the
necessity of religion, as a teacher, if not
as an enforcer, of social morality. They
say that religion alone can teach us what
morality is; that all the high morality
ever recognised by mankind was learnt
from religion; that the greatest unin
spired philosophers in their sublimest
flights stopped far short of the Christian
morality, and, whatever inferior morality
they may have attained to (by the assist
ance, as many think, of dim traditions
derived from the Hebrew books, or from
a primaeval revelation), they never could
induce the common mass of their fellow
citizens to accept it from them. That
only when a morality is understood to
come from the gods do men in general
adopt it, rally round it, and lend their
human sanctions for its enforcement.
That, granting the sufficiency of human
motives to make the rule obeyed, were it
not for the religious idea we should not
have had the rule itself.
45
There is truth in much of this, con
sidered as matter of history. Ancient
peoples have generally, if not always,
received their morals, their laws, their
intellectual beliefs, and even their prac
tical arts of life, all in short which tended
either to guide or to discipline them, as
revelations from the superior powers, and
in any other way could not easily have
been induced to accept them. This
was partly the effect of their hopes and
fears from those powers, which were of
much greater and more universal potency
in early times, when the agency of the
gods was seen in the daily events of life,
experience not having yet disclosed the
fixed laws according to which physical
phenomena succeed one another. In
dependently, too, of personal hopes and
fears, the involuntary deference felt by
these rude minds for power superior to
their own, and the tendency to suppose
that beings of superhuman power must
also be of superhuman knowledge and
wisdom, made them disinterestedly desire
to conform their conduct to the pre
sumed preferences of these powerful
beings, and to adopt no new practice
without their authorisation either spon
taneously given, or solicited and ob
tained.
But because, when men were still
savages, they would not have received
either moral or scientific truths unless
they had supposed them to be supernaturally imparted, does it follow that
they would now give up moral truths any
more than scientific because they be
lieved them to have no higher origin than
wise and noble human hearts ? Are not
moral truths strong enough in their own
evidence, at all events to retain the belief
of mankind when once they have
acquired it ? I grant that some of the
precepts of Christ as exhibited in the
�46
UTILITY OF RELIGION
Gospels—rising far above the Paulism
which is the foundation of ordinary
Christianity—carry some kinds of moral
goodness to a greater height than had
ever been attained before, though much
even of what is supposed to be peculiar
to them is equalled in the meditations of
Marcus Antoninus, which we have no
ground for believing to have been in any
way indebted to Christianity. But this
benefit, whatever it amounts to, has been
gained. Mankind have entered into the
possession of it. It has become the
property of humanity, and cannot now
be lost by anything short of a return to
primaeval barbarism. The “ new com
mandment to love one another”/ the
recognition that the greatest are those
who serve, not who are served by,
others; the reverence for the weak and
humble, which is the foundation of
chivalry, they and not the strong being
pointed out as having the first place in
God’s regard, and the first claim on their
fellow-men; the lesson of the parable of
the Good Samaritan; that of “he that
is without sin let him throw the first
stone”; the precept of doing as we
would be done by; and such other
noble moralities as are to be found,
mixed with some poetical exaggerations,
and some maxims of which it is difficult
to ascertain the precise object; in the
authentic sayings of Jesus of Nazareth :
these are surely in sufficient harmony
with the intellect and feelings of every
good man or woman to be in no danger
of being let go, after having been once
acknowledged as the creed of the best
1 Not, however, a new commandment. In
justice to the great Hebrew lawgiver, it should
always be remembered that the precept, to love
thy neighbour as thyself, already existed in the
Pentateuch ; and very surprising it is to find it
there. (See John xiii. 34, Levit. xix. 18.)
and foremost portion of our species.
There will be, as there have been, short
comings enough for a long time to come
in acting on them ; but that they should
be forgotten, or cease to be operative on
the human conscience, while human
beings remain cultivated or civilised,
may be pronounced, once for all, im
possible.
On the other hand, there is a very real
evil consequent on ascribing a super
natural origin to the received maxims of
morality. That origin consecrates the
whole of them, and protects them from
being discussed or criticised. So that if,
among the moral doctrines received as a
part of religion, there be any which are
imperfect—which were either erroneous
from the first, or not properly limited and
guarded in the expression, or which, un
exceptionable once, are no longer suited
to the changes that have taken place in
human relations (and it is my firm belief
that in so-called Christian morality
instances of all these kinds are to be
found), these doctrines are considered
equally binding on the conscience with
the noblest, most permanent, and most
universal precepts of Christ. Wherever
morality is supposed to be of supernatural
origin, morality is stereotyped; as law is,
for the same reason, among believers in
the Koran.
Belief, then, in the supernatural, great
as are the services which it rendered in
the early stages of human development,
cannot be considered to be any longer
required, either for enabling us to know
what is right and wrong, in social
morality, or for supplying us with motives
to do right and to abstain from wrong.
Such belief, therefore, is not necessary
for social purposes, at least in the coarse
way in which these can be considered
apart from the character of the individual
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
human being. That more elevated
branch of the subject now remains to be
considered. If supernatural beliefs are
indeed necessary to the perfection of the
individual character, they are necessary
also to the highest excellence in social
conduct: necessary in a far higher sense
than that vulgar one which constitutes
it the great support of morality in
common eyes.
Let us, then, consider what it is in
human nature which causes it to require
a religion; what wants of the human
mind religion supplies, and what qualities
it developes. When we have understood
this, we shall be better able to judge
how far these wants can be otherwise
supplied, and those qualities, or qualities
equivalent to them, unfolded and brought
to perfection by other means.
The old saying, Primus in orbe Deos
fecit timor, I hold to be untrue, or to con
tain, at most, only a small amount of truth.
Belief in gods had, I conceive, even in
the rudest minds, a more honourable
origin. Its universality has been very
rationally explained from the spon
taneous tendency of the mind to attribute
life and volition, similar to what it feels
in itself, to all natural objects and
phenomena which appear to be self
moving. This was a plausible fancy, and
no better theory could be formed at first.
It was naturally persisted in so long as
the motions and operations of these
objects seemed to be arbitrary, and in
capable of being accounted for but by
the free choice of the Power itself. At
first, no doubt, the objects themselves
were supposed to be alive; and this
belief still subsists among African fetish
worshippers. But as it must soon have
appeared absurd that things which could
do so much more than man, could not or
would not do what man does, as for
47
example to speak, the transition was
made to supposing that the object pre
sent to the senses was inanimate, but
was the creature and instrument of an
invisible being with a form and organs
similar to the human.
These beings having first been be
lieved in, fear of them necessarily
followed ; since they were thought able
to inflict at pleasure on human beings
great evils, which the sufferers neither
knew how to avert nor to foresee, but
were left dependent, for their chances of
doing either, upon solicitations addressed
to the deities themselves. It is true,
therefore, that fear had much to do with
religion; but belief in the gods evidently
preceded, and did not arise from, fear:
though the fear, when established, was
a strong support to the belief, nothing
being conceived to be so great an offence
to the divinities as any doubt of their
existence.
It is unnecessary to prosecute further
the natural history of religion, as we
have not here to account for its origin in
rude minds, but for its persistency in the
cultivated. A sufficient explanation of
this will, I conceive, be found in the
small limits of man’s certain knowledge
and the boundlessness of his desire to
know. Human existence is girt round
with mystery: the narrow region of our
experience is a small island in the midst
of a boundless sea, which at once awes
our feelings and stimulates our imagina
tion by its vastness and its obscurity.
To add to the mystery, the domain of
our earthly existence is not only an
island in infinite space, but also in
infinite time. The past and the future
are alike shrouded from us : we neither
know the origin of anything which is nor
its final destination. If we feel deeply
interested in knowing that there are
�4S
UTILITY OF RELIGION
myriads of worlds at an immeasurable,
and to our faculties inconceivable, dis
tance from us in space; if we are eager
to discover what little we can about
these worlds, and when we cannot know
what they are, can never satiate our
selves with speculating on what they may
be; is it not a matter of far deeper inte
rest to us to learn, or even to conjecture,
from whence came this nearer world
which we inhabit—what cause or agency
made it what it is, and on what powers
depends its future fate ? Who would not
desire this more ardently than any other
conceivable knowledge, so long as there
appeared the slightest hope of attaining
it ? What would not one give for any
credible tidings from that mysterious
region, any glimpse into it which might
enable us to see the smallest light
through its darkness, especially any
theory of it which we could believe, and
which represented it as tenanted by a
benignant and not a hostile influence?
But since we are able to penetrate into
that region with the imagination only,
assisted by specious but inconclusive
analogies derived from human agency
and design, imagination is free to fill up
the vacancy with the imagery most con
genial to itself; sublime and elevating if
it be a lofty imagination, low and mean
if it be a grovelling one.
Religion and poetry address them
selves, at least in one of their aspects, to
the same part of the human constitution:
they both supply the same want, that of
ideal conceptions grander and more
beautiful than we see realised in the
prose of human life. Religion, as dis
tinguished from poetry, is the product
of the craving to know whether these
imaginative conceptions have realities
answering to them in some other world
than ours. The mind, in this stage,
eagerly catches at any rumours respect
ing other worlds, especially when de
livered by persons whom it deems wiser
than itself. To the poetry of the super
natural comes to be thus added a
positive belief and expectation, which
unpoetical minds can share with the
poetical. Belief in a god or gods, and
in a life after death, becomes the canvas
which every mind, according to its
capacity, covers with such ideal pictures
as it can either invent or copy. In that
other life each hopes to find the good
which he has failed to find on earth, or
the better which is suggested to him by
the good which on earth he has partially
seen and known. More especially, this
belief supplies the finer minds with
material for conceptions of beings more
awful than they can have known on
earth, and more excellent than they
probably have known. So long as human
life is insufficient to satisfy human aspira
tions, so long there will be a craving for
higher things, which finds its most
obvious satisfaction in religion. So long
as earthly life is full of sufferings, so long
there will be need of consolations, which
the hope of heaven affords to the selfish,
the love of God to the tender and
grateful.
The value, therefore, of religion to the
individual, both in the past and present,
as a source of personal satisfaction and
of elevated feelings, is not to be dis
puted. But it has still to be considered
whether, in order to obtain this good, it
is necessary to travel beyond the boun
daries of the world which we inhabit;
or whether the idealisation of our earthly
life, the cultivation of a high conception
of what it may be made, is not capable
of supplying a poetry, and, in the best
sense of the word, a religion, equally
fitted to exalt the feelings, and (with the
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
same aid from education) still better
calculated to ennoble the conduct, than
any belief respecting the unseen powers.
At the bare suggestion of such a possi
bility, many will exclaim that the short
duration, the smallness and insignificance
of life, if there is no prolongation of it
beyond what we see, makes it impossible
that great and elevated feelings can con
nect themselves with anything laid out
on so small a scale : that such a concep
tion of life can match with nothing
higher than Epicurean feelings, and the
Epicurean doctrine, “ Let us eat and
drink, for to-morrow we die.”
Unquestionably, within certain limits,
the maxim of the Epicureans is sound,
and applicable to much higher things
than eating and drinking. To make
the most of the present for all good
purposes, those of enjoyment among the
rest; to keep under control those mental
dispositions which lead to undue sacri
fice of present good for a future which
may never arrive; to cultivate the habit
of deriving pleasure from things within
our reach, rather than from the too eager
pursuit of objects at a distance; to think
all time wasted which is not spent either
in personal pleasure or in doing things
useful to oneself or others: these are
wise maxims, and the “carpe diem” doc
trine, carried thus far, is a rational and
legitimate corollary from the shortness of
life. But that because life is short we
should care for nothing beyond it, is not
a legitimate conclusion; and the supposi
tion, that human beings in general are
not capable of feeling deep, and even the
deepest, interest in things which they will
never live to see, is a view of human
nature as false as it is abject. Let it be
remembered that, if individual life is
short, the life of the human species is
not short; its indefinite duration is
49
practically equivalent to endlessness; and,
being combined with indefinite capability
of improvement, it offers to the imagina
tion and sympathies a large enough
object to satisfy any reasonable demand
for grandeur of aspiration. If such an
object appears small to a mind accus
tomed to dream of infinite and eternal
beatitudes, it will expand into far other
dimensions when those baseless fancies
shall have receded into the past.
Nor let it be thought that only the
more eminent of our species, in mind
and heart, are capable of identifying their
feelings with the entire life of the human
race. This noble capability implies, in
deed, a certain cultivation, but not
superior to that which might be, and
certainly will be if human improvement
continues, the lot of all. Objects far
smaller than this, and equally confined
within the limits of the earth (though
not within those of a single human life),
have been found sufficient to inspire
large masses and long successions of
mankind with an enthusiasm capable of
ruling the conduct and colouring the
whole life. Rome was to the entire
Roman people for many generations as
much a religion as Jehovah was to the
Jews; nay, much more, for they never
fell off from their worship as the Jews
did from theirs. And the Romans,
otherwise a selfish people, with no very
remarkable faculties of any kind except
the purely practical, derived, nevertheless,
from this one idea a certain greatness of
soul, which manifests itself in all their
history where that idea is concerned and
nowhere else, and has earned for them
the large share of admiration, in other
respects not at all deserved, which has
been felt for them by most noble-minded
persons from that time to this.
When we consider how ardent a
E
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UTILITY OF RELIGION
sentiment, in favourable circumstances
of education, the love of country has
become, we cannot judge it impossible
that the love of that larger country, the
world, may be nursed into similar
strength, both as a source of elevated
emotion and as a principle of duty. He
who needs any other lesson on this sub
ject than the whole course of ancient
history affords, let him read Cicero de
Officiis. It cannot be said that the
standard of morals laid down in that
celebrated treatise is a high standard.
To our notions it is on many points un
duly lax, and admits capitulations of
conscience. But on the subject of duty
to our country there is no compromise.
That any man with the smallest pre
tensions to virtue could hesitate to sacri
fice life, reputation, family, everything
valuable to him, to the love of country is
a supposition which this eminent inter
preter of Greek and Roman morality
cannot entertain for a moment. If, then,
persons could be trained, as we see they
were, not only to believe in theory that
the good of their country was an object
to which all others ought to yield, but to
feel this practically as the grand duty of
life, so also may they be made to feel the
same absolute obligation towards the
universal good. A morality grounded
on large and wise views of the good of
the whole, neither sacrificing the in
dividual to the aggregate nor the
aggregate to the individual, but giving
to duty on the one hand and to freedom
and spontaneity on the other their proper
province, would derive its power in the
superior natures from sympathy and
benevolence and the passion for ideal
excellence: in the inferior, from the
same feelings cultivated up to the
measure of their capacity, with the super
added force of shame. This exalted
morality would not depend for its
ascendancy on any hope of reward ; but
the reward which might be looked for,
and the thought of which would be a
consolation in suffering, and a support in
moments of weakness, would not be a
problematical future existence, but the
approbation, in this, of those whom we
respect, and ideally of all those, dead or
living, whom we admire or venerate.
For the thought that our dead parents
or friends would have approved our con
duct is a scarcely less powerful motive
than the knowledge that our living ones
do approve it; and the idea that
Socrates, or Howard, or Washington, or
Antoninus, or Christ, would have sympa
thised with us, or that we are attempting
to do our part in the spirit in which they
did theirs, has operated on the very best
minds, as a strong incentive to act up to
their highest feelings and convictions.
To call these sentiments by the name
morality, exclusively of any other title, is
claiming too little for them. They are a
real religion; of which, as of other
religions, outward good works (the ut
most meaning usually suggested by the
word “morality”) are only a part, and are
indeed rather the fruits of the religion
than the religion itself. The essence of
religion is the strong and earnest direction
of the emotions and desires towards an
ideal object, recognised as of the highest
excellence, and as rightfully paramount
over all selfish objects of desire. This
condition is fulfilled by the Religion of
Humanity in as eminent a degree, and
in as high a sense, as by the supernatural
religions even in their best manifesta
tions, and far more so than in any of
their others.
Much more might be added on this
topic; but enough has been said to con
vince any one, who can distinguish
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
between the intrinsic capacities of human
nature and the forms in which those
capacities happen to have been histori
cally developed, that the sense of unity
with mankind, and a deep feeling for the
general good, may be cultivated into a
sentiment and a principle capable of ful
filling every important function of religion
and itself justly entitled to the name. I
will now further maintain that it is not
only capable of fulfilling these functions,
but would fulfil them better than any
form whatever of supernaturalism. It is
not only entitled to be called a religion :
it is a better religion than any of those
which are ordinarily called by that title.
For, in the first place, it is dis
interested. It carries the thoughts and
feelings out of self, and fixes them on an
unselfish object, loved and pursued as an
end for its own sake. The religions
which deal in promises and threats
regarding a future life do exactly the
contrary : they fasten down the thoughts
to the person’s own posthumous interests;
they tempt him to regard the perfor
mance of his duties to others mainly as
a means to his own personal salvation;
and are one of the most serious obstacles
to the great purpose of moral culture,
the strengthening of the unselfish and
weakening of the selfish element in our
nature; since they hold out to the
imagination selfish good and evil of such
tremendous magnitude that it is difficult
for any one who fully believes in their
reality to have feeling or interest to spare
for any other distant and ideal object.
It is true, many of the most unselfish of
mankind have been believers in super
naturalism, because their minds have not
dwelt on the threats and promises of
their religion, but chiefly on the idea of
a Being to whom they looked up with a
confiding love, and in whose hands they
5i
willingly left all that related especially to
themselves. Butin its effect on common
minds, what now goes by the name of
religion operates mainly through the
feelings of self-interest. Even the Christ
of the Gospel holds out the direct
promise of reward from heaven as a
primary inducement to the noble and
beautiful beneficence towards our fellow
creatures which he so impressively incul
cates. This is a radical inferiority of
the best supernatural religions, compared
with the Religion of Humanity, since
the greatest thing which moral influences
can do for the amelioration of human
nature is to cultivate the unselfish feel
ings in the only mode in which any
active principle in human nature can be
effectually cultivated—namely, by habitual
exercise; but the habit of expecting to
be rewarded in another life for our con
duct in this makes even virtue itself no
longer an exercise of the unselfish
feelings.
Secondly, it is an immense abate
ment from the worth of the old religions
as means of elevating and improving
human character, that it is nearly, if not
quite, impossible for them to produce
their best moral effects, unless we sup
pose a certain torpidity, if not positive
twist, in the intellectual faculties. For it
is impossible that any one who habitually
thinks, and who is unable to blunt his
inquiring intellect by sophistry, should
be able without misgiving to go on
ascribing absolute perfection to the
author and ruler of so clumsily made
and capriciously governed a creation as
this planet and the life of its inhabitants.
1 he adoration of such a being cannot be
with the whole heart, unless the heart
is first considerably sophisticated. The
worship must either be greatly over
clouded by doubt, and occasionally quite
�52
UTILITY OF RELIGION
darkened by it, or the moral sentiments
must sink to the low level of the ordi
nances of Nature : the worshipper must
learn to think blind partiality, atrocious
cruelty, and reckless injustice, not
blemishes in an object of worship, since
all these abound to excess in the com
monest phenomena of Nature. It is
true, the God who is worshipped is not,
generally speaking, the God of Nature
only, but also the God of some revela
tion ; and the character of the revelation
will greatly modify and, it may be,
improve the moral influences of the
religion. This is emphatically true of
Christianity; since the Author of the
Sermon on the Mount is assuredly a far
more benignant Being than the Author
of Nature. But, unfortunately, the be
liever in the Christian revelation is
obliged to believe that the same Being
is the author of both. This, unless he
resolutely averts his mind from the
subject, or practises the act of quieting
his conscience by sophistry, involves
him in moral perplexities without end;
since the ways of his Deity in Nature
are on many occasions totally at variance
with the precepts, as he believes, of the
same Deity in the Gospel. He who
comes out with least moral damage from
this embarrassment is probably the one
who never attempts to reconcile the two
standards with one another, but con
fesses to himself that the purposes of
Providence are mysterious, that its ways
are not our ways, that its justice and
goodness are not the justice and good
ness which we can conceive and which
it befits us to practise. When, however,
this is the feeling of the believer, the
worship of the Deity ceases to be the
adoration of abstract moral perfection.
It becomes the bowing down to a
gigantic image of something not fit for
us to imitate. It is the worship of power
only.
I say nothing of the moral difficulties
and perversions involved in revelation
itself; though even in the Christianity
of the Gospels, at least in its ordinary
interpretation, there are some of so
flagrant a character as almost to out
weigh all the beauty and benignity and
moral greatness which so eminently dis
tinguish the sayings and character of
Christ. The recognition, for example,
of the object of highest worship in a
being who could make a hell, and who
could create countless generations of
human beings with the certain fore
knowledge that he was creating them for
this fate. Is there any moral enormity
which might not be justified by imita
tion of such a Deity ? And is it possible
to adore such a one without a frightful
distortion of the standard of right and
wrong ? Any other of the outrages to
the most ordinary justice and humanity
involved in the common Christian con
ception of the moral character of God
sinks into insignificance beside this
dreadful idealisation of wickedness.
Most of them, too, are happily not so
unequivocally deducible from the very
words of Christ as to be indisputably a
part of Christian doctrine. It may be
doubted, for instance, whether Chris
tianity is really responsible for atone
ment and redemption, original sin and
vicarious punishment: and the same may
be said respecting the doctrine which
makes belief in the divine mission of
Christ a necessary condition of salvation.
It is nowhere represented that Christ
himself made this statement, except in
the huddled-up account of the Resurrec
tion contained in the concluding verses
of St. Mark, which some critics (I believe
the best) consider to be an interpolation.
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
Again, the proposition that “ the powers
that be are ordained of God,” and the
whole series of corollaries deduced
from it in the Epistles, belong to St.
Paul, and must stand or fall with
Paulism, not with Christianity. But
there is one moral contradiction insepar
able from every form of Christianity,
which no ingenuity ca.i resolve, and no
sophistry explain away. It is, that so
precious a gift, bestowed on a few,
should have been withheld from the
many; that countless millions of human
beings should have been allowed to live
and die, to sin and suffer, without the
one thing needful^ the divine remedy for
sin and suffering, which it would have
cost the Divine Giver as little to have
vouchsafed to all as to have bestowed
by special grace upon a favoured
minority. Add to this that the divine
message, assuming it to be such, has
been authenticated by credentials so in
sufficient that they fail to convince a
large proportion of the strongest and
cultivated minds, and the tendency to
disbelieve them appears to grow with
the growth of scientific knowledge and
critical discrimination. He who can be
lieve these to be the intentional short
comings of a perfectly good Being must
impose silence on every prompting of
the sense of goodness and justice as
received among men.
It is, no doubt, possible (and there
are many instances of it) to worship
with the intensest devotion either Deity,
that of Nature or of the Gospel, without
any perversion of the moral sentiments ;
but this must be by fixing the attention
exclusively on what is beautiful and
beneficent in the precepts and spirit of
the Gospel and in the dispensations of
Nature, and putting all tjiat is the reverse
as entirely aside as if it did not exist.
53
Accordingly, this simple and innocent
faith can only, as I have said, co-exist
with a torpid and inactive state of the
speculative faculties. For a person of
exercised intellect there is no way of
attaining anything equivalent to it, save
by sophistication and perversion, either
of the understanding or of the con
science. It may almost always be said
both of sects and of individuals, who
derive their morality from religion, that
the better logicians they are, the worse
moralists.
One only form of belief in the super
natural—one only theory respecting the
origin and government of the universe—■
stands wholly clear both of intellectual
contradiction and of moral obliquity. It
is that which, resigning irrevocably the
idea of an omnipotent creator, regards
Nature and Life not as the expression
throughout of the moral character and
purpose of the Deity, but as the product
of a struggle between contriving good
ness and an intractable material, as was
believed by Plato, or a Principle of Evil,
as was the doctrine of the Manicheans.
A creed like this, which I have known
to be devoutly held by at least one culti
vated and conscientious person of our
own day, allows it to be believed that all
the mass of evil which exists was un
designed by, and exists not by the
appointment of, but in spite of, the Being
whom we are called upon to worship. A
virtuous human being assumes in this
theory the exalted character of a fellow
labourer with the Highest, a fellow
combatant in the great strife; con
tributing his little, which by the aggrega
tion of many like himself becomes much,
towards that progressive ascendancy, and
ultimately complete triumph of good
over evil, which history points to, and
which this doctrine teaches us to regard
�54
UTILITY OF RELIGION
as planned by the Being to whom we
owe all the benevolent contrivance we
behold in Nature. Against the moral
tendency of this creed no possible
objection can lie : it can produce on
whoever can succeed in believing it no
other than an ennobling effect. The
evidence for it, indeed, if evidence it can
be called, is too shadowy and unsub
stantial, and the promises it holds out
too distant and uncertain, to admit of its
being a permanent substitute for the
religion of humanity; but the two may
be held in conjunction : and he to whom
ideal good, and the progress of the
world towards it, are already a religion,
even though that other creed may seem
to him a belief not grounded on evidence,
is at liberty to indulge the pleasing and
encouraging thought that its truth is
possible. Apart from all dogmatic belief,
there is for those who need it an ample
domain in the region of the imagination
which may be planted with possibilities,
with hypotheses which cannot be known
to be false; and when there is anything
in the appearances of nature to favour
them, as in this case there is (for, what
ever force we attach to the analogies of
nature with the effects of human con
trivance, there is no disputing the remark
of Paley, that what is good in nature
exhibits those analogies much oftener
than what is evil), the contemplation of
these possibilities is a legitimate indul
gence, capable of bearing its part, with
other influences, in feeding and animat
ing the tendency of the feelings and
impulses towards good.
One advantage, such as it is, the
supernatural religions must always
possess over the Religion of Humanity :
the prospect they hold out to the indi
vidual of a life after death. For, though
the scepticism of the understanding
does not necessarily exclude the Theism
of the imagination and feelings, and
this, again, gives opportunity for a
hope that the power which has done so
much for us may be able and willing to
do this also, such vague possibility must
ever stop far short of a conviction. It
remains then to estimate the value of
this element—the prospect of a world to
come—as a constituent of earthly happi
ness. I cannot but think that as the
condition of mankind becomes improved,
as they grow happier in their lives, and
more capable of deriving happiness from
unselfish sources, they will care less and
less for this flattering expectation. It is
not, naturally or generally, the happy
who are the most anxious either for a
prolongation of the present life, or for a
life hereafter : it is those who never have
been happy. They who have had their
happiness can bear to part with existence;
but it is hard to die without ever having
lived. When mankind cease to need a
future existence as a consolation for the
sufferings of the present, it will have lost
its chief value to them, for themselves.
I am now speaking of the unselfish.
Those who are so wrapped up in self
that they are unable to identify their
feelings with anything w’hich will survive
them, or to feel their life prolonged in
their younger cotemporaries and in all
who help to carry on the progressive
movement of human affairs, require the
notion of another selfish life beyond the
grave, to enable them to keep up any in
terest in existence, since the present life,
as its termination approaches, dwindles
into something too insignificant to be
worth caring about. But if the Religion
of Humanity were as sedulously culti
vated as the supernatural religions are
(and there is no difficulty in conceiving
that it might be much more so), all who
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
had received the customary amount of
moral cultivation would, up to the hour
of death, live ideally in the life of those
who are to follow them; and though,
doubtless, they would often willingly sur
vive as individuals for a much longer
period than the present duration of life,
it appears to me probable that, after a
length of time different in different per
sons, they would have had enough of
existence, and would gladly lie down and
take their eternal rest. Meanwhile, and
without looking so far forward, we may
remark that those who believe the
immortality of the soul generally quit
life with fully as much, if not more,
reluctance as those who have no such
expectation. The mere cessation of ex
istence is no evil to any one : the idea is
only formidable through the illusion of
imagination which makes one conceive
oneself as if one were alive and feeling
oneself dead. What is odious in death
is not death itself, but the act of dying
and its lugubrious accompaniments : all
of which must be equally undergone by
the believer in immortality. Nor can I
perceive that the sceptic loses by his
scepticism any real and valuable consola
tion except one—the hope of reunion
with those dear to him who have ended
their earthly life before him. That loss,
indeed, is neither to be denied nor ex
tenuated. In many cases it is beyond
the reach of comparison or estimate;
and will always suffice to keep alive, in
the more sensitive natures, the imagina
tive hope of a futurity which, if there is
nothing to prove, there is as little in our
knowledge and experience to contradict.
History, so far as we know it, bears
out the opinion that mankind can per
fectly well do without the belief in a
heaven. The Greeks had anything but
a tempting idea of a future state. Their
55
Elysian fields held out very little attrac
tion to their feelings and imagination.
Achilles in the Odyssey expressed a very
natural, and no doubt a very common
sentiment, when he said that he would
rather be on earth the serf of a needy
master than reign over the whole king
dom of the dead. And the pensive
character so striking in the address of the
dying emperor Hadrian to his soul gives
evidence that the popular conception had
not undergone much variation during
that long interval. Yet we neither find
that the Greeks enjoyed life less nor
feared death more than other people.
The Buddhist religion counts probably
at this day a greater number of votaries
than either the Christian or the Moham
medan. The Buddhist creed recognises
many modes of punishment in a future
life, or rather lives, by the transmigration
of the soul into new bodies of men or
animals. But the blessing from heaven
which it proposes as a reward, to be
earned by perseverance in the highest
order of virtuous life, is annihilation;
the cessation, at least, of all conscious
or separate existence. It is impossible
to mistake in this religion the work of
legislators and moralists endeavouring to
supply supernatural motives for the con
duct which they were anxious to en
courage; and they could find nothing
more transcendent to hold out as the
capital prize to be won by the mightiest
efforts of labour and self-denial than
what we are so often told is the terrible
idea of annihilation. Surely this is a
proof that the idea is not really or
naturally terrible; that not philosophers
only, but the common order of mankind,
can easily reconcile themselves to it, and
even consider it as a good; and that it is
no unnatural part of the idea of a happy
life, that life itself be laid down, after the
�56
UTILITY OF RELIGION
best that it can give has been fully en
joyed through a long lapse of time; when
all its pleasures, even those of benevo
lence, are familiar, and nothing untasted
and unknown is left to stimulate curiosity
and keep up the desire of prolonged
existence. It seems to me not only
possible, but probable, that in a higher,
and above all a happier, condition of
human life, not annihilation but immor
tality may be the burdensome idea ; and
that human nature, though pleased with
the present, and by no means impatient
to quit it, would find comfort and not
sadness in the thought that it is not
chained through eternity to a conscious
existence which it cannot be assured that
it will always wish to preserve.
�THEISM
Part
I.—INTRODUCTION
The contest which subsists from of old
between believers and unbelievers in
natural and revealed religion has, like
other permanent contests, varied materi
ally in its character from age to age;
and the present generation, at least in
the higher regions of controversy, shows,
as compared with the eighteenth and
the beginning of the nineteenth century,
a marked alteration in the aspect of the
dispute. One feature of this change is
so apparent as to be generally acknow
ledged : the more softened temper in
which the debate is conducted on the
part of unbelievers. The reactionary
violence, provoked by the intolerance of
the other side, has in a great measure
exhausted itself. Experience has abated
the ardent hopes once entertained of
the regeneration of the human race by
merely negative doctrine—by the destruc
tion of superstition. The philosophical
study of history, one of the most im
portant creations of recent times, has
rendered possible an impartial estimate
of the doctrines and institutions of the
past, from a relative instead of an abso
lute point of view—as incidents of
human development at which it is use
less to grumble, and which may deserve
admiration and gratitude for their effects
in the past, even though they may be
thought incapable of rendering similar
services to the future. And the position
assigned to Christianity or Theism by
the more instructed of those who reject
the supernatural is that of things once
of great value, but which can now be
done without, rather than, as formerly, of
things misleading and noxious ab initio.
Along with this change in the moral
attitude of thoughtful unbelievers to
wards the religious ideas of man
kind, a corresponding difference has
manifested itself in their intellectual
attitude. The war against religious
beliefs in the last century was carried
on principally on the ground of
common sense or of logic; in the present
age, on the ground of science. The
progress of the physical science is con
sidered to have established, by conclu
sive evidence, matters of fact with which
the religious traditions of mankind are not
reconcilable; while the science of human
nature and history is considered to show
that the creeds of the past are natural
growths of the human mind, in particular
stages of its career, destined to dis
appear and give place to other convic
tions in a more advanced stage. In the
progress of discussion this last class of
considerations seems even to be super
seding those which address themselves
directly to the question of truth. Re
ligions tend to be discussed, at least by
�58
THEISM
those who reject them, less as intrinsi
cally true or false than as products
thrown up by certain states of civilisa
tion, and which, like the animal and
vegetable productions of a geological
period, perish in those which succeed it
from the cessation of the conditions
necessary to their continued existence.
This tendency of recent speculation
to look upon human opinions pre
eminently from an historical point of
view, as facts obeying laws of their own,
and requiring, like other observed facts,
an historical or a scientific explanation
(a tendency not confined to religious
subjects), is by no means to be blamed,
but to be applauded; not solely as
drawing attention to an important .and
previously neglected aspect of human
opinions, but because it has a real,
though indirect, bearing upon the ques
tion of their truth. For whatever opinion
a person may adopt on any subject that
admits of controversy, his assurance, if
he be a cautious thinker, cannot be
complete unless he is able to account
for the existence of the opposite opinion.
To ascribe it to the weakness of the
human understanding is an explanation
which cannot be sufficient for such a
thinker, for he will be slow to assume
that he has himself a less share of that
infirmity than the rest of mankind, and
that error is more likely to be on the
other side than on his own. In his
examination of evidence the persuasion
of others, perhaps of mankind in general,
is one of the data of the case—one of
the phenomena to be accounted for. As
the human intellect, though weak, is not
essentially perverted, there is a certain
presumption of the truth of any opinion
held by many human minds, requiring to
be rebutted by assigning some other real
or possible cause for its prevalence.
And this consideration has a special
relevancy to the inquiry concerning the
foundations of Theism, inasmuch as no
argument for the truth of Theism is more
commonly invoked or more confidently
relied on than the general assent of
mankind.
But while giving its full value to this
historical treatment of the religious ques
tion, we ought not, therefore, to let it
supersede the dogmatic. The most im
portant quality of an opinion on any
momentous subject is its truth or falsity,
which to us resolves itself into the
sufficiency of the evidence on which it
rests. It is indispensable that the
subject of religion should from time to
time be reviewed as a strictly scientific
question, and that its evidences should
be tested by the same scientific methods
and on the same principles as those of
the speculative conclusions drawn by
physical science. It being granted, then,
that the legitimate conclusions of science
are entitled to prevail over all opinions,
however widely held, which conflict with
them, and that the canons of scientific
evidence which the successes and failures
of two thousand years have established
are applicable to all subjects on which
knowledge is attainable, let us proceed
to consider what place there is for
religious beliefs on the platform of
science; what evidences they can appeal
to such as science can recognise, and
what foundation there is for the doc
trines of religion, considered as scientific
theorems.
In this inquiry we, of course, begin
with Natural Religion, the doctrine of
the existence and attributes of God.
THEISM.
Though I have defined the problem
of Natural Theology to be that of the
�THEISM
existence of God or of a god, rather than
of gods, there is the amplest historical
evidence that the belief in gods is
immeasurably more natural to the human
mind than the belief in one author and
ruler of nature; and that this more
elevated belief is, compared with the
former, an artificial product, requiring
(except when impressed by early educa
tion) a considerable amount of intellectual
culture before it can be reached. For a
long time the supposition appeared
forced and unnatural that the diversity
we see in the operations of nature can
all be the work of a single will. To the
untaught mind", and to all minds in prescientific times, the phenomena of nature
seem to be the result of forces altogether
heterogeneous, each taking its course
quite independently of the others; and
though to attribute them to conscious
wills is eminently natural, the natural
tendency is to suppose as many such
independent wills as there are distin
guishable forces of sufficient importance
and interest to have been remarked and
named. There is no tendency in Poly
theism as such to transform itself spon
taneously into Monotheism. It is true
that in polytheistic systems generally the
Deity, whose special attributes inspire
the greatest degree of awe, is usually
supposed to have a power of controlling
the other deities; and even in the most
degraded, perhaps, of all such systems,
the Hindoo, adulation heaps upon the
divinity who is the immediate object of
adoration epithets like those habitual to
believers in a single god. But there is
no real acknowledgment of one governor.
Every god normally rules his particular
department, though there may be a still
stronger god, whose power when he
chooses to exert it can frustrate the
purposes of the inferior divinity. There
59
could be no real belief in one Creator
and one Governor until mankind had
begun to see in the apparently confused
phenomena which surrounded them a
system capable of being viewed as the
possible working out of a single plan. This
conception of the world was perhaps
anticipated (though less frequently than
is often supposed) by individuals of ex
ceptional genius, but it could only
become common after a rather long
cultivation of scientific thought.
The special mode in which scientific
study operates to instil Monotheism in
place of the more natural Polytheism is
in no way mysterious. The specific
effect of science is to show by accumula
ting evidence that every event in nature
is connected by laws with some fact or
facts which preceded it, or, in other
words, depends for its existence on some
antecedent; but yet not so strictly on
one as not to be liable to frustration or
modification from others; for these dis
tinct chains of causation are so entangled
with one another; the action of each
cause is so interfered with by other
causes, though each acts according to its
own fixed law; that every effect is truly
the result rather of the aggregate of all
causes in existence than of any one only;
and nothing takes place in the world of
our experience without spreading a per
ceptible influence of some sort through
a greater or less portion of nature, and
making perhaps every portion of it
slightly different from what it would have
been if that event had not taken place.
Now, when once the double conviction
has found entry into the mind—that every
event depends on antecedents; and at
the same time that to bring it about
many antecedents must concur, perhaps
all the antecedents in nature, insomuch
that a slight difference in any one of
�6o
THEISM
them might have prevented the
phenomenon, or materially altered its
character—the conviction follows that
no one event, certainly no one kind of
events, can be absolutely preordained or
governed by any Being but one who
holds in his hand the reins of all Nature,
and not of some department only. At
least, if a plurality be supposed, it is
necessary to assume so complete a con
cert of action and unity of will among
them that the difference is for most pur
poses immaterial between such a theory
and that of the absolute unity of the
Godhead.
The reason, then, why Monotheism
may be accepted as the representative of
Theism in the abstract is not so much
because it is the Theism of all the more
improved portions of the human race, as
because it is the only Theism which can
claim for itself any footing on scientific
ground. Every other theory of the
government of the universe by super
natural beings is inconsistent, either with
the carrying on of that government
through a continual series of natural
antecedents according to fixed laws, or
with the interdependence of each of
these series upon all the rest, which are
the two most general results of science.
Setting out, therefore, from the scientific
view of nature as one connected system,
or united whole—united not like a web
composed of separate threads in passive
juxtaposition with one another, but
rather like the human or animal frame,
an apparatus kept going by perpetual
action and reaction among all its parts
—it must be acknowledged that the
question, to which Theism is an answer,
is at least a very natural one, and issues
from an obvious want of the human
mind. Accustomed as we are to find, in
proportion to our means of observation,
a definite beginning to each individual
fact; and since, wherever there is a be
ginning, we find that there was an ante
cedent fact (called by us a cause), a fact
but for which the phenomenon which
thus commences would not have been,
it was impossible that the human mind
should not ask itself whether the whole,
of which these particular phenomena are
a part, had not also a beginning, and, if
so, whether that beginning was not an
origin; whether there was not something
antecedent to the whole series of causes
and effects that we term Nature, and but
for which Nature itself would not have
been. From the first recorded specula
tion this question has never remained
without an hypothetical answer. The
only answer which has long continued to
afford satisfaction is Theism.
Looking at the problem, as it is our
business to do, merely as a scientific in
quiry, it resolves itself into two questions.
First: Is the theory which refers the
origin of all the phenomena of nature to
the will of a Creator consistent or not
with the ascertained results of science ?
Secondly, assuming it to be consistent,
will its proofs bear to be tested by the
principles of evidence and canons of
belief by which our long experience of
scientific inquiry has proved the necessity
of being guided ?
First, then : there is one conception of
Theism which is consistent, another
which is radically inconsistent, with the
most general truths that have been made
known to us by scientific investigation.
The one which is inconsistent is the
conception of a God governing the
world by acts of variable will. The one
which is consistent is the conception of
a God governing the world by invariable
laws.
The primitive, and even in our own
�THE EVIDENCES OF THEISM
day the vulgar, conception of the divine
rule is that the one God, like the many
gods of antiquity, carries on the govern
ment of the world by special decrees,
made pro hac vice. Although supposed
to be omniscient as well as omnipotent,
he is thought not to make up his mind
until the moment of action; or at least
not so conclusively, but that his in
tentions may be altered up to the very
last moment by appropriate solicitation.
Without entering into the difficulties of
reconciling this view of the divine govern
ment with the prescience and the per
fect wisdom ascribed to the Deity, we
may content ourselves with the fact that
it contradicts what experience has taught
us of the manner in which things actually
take place. The phenomena of nature
do take place according to general laws.
They do originate from definite natural
antecedents. Therefore, if their ultimate
origin is derived from a will, that will
must have established the general laws
and willed the antecedents. If there be
a Creator, his intention must have been
that events should depend upon ante
cedents and be produced according to
fixed laws. But this being conceded,
there is nothing in scientific experience
inconsistent with the belief that those
laws and sequences are themselves due
to a divine will. Neither are we obliged
to suppose that the divine will exerted
itself once for all, and, after putting a
power into the system which enabled it
to go on of itself, has ever since let it
alone. Science contains nothing repug
nant to the supposition that every event
which takes place results from a specific
volition of the presiding Power, provided
that this Power adheres in its particular
volitions to general laws laid down by
itself. The common opinion is that this
hypothesis tends more to the glory of the
61
Deity than the supposition that the
universe was made so that it could go
on of itself. There have been thinkers,
however—of no ordinary eminence (of
whom Leibnitz was one)—who thought
the last the only supposition worthy of
the Deity, and protested against likening
God to a clockmaker whose clock will
not go unless he puts his hand to the
machinery and keeps it going. With
such considerations we have no concern
in this place. We are looking at the
subject not from the point of view of
reference, but from that of science ; and
with science both these suppositions as
to the mode of the divine action are
equally consistent.
We must now, however, pass to the
next question. There is nothing to dis
prove the creation and government of
Nature by a sovereign will; but is there
anything to prove it ? Of what nature
are its evidences; and, weighed in the
scientific balance, what is their value ?
THE EVIDENCES OF THEISM.
The evidences of a Creator are not only
of several distinct kinds, but of such
diverse characters that they are adapted
to minds of very different descriptions,
and it is hardly possible for any mind to
be equally impressed by them all. The
familiar classification of them into proofs
a priori and a posteriori marks that, when
looked at in a purely scientific view, they
belong to different schools of thought.
Accordingly, though the unthoughtful
believer whose creed really rests on
authority gives an equal welcome to all
plausible arguments in support of the
belief in which he has been brought up,
philosophers who have had to make a
choice between the a priori and the
a posteriori methods in general science
seldom fail, while insisting on one of
�62
THEISM
these modes of support for religion, to
speak with more or less of disparage
ment of the other. It is our duty in the
present inquiry to maintain complete im
partiality and to give a fair examination
to both. At the same time, I entertain a
strong conviction that one of the two
modes of argument is in its nature scien
tific, the other not only unscientific, but
condemned by science. The scientific
argument is that which reasons from the
facts and analogies of human experience,
as a geologist does when he infers the
past states of our terrestrial globe, or an
astronomical observer when he draws
conclusions respecting the physical com
position of the heavenly bodies. This is
the cl posteriori method, the principal
application of which to Theism is the
argument (as it is called) of design. The
mode qf reasoning which I call unscien
tific, though in the opinion of some
thinkers it is also a legitimate mode
of scientific procedure, is that which
infers external objective facts from ideas
or convictions of our minds. I say this
independently of any opinion of my own
respecting the origin of our ideas or con
victions ; for even if we were unable to
point out any manner in which the idea
of God, for example, can have grown
up from the impressions of experience,
still the idea can only prove the idea,
and not the objective fact, unless, in
deed, the fact is supposed (agreeably to
the book of Genesis) to have been
handed down by tradition from a time
when there was direct personal inter
course with the Divine Being; in which
case the argument is no longer a priori.
The supposition that an idea, or a wish,
or a need, even if native to the mind,
proves the reality of a corresponding
object, derives all the plausibility from
the belief already in our minds that we
were made by a benignant Being who
would not have implanted in us a ground
less belief, or a want which he did not
afford us the means of satisfying; and
is therefore a palpable petitio principii if
adduced as an argument to support the
very belief which it pre-supposes.
At the same time, it must be admitted
that all a priori systems, whether in
philosophy or religion, do in some sense
profess to be founded on experience,
since, though they affirm the possibility
of arriving at truths which transcend
experience, they yet make the facts of
experience their starting-point (as what
other starting-point is possible ?). They
are entitled to consideration in so far as
it can be shown that experience gives
any countenance either to them or to
their method of inquiry. Professedly a
priori arguments are not unfrequently of
a mixed nature, partaking in some degree
of the a posteriori character, and may
often be said to be a posteriori arguments
in disguise; the d priori considerations
acting chiefly in the way of making some
particular a posteriori argument tell for
more than its worth. This is emphati
cally true of the argument for Theism
which I shall first examine—the necessity
of a First Cause. For this has in truth
a wide basis of experience in the univer
sality of the relation of cause and effect
among the phenomena of nature ; while,
at the same time, theological philoso
phers have not been content to let it
rest upon this basis, but have affirmed
causation as a truth of reason appre
hended intuitively by its own light.
ARGUMENT FOR A FIRST
CAUSE.
The argument for a First Cause
admits of being, and is, presented as a
conclusion from the whole of human
�ARGUMENT FOR A FIRST CAUSE
experience. Everything that we know
(it is argued) had a cause, and owed its
existence to that cause. How, then, can
it be but that the world, which is but a
name for the aggregate of all that we
know, has a cause to which it is indebted
for its existence ?
The fact of experience, however, when
correctly expressed, turns out to be, not
that everything which we know derives
its existence from a cause, but only
every event or change. There is in
nature a permanent element, and also a
changeable : the changes are always the
effects of previous changes; the perma
nent existences, so far as we know, are
not effects at all. It is true we are
accustomed to say, not only of events,
but of objects, that they are produced
by causes, as water by the union of
hydrogen and oxygen. But by this we
only mean that, when they begin to exist,
their beginning is the effect of a cause.
But their beginning to exist is not an
object; it is an event. If it be objected
that the cause of a thing’s beginning to
exist may be said with propriety to be
the cause of the thing itself, I shall not
quarrel with the expression. But thatwhich in an object begins to exist is that
in it which belongs to the changeable
element in nature ; the outward form and
the properties depending on mechanical
or chemical combinations of its compo
nent parts. There is in every object
another and a permanent element—viz.,
the specific elementary substance or sub
stances of which it consists and their
inherent properties. These are not known
to us as beginning to exist: within the
range of human knowledge they had
no beginning, consequently no cause;
though they themselves are causes or
con-causes of everything that takes place.
Experience, therefore, affords no evi
63
dences, not even analogies, to justify our
extending to the apparently immutable
a generalisation grounded only on our
observation of the changeable.
As a fact of experience, then, causation
cannot legitimately be extended to the
material universe itself, but only to its
changeable phenomena; of these, indeed,
causes may be affirmed without any
exception. But what causes ? The cause
of every change is a prior change ; and
such it cannot but be; for, if there were
no new antecedent, there would not be
a new consequent. If the state of facts
which brings the phenomenon into
existence had existed always or for an
indefinite duration, the effect also would
have existed always or been produced
an indefinite time ago. It is thus a
necessary part of the fact of causation,
within the sphere of our experience, that
the causes as well as the effects had a
beginning in time, and were themselves
caused. It would seem, therefore, that
our experience, instead of furnishing an
argument for a First Cause, is repugnant
to it; and that the very essence of
causation, as it exists within the limits
of our knowledge, is incompatible with a
First Cause.
But it is necessary to look more par
ticularly into the matter, and analyse
more closely the nature of the causes of
which mankind have experience. For
if it should turn out that, though all
causes have a beginning, there is in all
of them a permanent element which
had no beginning, this permanent
element may with some justice be
termed a first or universal cause, inas
much as, though not sufficient of itself to
cause anything, it enters as a con-cause
into all causation. Now, it ‘ happens
that the last result of physical inquiry,
derived from the converging evidences
�64
THEISM
of all branches of physical science, does, from it, inasmuch as mind is the only
if it holds good, land us, so far as the thing which is capable of originating
material world is concerned, in a result change. This is said to be the lesson of
of this sort. Whenever a physical phe human experience. In the phenomena
nomenon is traced to its cause, that of inanimate nature the force which
cause when analysed is found to be works is always a pre-existing force, not
a certain quantum of force, combined originated, but transferred. One physical
with certain collocations. And the last object moves another by giving out to it
great generalisation of science, the con the force by which it has first been itself
servation of force, teaches us that vhe moved. The wind communicates to
variety in the effects depends partly the waves, or to a windmill, or a ship,
upon the amount of the force and partly part of the motion which has been given
upon the diversity of the collocations. to itself by some other agent. In volun
The force itself is essentially one and tary action alone we see a commence
the same; and there exists of it in ment, an origination of motion ; since all
nature a fixed quantity, which (if the other causes appear incapable of this
theory be true) is never increased or origination, experience is in favour of the
diminished. Here, then, we find, even conclusion that all the motion in exist
in the changes of material nature, a per ence owed its beginning to this one
manent element,-to all appearance the cause, voluntary agency, if not that of
very one of which we were in quest. This man, then of a more powerful Being.
it is apparently to which, if to anything,
This argument is a very old one. It
we must assign the character of First is to be found in Plato; not, as might
Cause, the cause of the material universe. have been expected, in the Phadon,
For all effects may be traced up to it, where the arguments are not such as
while it cannot be traced up by our would now be deemed of any weight, but
experience to anything beyond : its trans in his latest production, the Leges. LnA
formations alone can be so traced, and of it is still one of the most telling arguthem the cause always includes the force • ments with the more metaphysical class
itself; the same quantity of force in of defenders of Natural Theology.
some previous form. It would seem,
Now, in the first place, if there be
then, that in the only sense in which truth in the doctrine of the conservation
experience supports in any shape the of force—in other words, the constancy
doctrine of a First Cause—viz., as the of the total amount of force in existence—
primaeval and universal element in all this doctrine does not change from true
causes—the First Cause can be no other to false when it reaches the field of
than Force.
voluntary agency. The will does not,
We are, however, by no means at the any more than other causes, create force :
end of the question. On the contrary, granting that it originates motion, it has
the greatest stress of the argument is no means of doing so but by converting
exactly at the point which we have now into that particular manifestation a por
reached. For it is maintained that mind tion of force which already existed in
is the only possible cause of force; or other forms. It is known that the source
rather, perhaps, that mind is a force, from which this portion of force is
and that all other force must be derived derived is chiefly, or entirely, the force
�ARGUMENT FOR A FIRST CAUSE
evolved in the processes of chemical com
position and decomposition which con
stitute the body of nutrition; the force
so liberated becomes a fund upon which
every muscular, and even every merely
nervous action, as of the brain in thought,
is a draft. It is in this sense only that,
according to the best lights of science,
volition is an originating cause. Volition,
therefore, does not answer to the idea of
a First Cause; since force must in
every instance be assumed as prior to it;
and there is not the slightest colour, de
rived from experience, for supposing
force itself to have been created by a
volition. As far as anything can be con
cluded from human experience, force has
all the attributes of a thing eternal and
uncreated.
This, however, does not close the dis
cussion. For though whatever verdict
experience can give in the case is against
the possibility that will ever originates
force, yet, if we can be assured that
neither does force originate will, will
must be held to be an agency, if not
prior to force, yet coeternal with it; and
if it be true that will can originate, not
indeed force, but the transformation of
force from some other of its mani
festations into that of mechanical motion,
and that there is within human experience
no other agency capable of doing so, the
argument for a will as the originator,
though not of the universe, yet of the
kosmos, or order of the universe, remains
unanswered.
But the case thus stated is not con
formable to fact. Whatever volition can
do in the way of creating motion out of
other forms of force, and generally of
evolving force from a latent into a visible
state, can be done by many other causes.
Chemical action, for instance; electricity ;
heat; the mere presence of a gravitating
65
body : all these are causes of mechanical
motion on a far larger scale than any
volitions which experience presents to us ;
and in most of the effects thus produced
the motion given by one body to another
is not, as in the ordinary cases of
mechanical action, motion that has first
been given to that other by some third
body. The phenomenon is not a mere
passing on of mechanical motion, but a
creation of it out of a force previously
latent or manifesting itself in some other
form. Volition, therefore, regarded as
an agent in the material universe, has no
exclusive privilege of origination : all that
it can originate is also originated by other
transforming agents. If it be said that
those other agents must have had the
force they give out put into them from
elsewhere, I answer that this is no less
true of the force which volition disposes
of. We know that this force comes from
an external source—the chemical action
of the food and air. The force by which
the phenomena of the material world are
produced circulates through all physical
agencies in a never-ending though some
times intermitting stream. I am, of
course, speaking of volition only in its
action on the material world. We have
nothing to do here with the freedom of
the will itself as a mental phenomenon—
with the vex ata questio whether volition
is self-determining or determined by
causes. To the question now in hand it
is only the effects of volition that are
relevant, not its origin. The assertion is
that physical nature must have been pro
duced by a will, because nothing but will
is known to us as having the power of
originating the production of phenomena.
We have seen that, on the contrary, all
the power that will possesses over
phenomena is shared, as far as we have
the means of judging, by other and much
F
�66
THEISM
more powerful agents, and that in the
only sense in which those agents do not
originate, neither does will originate. No
prerogative, therefore, can, on the ground
of experience, be assigned to volition
above other natural agents, as a pro
ducing cause of phenomena. All that
can be affirmed by the strongest assertor
of the freedom of the will is that voli
tions are themselves uncaused, and are
therefore alone fit to be the First or
Universal Cause. But, even assuming
volitions to be uncaused, the properties
of matter, so far as experience discloses,
are uncaused also, and have the advan
tage over any particular volition, in being,
so far as experience can show, eternal.
Theism, therefore, in so far as it rests on
the necessity of a First Cause, has no
support from experience.
To those who, in default of experience,
consider the necessity of a First Cause as
matter of intuition, I would say that it is
needless, in this discussion, to contest
their premises; since admitting that there
is and must be a First Cause, it has now
been shown that several other agencies
than will can lay equal claim to that
character. One thing only may be said
which requires notice here. Among the
facts of the universe to be accounted for,
it may be said, is mind; and it is selfevident that nothing can have produced
mind but mind.
The special indications that mind is
deemed to give, pointing to intelligent
contrivance, belong to a different portion
of this inquiry. But if the mere exist
ence of mind is supposed to require,
as a necessary antecedent, another mind
greater and more powerful, the difficulty
is not removed by going one step back :
the creating mind stands as much in
need of another mind to be the source
of its existence as the created mind. Be
it remembered that we have no direct
knowledge (at least apart from revela
tion) of a mind which is even apparently
eternal, as force and matter are: an
eternal mind is, as far as the present
argument is concerned, a simple
hypothesis to account for the minds
which we know to exist. Now, it is
essential to an hypothesis that, if ad
mitted, it should at least remove the
difficulty and account for the facts. But
it does not account for mind to refer one
mind to a prior mind for its origin. The
problem remains unsolved, the difficulty
undiminished—nay, rather increased.
To this it may be objected that the
causation of every human mind is matter
of fact, since we know that it had a
beginning in time. We even know, or
have the strongest grounds for believing,
that the human species itself had a
beginning in time. For there is a vast
amount of evidence that the state of
our planet was once such as to be incom
patible with animal life, and that human
life is of a very much more modern
origin than animal life. In any case,
therefore, the fact must be faced that
there must have been a Cause which
called the first human mind—nay, the
very first germ of organic life—into exist
ence. No such difficulty exists in the
supposition of an eternal mind. If we
did not know that mind on our earth
began to exist, we might suppose it to
be uncaused; and we may still suppose
this of the mind to which we ascribe its
existence.
To take this ground is to return into
the field of human experience, and to
become subject to its canons, and we
are then entitled to ask where is the
proof that nothing can have caused a
mind except another mind. From what,
except from experience, can we know
�ARGUMENT FROM THE GENERAL CONSENT OF MANKIND
67
what can produce what—what causes reason to expect, from the mere occur
are adequate to what effects ? That rence of changes, that, if we could trace
nothing can consciously produce mind back the series far enough, we should
but mind is self-evident., being involved arrive at a primaeval volition. The world
in the meaning of the words ; but that does not, by its mere existence, bear
there cannot be unconscious production witness to a God; if it gives indications
must not be assumed, for it is the very of one, these must be given by the
point to be proved. Apart from experi special nature of the phenomena, by
ence, and arguing on what is called what they present that resembles adapta
reason—that is, on supposed self-evidence tion to an end : of which hereafter. If,
—the notion seems to be that no causes in default of evidence from experience,
can give rise to products of a more the evidence of intuition is relied upon,
precious or elevated kind than them it may be answered that if mind, as
selves. But this is at variance with the mind, presents intuitive evidence of
known analogies of nature. How vastly having been created, the creative mind
nobler and more precious, for instance, must do the same, and we are no nearer
are the higher vegetables and animals to the First Cause than before. But if
than the soil and manure out of which, there be nothing in the nature of mind
and by the properties of which, they are which in itself implies a Creator, the
raised up. The tendency of all recent minds which have a beginning in time, as
speculation is towards the opinion that all minds have which are known to our ex
the development of inferior orders of perience, must, indeed, have been caused,
existence into superior, the substitution but it is not necessary that their cause
of greater elaboration and higher organi should have been a prior intelligence.
sation for lower, is the general rule of
ARGUMENT FROM THE
Nature. Whether it is so or not, there
GENERAL CONSENT OF MAN
are at least in nature a multitude of facts
KIND.
bearing that character, and this is
sufficient for the argument.
Before proceeding to the argument
Here, then, this part of the discussion from Marks of Design, which, as it
may stop. The result it leads to is that seems to me, must always be the main
the First Cause argument is in itself of no strength of Natural Theism, we may
value for the establishment of Theism : dispose briefly of some other arguments
because no cause is needed for the exist which are of little scientific weight, but
ence of that which has no beginning; which have greater influence on the
and both matter and force (whatever human mind than much better argu
metaphysical theory we may give of the ments, because they are appeals to
one or the other) have had, so far as authority, and it is by authority that the
our experiences can teach us, no begin opinions of the bulk of mankind are
ning—which cannot be said of mind. principally, and not unnaturally, governed.
The phenomena or changes in the The authority invoked is that of mankind
universe have, indeed, each of them a generally, and specially of some of its
beginning and a cause, but their cause wisest men; particularly such as were in
is always a prior change; nor do the other respects conspicuous examples of
analogies of experience give us any ' breaking loose from received prejudices.
�68
THEISM
Socrates and Plato, Bacon, Locke, and
Newton, Descartes and Leibnitz, are
common examples.
It may, doubtless, be good advice to
persons who in point of knowledge and
cultivation are not entitled to think
themselves competent judges of difficult
questions, to bid them content them
selves with holding that true which
mankind generally believe, and so long
as they believe it; or that which has
been believed by those who pass for the
most eminent among the minds of the
past. But to a thinker the argument
from other people’s opinion has little
weight. It is but second-hand evidence;
and merely admonishes us to look out
for and weigh the reasons on which this
conviction of mankind or of wise men
was founded. Accordingly, those who
make any claim to philosophic treat
ment of the subject employ this general
consent chiefly as evidence that there is
in the mind of man an intuitive percep
tion, or an instinctive sense, of Deity.
From the generality of the belief they
infer that it is inherent in our constitu
tion ; from which they draw the con
clusion, a precarious one indeed, but
conformable to the general mode of
proceeding of the intuitive philosophy,
that the belief must be true; though as
applied to Theism this argument begs
the question, since it has itself nothing
to rest upon but the belief that the
human mind was made by a God, who
would not deceive his creatures.
But, indeed, what ground does the
general prevalence of the belief in Deity
afford us for inferring that this belief is
native to the human mind, and indepen
dent of evidence ? Is it, then, so very
devoid of evidence, even apparent ?
Lias it so little semblance of foundation
in fact that it can only be accounted for
by the supposition of its being innate ?
We should not expect to find Theists
believing that the appearances in nature
of a contriving intelligence are not only
insufficient, but are not even plausible,
and cannot be supposed to have carried
conviction either to the general or to
the wiser mind. If there are external
evidences of Theism, even if not perfectly
conclusive, why need we suppose that
the belief of its truth was the result of
anything else ? The superior minds to
whom an appeal is made, from Socrates
downwards, when they professed to give
the grounds of their opinion, did not
say that they found the belief in them
selves without knowing from whence it
came, but ascribed it, if not to revelation,
either to some metaphysical argument
or to those very external evidences
which are the basis of the argument
from design.
If it be said that the belief in Deity is
universal among barbarous tribes, and
among the ignorant portion of civilised
populations, who cannot be supposed to
have been impressed by the marvellous
adaptations of Nature, most of which are
unknown to them ; I answer, that the
ignorant in civilised countries take their
opinions from the educated, and that in
the case of savages, if the evidence is in
sufficient, so is the belief. The religious
belief of savages is not belief in the God
of natural theology, but a mere modifica
tion of the crude generalisation which
ascribes life, consciousness, and will to all
natural powers of which they cannot per
ceive the source or control the operation.
And the divinities believed in are as
numerous as those powers. Each river,
fountain, or tree has a divinity of its own.
To see in this blunder of primitive
ignorance the hand of the Supreme
Being implanting in his creatures an
�ARGUMENT FROM THE GENERAL CONSENT OF MANKIND
instinctive knowledge of his existence is
a poor compliment to the Deity. The
religion of savages is fetichism of the
grossest kind, ascribing animation and
will to individual objects, and seeking to
propitiate them by prayer and sacrifice.
That this should be the case is the less
surprising when we remember that there
is not a definite boundary line, broadly
separating the conscious human being
from inanimate objects. Between these
and man there is an intermediate class
of objects, sometimes much more power
ful than man, which do possess life and
will—viz., the brute animals, which in an
early stage of existence play a very great
part in human life; making it the less
surprising that the line should not at
first be quite distinguishable between the
animate and the inanimate part of nature.
As observation advances, it is perceived
that the majority of outward objects have
all their important qualities in common
with entire classes or groups of objects
which comport themselves exactly alike
in the same circumstances, and in these
cases the worship of visible objects is ex
changed for that of an invisible Being
supposed to preside over the whole class.
This step in generalisation is slowly
made, with hesitation and even terror;
as we still see in the case of ignorant
populations with what difficulty experi
ence disabuses them of belief in the
supernatural powers and terrible resent
ment of a particular idol. Chiefly by
these terrors the religious impressions of
barbarians are kept alive, with only
slight modifications, until the Theism
of cultivated minds is ready to take
their place. And the Theism of culti
vated minds, if we take their own
word for it, is always a conclusion either
from arguments called rational or from
the appearances in nature.
69
It is needless here to dwell upon the
difficulty of the hypothesis of a natural
belief not common to all human beings,
an instinct not universal. It is con
ceivable, doubtless, that some men
might be born without a particular
natural faculty, as some are born without
a particular sense. But when this is the
case, we ought to be much more particular
as to the proof that it really is a natural
faculty. If it were not a matter of
observation, but of speculation, that men
can see ; if they had no apparent organ
of sight, and no perceptions or knowledge
but such as they might conceivably have
acquired by some circuitous process
through their other senses, the fact that
men exist who do not even suppose
themselves to see would be a consider
able argument against the theory of a
visual sense. But it would carry us too
far to press, for the purposes of this dis
cussion, an argument which applies so
largely to the whole of the intuitional
philosophy. The strongest Intuitionist
will not maintain that a belief should be
held for instinctive when evidence (real
or apparent), sufficient to engender it, is
universally admitted to exist. To the
force of the evidence must be, in this
case, added all the emotional or moral
causes which incline men to the belief;
the satisfaction which it gives to the
obstinate questionings with which men
torment themselves respecting the past;
the hopes which it opens for the future ;
the fears also, since fear as well as hope
predisposes to belief; and to these in the
case of the more active spirits must
always have been added a perception of
the power which belief in the supernatural
affords for governing mankind, either for
their own good or for the selfish pur
poses of the governors.
The general consent of mankind does
�70
THEISM
not, therefore, afford ground for ad
mitting, even as an hypothesis, the origin,
in an inherent law of the human mind,
of a fact otherwise so more than suffici
ently, so amply, accounted for.
THE ARGUMENT FROM CON
SCIOUSNESS.
There have been numerous arguments,
indeed almost every religious meta
physician has one of his own, to prove
the existence and attributes of God from
what are called truth of reason, sup
posed to be independent of experience.
Descartes, who is the real founder of the
intuitional metaphysics, draws the con
clusion immediately from the first
premise of his philosophy, the celebrated
assumption that whatever he could very
clearly and distinctly apprehend must
be true. The idea of a God, perfect in
power, wisdom, and goodness, is’ a clear
and distinct idea, and must therefore, on
this principle, correspond to a real object.
This bold generalisation, however, that a
conception of the human mind proves
its own objective reality, Descartes is
obliged to limit by the qualification—
“ if the idea includes existence.” Now,
the idea of God implying the union of
all perfections, and existence being a
perfection, the idea of God proves his
existence. This very simple argument,
which denies to man one of his most
familiar and most precious attributes,
that of idealising as it is called—of con
structing from the materials of experience
a conception more perfect than experi
ence itself affords—is not likely to satisfy
any one in the present day. More
elaborate, though scarcely more success
ful efforts, have been made by many of
Descartes’ successors, to derive know
ledge of the Deity from an inward light;
to make it a truth not dependent on ex
ternal evidence, a fact of direct per
ception, or, as they are accustomed to
call it, of consciousness. The philo
sophical world is familiar with the attempt
of Cousin to make out that, whenever we
perceive a particular object, we perceive
along with it, or are conscious of, God;
and also with the celebrated refutation
of this doctrine by Sir William Hamilton.
It would be waste of time to examine
any of these theories in detail. While
each has its own particular logical
fallacies, they labour under the common
infirmity that one man cannot, by pro
claiming with ever so much confidence
that he perceives an object, convince
other people that they see it too. If, in
deed, he laid claim to a divine faculty of
vision, vouchsafed to him alone, and
making him cognisant of things which
men not thus assisted have not the
capacity to see, the case might be
different. Men have been able to get
such claims admitted; and other people
can only require of them to show their
credentials. But when no claim is set up
to any peculiar gift, but we are told that
all of us are as capable as the prophet of
seeing what he sees, feeling what he feels
—nay, that we actually do so—and when
the utmost effort of which we are capable
fails to make us aware of what we are
told we perceive, this supposed universal
faculty of intuition is but
“ The dark lantern of the Spirit
Which none see by but those who bear it
and the bearers may fairly be asked to
consider whether it is not more likely
that they are mistaken as to the origin of
an impression in their minds than that
others are ignorant of the very existence
of an impression in theirs.
The inconclusiveness, in a speculative
point of view, of all arguments from the
subjective notion of Deity to its objective
�THE ARGUMENT FROM CONSCIOUSNESS
reality was well seen by Kant, the most
discriminating of the a prion meta
physicians, who always kept the two
questions, the origin and composition of
our ideas and the reality of the
corresponding objects, perfectly distinct.
According to Kant, the idea of the
Deity is native to the mind, in the sense
that it is constructed by the mind’s own
laws, and not derived from without; but
this idea of speculative reason cannot be
shown by any logical process, or per
ceived by direct apprehension, to have a
corresponding reality outside the human
mind. To Kant, God is neither an
object of direct consciousness nor a con
clusion of reasoning, but a Necessary
Assumption—necessary, not by a logical
but a practical necessity, imposed by the
reality of the Moral Law. Duty is a
fact of consciousness : “Thou shalt ” is
a command issuing from the recesses of
our being, and not to be accounted for
by any impressions derived from experi
ence ; and this command requires a
commander, though it is not perfectly
clear whether Kant’s meaning is that
conviction of a law includes conviction
of a lawgiver, or only that a being of
whose will the law is an expression is
eminently desirable. If the former be
intended, the argument is founded on a
double meaning of the word “ law.” A
rule to which we feel it a duty to con
form has, in common with laws commonly
so-called, the fact of claiming our obedi
ence ; but it does not follow that the
rule must originate, like the laws of the
land, in the will of a legislator or legis
lators external to the mind. We may
even say that a feeling of obligation
which is merely the result of a command
is not what is meant by moral obligation,
which, on the contrary, supposes some
thing that the internal conscience bears
7i
witness to as binding in its own nature;
and which God, in superadding his
command, conforms to, and perhaps
declares, but does not create. Conced
ing, then, for the sake of the argument,
that the moral sentiment is as purely of
the mind’s own growth, the obligation of
duty as entirely independent of experi
ence and acquired impressions, as Kant
or any other metaphysician ever con
tended, it may yet be maintained that
this feeling of obligation rather excludes
than compels the belief in a Divine
legislator merely as the source of the
obligation; and, as a matter of fact, the
obligation of duty is both theoretically
acknowledged and practically felt in the
fullest manner by many who have no
positive belief in God, though seldom,
probably, without habitual and familiar
reference to him as an ideal conception.
But if the existence of God as a wise
and just lawgiver is not a necessary part
of the feelings of morality, it may still be
maintained that those feelings make his
existence eminently desirable. No doubt
they do, and that is the great reason why
we find that good men and women cling
to the belief, and are pained by its being
questioned. But surely it is not legiti
mate to assume that in the order of the
universe whatever is desirable is true.
Optimism, even when a God is already
believed in, is a thorny doctrine to
maintain, and had to be taken by
Leibnitz in the limited sense that the
universe, being made by a good being, is
the best universe possible, not the best
absolutely; that the Divine power, in
short, was not equal to making it more
free from imperfections than it is. But
optimism, prior to belief in a God, and
as the ground of that belief, seems one
of the oddest of all speculative delusions.
[ Nothing, however, I believe, contributes
�72
THEISM
more to keep up the belief in the general
mind of humanity than this feeling of its
desirableness, which, when clothed, as it
very often is, in the forms of an argu
ment, is a naif expression of the ten
dency of the human mind to believe
what is agreeable to it. Positive value
the argument, of course, has none.
Without dwelling further on these or
on any other of the a priori arguments
for Theism, we will no longer delay
passing to the far more important argu
ment of the appearances of contrivance
in nature.
THE ARGUMENT FROM MARKS
OF DESIGN IN NATURE.
We now at last reach an argument of
a really scientific character, which does
not shrink from scientific tests, but
claims to be judged by the established
canons of Induction. The design argu
ment is wholly grounded on experience.
Certain qualities, it is alleged, are found
to be characteristic of such things as are
made by an intelligent mind for a
purpose. The order of Nature, or some
considerable parts of it, exhibit these
qualities in a remarkable degree. We
are entitled from this great similarity in
the effects to infer similarity in the
cause, and to believe that things which
it is beyond the power of man to make,
but which resemble the works of man in
all but power, must also have been made
by intelligence, armed with a power
greater than human.
I have stated this argument in its
fullest strength, as it is stated by its
most thoroughgoing assertors. A very
little consideration, however, suffices to
show that, though it has some force, its
force is very generally overrated. Paley’s
illustration of a watch puts the case
much too strongly. If I found a watch
on an apparently desolate island, I
should, indeed, infer that it had been
left there by a human being; but the
inference would not be from marks
of design, but because I already knew
by direct experience that watches are
made by men. I should draw the infer
ence no less confidently from a footprint,
or from any relic, however insignificant,
which experience has taught me to attri
bute to man : as geologists infer the past
existence of animals from coprolites,
though no one sees marks of design in a
coprolite. The evidence of design in
creation can never reach the height of
direct induction; it amounts only to the
inferior kind of inductive evidence called
analogy. Analogy agrees with induction
in this, that they both argue that a thing
known to resemble another in certain
circumstances (call those circumstances
A and B) will resemble it in another
circumstance (call it C). But the differ
ence is that in induction A and B are
known, by a previous comparison of
many instances, to be the very circum
stances on which C depends, or with
which it is in some way connected.
When this has not been ascertained, the
argument amounts only to this, that
since it is not known with which of the
circumstances existing in the known
case C is connected, they may as well be
A and B as any others ; and therefore
there is a greater probability of C in
cases where we know that A and B exist
than in cases of which we know nothing
at all. This argument is of a weight
very difficult to estimate at all, and
impossible to estimate precisely. It may
be very strong, when the known points of
agreement, A and B, etc., are numerous
and the known points of difference few;
or very weak when the reverse is the
case; but it can never be equal in
�THE ARGUMENT FROM MARKS OF DESIGN IN NATURE
validity to a real induction. The resem
blances between some of the arrange
ments in nature and some of those made
by man are considerable, and even as
mere resemblances afford a certain pre
sumption of similarity of cause; but how
great that presumption is it is hard to
say. All that can be said with certainty
is that these likenesses make creation by
intelligence considerably more probable
than if the likenesses had been less, or
than if there had been no likenesses
at all.
This mode, however, of stating the
case does not do full justice to the
evidence of Theism. The design argu
ment is not drawn from mere resem
blances in Nature to the works of human
intelligence, but from the special charac
ter of those resemblances. The circum
stances in which it is alleged that the
world resembles the works of man are
not circumstances taken at random, but
are particular instances of a circumstance
which experience shows to have a real
connection with an intelligent origin, the
fact of conspiring to an end. The
argument, therefore, is not one of mere
analogy. As mere analogy it has its
weight, but it is more than analogy. It
surpasses analogy exactly as induction
surpasses it. It is an inductive argu
ment.
This, I think, is undeniable, and it
remains to test the argument by the
logical principles applicable to induction.
For this purpose it will be convenient to
handle, not the argument as a whole, but
some one of the most impressive cases
of it, such as the structure of the eye or
of the ear. It is maintained that the
structure of the eye proves a designing
mind. To what class of inductive argu
ments does this belong ? and what is its
degree of force ?
73
The species of inductive arguments
are four in number, corresponding to the
four inductive methods—the methods of
agreement, of difference, of residues, and
of concomitant variations. The argu
ment under consideration falls within the
first of these divisions—the method of
agreement. This is, for reasons known
to inductive logicians, the weakest of the
four; but the particular argument is a
strong one of the kind. It may be
logically analysed as follows :—
The parts of which the eye is com
posed, and the collocations which con
stitute the arrangement of those parts,
resemble one another in this very
remarkable property, that they all con
duce to enabling the animal to see.
These things being as they are, the
animal sees; if any one of them were
different from what it is, the animal, for
the most part, would either not see, or
would not see equally well. And this is
the only marked resemblance that we can
trace among the different parts of this
structure, beyond the general likeness of
composition and organisation which
exists among all other parts of the animal.
Now, the particular combination of
organic elements called an eye had, in
every instance, a beginning in time, and
must, therefore, have been brought
together by a cause or causes. The
number of instances is immeasurably
greater than is, by the principles of in
ductive logic, required for the exclusion
of a random concurrence of independent
causes, or, speaking technically, for the
elimination of chance. We are, there
fore, warranted by the canons of in
duction in concluding that what brought
all these elements together was some
cause common to them all; and inasmuch
as the elements agree in the single
circumstance of conspiring to produce
�74
THEISM
sight, there must be some connection by
way of causation between the cause which
brought those elements together and the
fact of sight.
This I conceive to be a legitimate in
ductive inference, and the sum and sub
stance of what induction can do for
Theism. The natural sequel of the argu
ment would be this. Sight, being a fact
not precedent but subsequent to the
putting together of the organic structure
of the eye, can only be connected with
the production of that structure in the
character of a final, not an efficient, cause;
that is, it is not sight itself, but an ante
cedent idea of it, that must be the
efficient cause. But this at once marks
the origin as proceeding from an in
telligent will.
I regret to say, however, that this
latter half of the argument is not so in
expugnable as the former half. Creative
forethought is not absolutely the only
link by which the origin of the wonderful
mechanism of the eye may be connected
with the fact of sight. There is another
connecting-link on which attention has
been greatly fixed by recent speculations,
and the reality of which cannot be called
in question, though its adequacy to
account for such truly admirable com
binations as some of those in Nature is
still, and will probably long remain,
problematical. This is the principle of
“ the survival of the fittest.”
This principle does not pretend to
account for the commencement of
sensation or of animal or vegetable life.
But assuming the existence of some one
or more very low forms of organic life, in
which there are no complex adaptations
nor any marked appearances of con
trivance, and supposing, as experience
warrants us in doing, that many small
variations from those simple types would
be thrown out in all directions, which
would be transmissible by inheritance,
and of which some would be advan
tageous to the creature in its struggle for
existence and others disadvantageous,
the forms which are advantageous would
always tend to survive, and those which
are disadvantageous to perish. And
thus there would be a constant though
slow general improvement of the type as
it branched out into many different
varieties, adapting it to different media
and modes of existence, until it might
possibly, in countless ages, attain to the
most advanced examples which now
exist.
It must be acknowledged that there is
something very startling, and prima facie
improbable, in this hypothetical history
of Nature. It would require us, for
example, to suppose that the primaeval
animal, of whatever nature it may have
been, could not see, and had at most
such slight preparation for seeing as
might be constituted by some chemical
action of light upon its cellular structure.
One of the accidental variations which
are liable to take place in all organic
beings would at some time or other pro
duce a variety that could see, in some
imperfect manner, and this peculiarity
being transmitted by inheritance, while
other variations continued to take place
in other directions, a number of races
would be produced who, by the power of
even imperfect sight, would have a great
advantage over all other creatures which
could not see, and would in time ex
tirpate them from all places, except,
perhaps, a few very peculiar situations
underground. Fresh variations super
vening would give rise to races with
better and better seeing powers, until we
might at last reach as extraordinary a
combination of structures and functions
�ATTRIBUTES
as are seen in the eye of man and of the
more important animals. Of this theory,
when pushed to this extreme point, all
that can now be said is that it is not so
absurd as it looks, and that the analogies
which have been discovered in experi
ence, favourable to its possibility, far
exceed what any one could have sup
posed beforehand. Whether it will ever
be possible to say more than this is at
present uncertain.
The theory, if
admitted, would be in no way whatever
inconsistent with creation. But it must
be acknowledged that it would greatly
attenuate the evidence for it.
Leaving this remarkable speculation
to whatever fate the progress of discovery
may have in store for it, I think it must
be allowed that, in the present state of
our knowledge, the adaptations in Nature
afford a large balance of probability in
favour of creation by intelligence. It is
equally certain that this is no more than
Part
75
a probability ; and that the various other
arguments of natural theology which we
have considered add nothing to its force.
Whatever ground there is, revelation
apart, to believe in an author of nature
is derived from the appearances in the
universe. Their mere resemblance to
the works of man, or to what man could
do if he had the same power over the
materials of organised bodies which he
has over the materials of a watch, is of
some value as an argument of analogy;
but the argument is greatly strengthened
by the properly inductive considerations
which establish that there is some con
nection through causation between the
origin of the arrangements of nature and
the ends they fulfil; an argument which
is in many cases slight, but in others,
and chiefly in the nice and intricate
combinations of vegetable and animal
life, is of considerable strength.
II.—ATTRIBUTES
The question of the existence of a Deity,
in its purely scientific aspect, standing as
is shown in the First Part, it is next to
be considered, given the indications of a
Deity, what sort of a Deity do they point
to? What attributes are we warranted,
by the evidence which Nature affords of
a creative mind, in assigning to that
mind?
It needs no showing that the power, if
not the intelligence, must be so far
superior to that of man as to surpass
all human estimate. But from this to
omnipotence and omniscience there is a
wide interval. And the distinction is of
immense practical importance.
It is not too much to say that every
indication of Design in the Kosmos is so
much evidence against the omnipotence
of the designer. For what is meant by
design? Contrivance : the adaptation of
means to an end. But the necessity for
contrivance—the need of employing
means—is a consequence of the limita
tion of power. Who would have re
course to means if to attain his end his
mere word was sufficient? The very idea
of means implies that the means have an
�7&
THEISM
efficacy which the direct action of the
being who employs them has not.
Otherwise they are not means, but an
encumbrance. A man does not use
machinery to move his arms. If he did,
it could only be when paralysis had
deprived him of the power of moving
them by volition. But if the employ
ment of contrivance is in itself a sign of
limited power, how much more so
is the careful and skilful choice of con
trivances? Can any wisdom be shown
in the selection of means when the
means have no efficacy but what is given
them by the will of him who employs
them, and when his will could have
bestowed the same efficacy on any other
means ? Wisdom and contrivance are
shown in overcoming difficulties, and
there is no room for them in a being for
whom no difficulties exist. The evi
dences, therefore, of Natural Theology
distinctly imply that the Author of the
Kosmos worked under limitations; that
he was obliged to adapt himself to
conditions independent of his will, and
to attain his ends by such arrangements
as those conditions admitted of.
And this hypothesis agrees with what
we have seen to be the tendency of the
evidences in another respect. We foundthat the appearances in nature point,
indeed, to an origin of the Kosmos, or
order in nature, and indicate that origin
to be design, but do not point to any
commencement, still less creation, of the
two great elements of the universe—the
passive element and the active element,
matter and force. There is in nature
no reason whatever to suppose that
either matter or force, or any of their
properties, were made by the being who
was the author of the collocations by
which the world is adapted to what we
consider as its purposes; or that he has
power to alter any of those properties"
It is only when we consent to entertain
this negative supposition that there
arises a need for wisdom and con
trivance in the order of the universe.
The Deity had on this hypothesis to
work out his ends by combining materials
of a given nature and properties. Out
of these materials he had to construct a
world in which his designs should be
carried into effect through given proper
ties of matter and force, working to
gether and fitting into one another.
This did require skill and contrivance,
and the means by which it is effected
are often such as justly excite our
wonder and admiration; but exactly be
cause it requires wisdom, it implies
limitation of power, or rather the two
phrases express different sides of the
same fact.
If it be said that an Omnipotent
Creator, though under no necessity of
employing contrivances such as man
must use, thought fit to do so in order
to leave traces by which man might
recognise his creative hand, the answer
is that this equally supposes a limit to
his omnipotence. For if it was his will
that men should know that they them
selves and the world are his work, he,
being omnipotent, had only to will that
they should be aware of it. Ingenious
men have sought for reasons why God
might choose to leave his existence so
far a matter of doubt that men should
not be under an absolute necessity of
knowing it, as they are of knowing that
three and two make five. These
imagined reasons are very unfortunate
specimens of casuistry; but even did we
admit their validity, they are of no avail
on the supposition of omnipotence, since,
if it did not please God to implant in man
a complete conviction of his existence,
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nothing hindered him from making the
conviction fall short of completeness by
any margin he chose to leave. It is usual
to dispose of arguments of this descrip
tion by the easy answer—that we do not
know what wise reasons the Omniscient
may have had for leaving undone things
which he had the power to do. It is
not perceived that this plea itself implies
a limit to omnipotence. When a thing is
obviously good and obviously in accor
dance with what all the evidences of
creation imply to have been the Creator’s
design, and we say we do not know
what good reason he may have had for
not doing it, we mean that we do not
know to what other, still better object—
to what object still more completely in
the line of his purposes, he may have
seen fit to postpone it. But the neces
sity of postponing one thing to another
belongs only to limited power. Omni
potence could have made the objects
compatible. Omnipotence does not need
to weigh one consideration against
another. If the Creator, like a human
ruler, had to adapt himself to a set
of conditions which he did not make,
it is as unphilosophical as presumptuous
in Us to call him to account for any
imperfections in his work; to complain
that he left anything in it contrary to
what, if the indications of design prove
anything, he must have intended. He
must at least know more than we know,
and we cannot judge what greater good
would have had to be sacrificed, or what
greater evil incurred, if he had decided
to remove this particular blot. Not so
if he be omnipotent. If he be that, he
must himself have willed that the two
desirable objects should be incompatible;
he must himself have willed that the
obstacle to his supposed design should
be insuperable. It cannot, therefore, be
77
his design. It will not do to say that it
was, but that he had other designs which
interfered with it; for no one purpose
imposes necessary limitations on another
in the case of a being not restricted by
conditions of possibility.
Omnipotence, therefore, cannot be
predicated of the Creator on grounds of
natural theology. The fundamental
principles of natural religion, as deduced
from the facts of the universe, negative
his omnipotence. They do not, in the
same manner, exclude omniscience: if
we suppose limitation of power, there is
nothing to contradict the supposition of
perfect knowledge and absolute wisdom.
But neither is there anything to prove it.
The knowledge of the powers and
properties of things necessary for
planning and executing the arrange
ments of the Kosmos is, no doubt, as
much in excess of human knowledge as
the power implied in creation is in excess
of human power. And the skill, the
subtlety of contrivance, the ingenuity as
it would be called in the case of a human
work, is often marvellous. But nothing
obliges us to suppose that either the
knowledge or the skill is infinite. We
are not even compelled to suppose that
the contrivances were always the best
possible. If we venture to judge them
as we judge the works of human artificers,
we find abundant defects. The human
body, for example, is one of the most
striking instances of artful and ingenious
contrivance which nature offers, but we
may well ask whether so complicated a
machine could not have been made to
last longer, and not to get so easily and
frequently out of order. We may ask
why the human race should have been
so constituted as to grovel in wretched
ness and degradation for countless ages
before a small portion of it was enabled
�78
THEISM
to lift itself into the very imperfect state
of intelligence, goodness, and happiness
which we enjoy. The divine power may
not have been equal to doing more ; the
obstacles to a better arrangement of
things may have been insuperable. But
it is also possible that they were not.
The skill of the Demiourgos was suffi
cient to produce what we see; but we
cannot tell that this skill reached the
extreme limit of perfection compatible
with the material it employed and the
forces it had to work with. I know not
how we can even satisfy ourselves, on
grounds of natural theology, that the
Creator foresees all the future; that he
foreknows all the effects that will issue
from his own contrivances. There may
be great wisdom without the power of
foreseeing and calculating everything;
and human workmanship teaches us the
possibility that the workman’s knowledge
of the properties of the things he works
on may enable him to make arrange
ments admirably fitted to produce a given
result, while he may have very little
power of foreseeing the agencies of
another kind which may modify or
counteract the operation of the machinery
he has made. Perhaps a knowledge of
the laws of nature on which organic life
depends, not much more perfect than
the knowledge which man even now
possesses of .some other natural laws,
would enable man, if he had the same
power over the materials and the forces
concerned which he has over some of
those of inanimate nature, to create
organised beings not less wonderful nor
less adapted to their conditions of exist
ence than those in nature.
Assuming, then, that while we confine
ourselves to Natural Religion we must
rest content with a Creator less than
Almighty, the question presents itself,
Of what nature is the limitation of his
power ? Does the obstacle at which the
power of the Creator stops, which says
to it, Thus far shalt thou go and no
further, lie in the power of other Intelli
gent Beings; or in the insufficiency and
refractoriness of the materials of the
universe ; or must we resign ourselves to
admitting the hypothesis that the author
of the Kosmos, though wise and know
ing, was not all-wise and all-knowing, and
may not always have done the best that
was possible under the conditions of the
problem ?
The first of these suppositions has
until a very recent period been, and in
many quarters still is, the prevalent
theory even of Christianity. Though
attributing, and in a certain sense
sincerely, omnipotence to the Creator,
the received religion represents him as
for some inscrutable reason tolerating
the perpetual counteraction of his pur
poses by the will of another Being of
opposite character and of great though
inferior power, the Devil. The only
difference on this matter between popular
Christianity and the religion of Ormuzd
and Ahriman is that the former pays its
good Creator the bad compliment of
having been the maker of the Devil, and
of being at all times able to crush and
annihilate him and his evil deeds and
counsels, which, nevertheless, 'he does
not do. But, as I have already
remarked, all forms of polytheism, and
this among the rest, are with difficulty
reconcileable with an universe governed
by general laws. Obedience to law. is
the note of a settled government, and
not of a conflict always going on. When
powers are at war with one another for
the rule of the world, the boundary
between them is not fixed, but constantly
fluctuating. This may seem to be the
�ATTRIBUTES
case on our planet as between the
powers of good and evil when we look
only at the results; but when we con
sider the inner springs we find that both
the good and the evil take place in the
common course of nature, by'virtue of
the same general laws originally im
pressed—the same machinery turning
out now good, now evil things, and
oftener still the two combined. The
division of power is only apparently
variable, but really so regular that, were
we speaking of human potentates, we
should declare without hesitation that
the share of each must have been fixed
by previous consent. Upon that suppo
sition, indeed, the result of the combina
tion of antagonist forces might be much
the same as on that of a single creator
with divided purposes.
But when we come to consider, not
what hypothesis may be conceived, and
possibly reconciled with known facts, but
what supposition is pointed to by the
evidences of natural religion, the case
is different. The indications of design
point strongly in one direction—the
preservation of the creatures in whose
structure the indications are found.
Along with the preserving agencies there
are destroying agencies, which we might
be tempted to ascribe to the will of a
different Creator; but there are rarely
appearances of the recondite contrivance
of means of destruction, except when the
destruction of one creature is the means
of preservation to others. Nor can it be
supposed that the preserving agencies are
wielded by one Being, the destroying
agencies by another. The destroying
agencies are a necessary part of the pre
serving agencies : the chemical com
positions by which life is carried on
could not take place without a parallel
series of decompositions. The great J
79
agent of decay in both organic and in
organic substances is oxidation, and it is
only by oxidation that life is continued
for even the length of a minute. The
imperfections in the attainment of the
purposes which the appearances indicate
have not the air of having been designed.
They are like the unintended results of
accidents insufficiently guarded against,
or of a little excess or deficiency in the
quantity of some of the agencies by
which the good purpose is carried on, or
else they are consequences of the wearing
out of a machinery not made to last for
ever: they point either to shortcomings
in the workmanship as regards its in
tended purpose, or to external forces not
under the control of the workman, but
which forces bear no mark of being
wielded and aimed by any other and
rival Intelligence.
We may conclude, then, that there is
no ground in Natural Theology for attri
buting intelligence or personality to the
obstacles which partially thwart what
seem the purposes of the Creator. The
limitation of his power more -probably
results either from the qualities of the
material—the substances and forces of
which the universe is composed not
admitting of any arrangements by which
his purposes could be more completely
fulfilled; or else, the purposes might have
been more fully attained, but the Creator
did not know how to do it; creative
skill, wonderful as it is, was not suffi
ciently perfect to accomplish his purposes
more thoroughly.
We now pass to the moral attributes
of the Deity, so far as indicated in the
Creation ; or (stating the problem in the
broadest manner) to the question, what
indications Nature gives of the purposes
of its author. This question bears a very
different aspect to us from what it bears
�8o
THEISM
to those teachers of Natural Theology who
are encumbered with the necessity of ad
mitting the omnipotence of the Creator.
We have not to attempt the impossible
problem of reconciling infinite benevo
lence and justice with infinite power in
the Creator of such a world as this. The
attempt to do so not only involves abso
lute contradiction in an intellectual point
of view, but exhibits to excess the revolt
ing spectacle of a Jesuitical defence of
moral enormities.
On this topic I need not add to the
illustrations given of this portion of the
subject in my essay on Nature. At the
stage which our argument has reached
there is none of this moral perplexity.
Grant that creative power was limited by
conditions the nature and extent of which
are wholly unknown to us, and the good
ness and justice of the Creator may be all
that the most pious believe; and all in
the work that conflicts with those moral
attributes may be the fault of the con
ditions which left to the Creator only a
choice of evils.
It is, however, one question whether
any given conclusion is consistent with
known facts, and another whether there
is evidence to prove it; and if we have
no means for judging of the design but
from the work actually produced, it is a
somewhat hazardous speculation to sup
pose that the work designed was of a
different quality from the result realised.
Still, though the ground is unsafe, we
may, with due caution, journey a certain
distance on it. Some parts of the order
of nature give much more indication of
contrivance than others; many, it is not
too much to say, give no sign of it at all.
The signs of contrivance are most con
spicuous in the structure and processes
of vegetable and animal life. But for
these, it is probable that the appearances
in nature would never have seemed to
the thinking part of mankind to afford
any proofs of a God. But when a God
had been inferred from the organisation
of living beings, other parts of nature,
such as the structure of the solar system,
seemed to afford evidences more or less
strong in confirmation of the belief:
granting, then, a design in Nature, we can
best hope to be enlightened as to what
that design was by examining it in the
parts of nature in which its traces are the
most conspicuous.
To what purpose, then, do the ex
pedients in the construction of animals
and vegetables, which excite the admira
tion of naturalists, appear to tend ?
There is no blinking the fact that they
tend principally to no more exalted
object than to make the structure
remain in life and in working order for
a certain time; the individual for a few
years, the species or race for a longer
but still a limited period. And the
similar though less conspicuous marks
of creation which are recognised in
inorganic nature are generally of the
same character. The adaptations, for
instance, which appear in the solar
system consist in placing it under con
ditions which enable the mutual action
of its parts to maintain instead of
destroying its stability, and even that
only for a time, vast,.indeed, if measured
against our short span of animated
existence, but which can be per
ceived even by us to be limited;
for even the feeble means which
we possess of exploring the past are
believed by those who have examined
the subject by the most recent lights to
yield evidence that the solar system was
once a vast sphere of nebula or vapour,
and is going through a process which in
the course of ages will reduce it to a
�ATTRIBUTES
single and not very large mass of solid '
matter frozen up with more than arctic
cold. If the machinery of the system is
adapted to keep itself at work only for a
time, still less perfect is the adaptation
of it for the abode of living beings, since
it is only adapted to them during the
relatively short portion of its total dura
tion which intervenes between the time
when each planet was too hot and the
time when it became, or will become,
too cold to admit of life under the only
conditions in which we have experience
of its possibility. Or we should, per
haps, reverse the statement, and say that
organisation and life are only adapted
to the conditions of the solar system
during a relatively short portion of the
system’s existence.
The greater part, therefore, of the
design of which there is indication in
nature, however wonderful its mechanism,
is no evidence of any moral attributes,
because the end to which it is directed,
and its adaptation to which end is the
evidence of its being directed to an end at
all, is not a moral end; it is not the good
of any sentient creature; it is but the
qualified permanence for a limited period
of the work itself, whether animate or
inanimate. The only inference that can
be drawn from most of it respecting
the character of the Creator is that he
does not wish his works to perish as
soon as created; he wills them to have
a certain ^duration. From this alone
nothing can be justly inferred as to the '
manner in which he is affected towards
his animate or rational creatures.
After deduction of the great number
of adaptations which have no apparent
object but to keep the machine going,
there remain a certain number of pro
visions for giving pleasure to living
beings, and a certain number of provi-
sions for giving them pain. There is no
positive certainty that the whole of these
ought not to take their place among the
contrivances for keeping the creature or
its species in existence, for both the
pleasures and the pains have a con
servative tendency—the pleasures being
generally so disposed as to attract to the
things which maintain individual or
collective existence; the pains, so as to
deter from such as would destroy it.
When all these things are considered,
it is evident that a vast deduction must
be made from the evidences of a Creator
before they can be counted as evidences
of a benevolent purpose; so vast, indeed,
that some may doubt whether, after such
a deduction, there remains any balance.
Yet, endeavouring to look at the question
without partiality or prejudice, and with
out allowing wishes to have any influence
over judgment, it does appear that,
granting the existence of design, there is
a preponderance of evidence that the
Creator desired the pleasure of his
creatures. This is indicated by the fact
that pleasure of one description or
another is afforded by almost everything,
the mere play of the faculties, physical
and mental, being a never-ending source
of pleasure, and even painful things
giving pleasure by the satisfaction of
curiosity and the agreeable sense of
acquiring knowledge; and also that
pleasure, when experienced, seems to
result from the normal working of the
machinery, while pain usually arises from
some external interference with it, and
resembles in each particular case the
result of an accident. Even in cases
when pain results, like pleasure, from the
machinery itself, the appearances do not
indicate that contrivance was brought
into play purposely to produce pain :
what is indicated is rather a clumsiness
G
�82
THEISM
in the contrivance employed for some
other purposes. The author of the
machinery is no doubt accountable for
having made it susceptible of pain ; but
this may have been a necessary condition
of its susceptibility to pleasure; a suppo
sition which avails nothing on the theory
of an omnipotent Creator, but is an
extremely probable one in the case of a
Contriver working under the limitation
of inexorable laws and indestructible
properties of matter. The susceptibility
being conceded as a thing which did
enter into design, the pain itself usually
seems like a thing undesigned ; a casual
result of the collision of the organism
with some outward force to which it was
not intended to be exposed, and which
in many cases provision is even made to
hinder it from being exposed to. There
is, therefore, much appearance that
pleasure is agreeable to the Creator,
while there is very little, if any, appear
ance that pain is so; and there is a
certain amount of justification for infer
ring, on grounds of Natural Theology
alone, that benevolence is one of the
attributes of the Creator. But to jump
from this to the inference that his sole
or chief purposes are those of benevo
lence, and that the single end and aim of
Creation was the happiness of his creatures,
is not only not justified by any evidence,
but is a conclusion in opposition to such
evidence as we have. If the motive of
the Deity for creating sentient beings
was the happiness of the beings he
created, his purpose, in our corner of
the universe at least, must be pro
nounced, taking past ages and all
countries and races into account, to
have been thus far an ignominious
failure; and if God had no purpose but
our happiness and that of other living
creatures, it is not credible that he would
have called them into existence with the
prospect of being so completely baffled.
If man had not the power by the exercise
of his own energies for the improvement
both of himself and of his outward
circumstances to do for himself and
other creatures vastly more than God
had in the first instance done, the Being
who called him into existence would
deserve something very different from
thanks at his hands. Of course, it may
be said that this very capacity of improv
ing himself and the world was given to
him by God, and that the change which
he will be thereby enabled ultimately to
effect in human existence will be worth
purchasing by the sufferings and wasted
lives of entire geological periods. This
may be so; but to suppose that God
could not have given him these blessings
at a less frightful cost is to make a
very strange supposition concerning the
Deity. It is to suppose that God could
not, in the first instance, create anything
better than a Bosjesman or an Andaman
islander, or something still lower; and
yet was able to endow the Bosjesman or
the Andaman islander with the power of
raising himself into a Newton or a
Fenelon. We certainly do not know
the nature of the barriers which limit
the divine omnipotence; but it is a very
odd notion of them that they enable the
Deity to confer on an almost bestial
creature the power of producing by a
succession of efforts what God himself
had no other means of creating.
Such are the indications of Natural
Religion in respect to the divine benevo
lence. If we look for any other of the
moral attributes which a certain class of
philosophers are accustomed to distin
guish from benevolence, as, for example,
Justice, we find a total blank. There is
no evidence whatever in nature for
�IMMORTALITY
divine justice, whatever standard of
justice our ethical opinions may lead us to
recognise. There is no shadow of justice
in the general arrangements of nature;
and what imperfect realisation it obtains
in any human society (a most imperfect
realisation as yet) is the work of man
himself, struggling upwards against
immense natural difficulties into civilisa
tion, and making to himself a second
nature, far better and more unselfish
than he was created with. But on this
point enough has been said in another
essay, already referred to, on Nature.
These, then, are the net results of
Natural Theology on the question of the
divine attributes. A Being of great but
limited power, how or by what limited
Part
83
we cannot even conjecture; of great,
and perhaps unlimited intelligence, but
perhaps, also, more narrowly limited than
his power; who desires, and pays some
regard to, the happiness of his creatures,
but who seems to have other motives of
action which he cares more for, and who
can hardly be supposed to have created
the universe for that purpose alone.
Such is the Deity whom Natural Re
ligion points to; and any idea of God
more captivating than this comes only
from human wishes, or from the teaching
of either real or imaginary Revelation.
We shall next examine whether the
light of nature gives any indications con
cerning the immortality of the soul and
a future life.
III.—IMMORTALITY
The indications of immortality may be
considered in two divisions—those which
are independent of any theory respecting
the Creator and his intentions, and those
which depend upon an antecedent belief
on that subject.
Of the former class of arguments
speculative men have in different ages
put forward a considerable variety, of
which those in the Phcedon of Plato are
an example; but they are for the most
part such as have no adherents, and
need not be seriously refuted, now.
They are generally founded upon pre
conceived theories as to the nature of
the thinking principle in man, considered
as distinct and separable from the body,
and on other preconceived theories re
specting death. As, for example, that
death, or dissolution, is always a separa
tion of parts ; and the soul being without
parts, being simple and indivisible, is
not susceptible of this separation.
Curiously enough, one of the interlo
cutors in the Phcedon anticipates the
answer by which an objector of the
present day would meet this argument—
namely, that thought and consciousness,
though mentally distinguishable from
the body, may not be a substance
separable from it, but a result of it,
standing in relation to it (the illustration
is Plato’s) like that of a tune to the
musical instrument on which it is
played; and that the arguments used
to prove that the soul does not die with
the body would equally prove that the
tune does not die with the instrument,
�84
THEISM
but survives its destruction and con
tinues to exist apart. In fact, those
moderns who dispute the evidences of
the immortality of the soul do not, in
general, believe the soul to be a sub
stance per se, but regard it as the name
of a bundle of attributes, the attributes
of feeling, thinking, reasoning, believing,
willing, etc.; and these attributes they
regard as a consequence of the bodily
organisation, which, therefore, they argue,
it is as unreasonable to suppose surviving
when that organisation is dispersed as
to suppose the colour or odour of a
rose surviving when the rose itself has
perished. Those, therefore, who would
deduce the immortality of the soul from
its own nature have first to prove that
the attributes in question are not attri
butes of the body, but of a separate
substance. Now, what is the verdict of
science on this point ? It is not per
fectly conclusive either way. In the
first place, it does not prove, experi
mentally, that any mode of organisation
has the power of producing feeling or
thought. To make that proof good it
would be necessary that we should be
able to produce an organism, and try
whether it would feel—which we cannot
do; organisms cannot by any human
means be produced, they can only be
developed out of a previous organism.
On the other hand, the evidence is wellnigh complete that all thought and feel
ing has some action of the bodily
organism for its immediate antecedent
or accompaniment; that the specific
variations, and especially the different
degrees of complication of the nervous
and cerebral organisation, correspond to
differences in the development of the
mental faculties; and though we have
no evidence, except negative, that the
mental consciousness ceases for ever
when the functions of the brain are
at an end, we do know that diseases
of the brain disturb the mental functions,
and that decay or weakness of the brain
enfeebles them. We have, therefore,
sufficient evidence that cerebral action
is, if not the cause, at least, in our
present state of existence, a condition
sine qua non of mental operations; and
that, assuming the mind to be a distinct
substance, its separation from the body
would not be, as some have vainly
flattered themselves, a liberation from
trammels and restoration to freedom,
but would simply put a stop to its
functions and remand it to unconscious
ness, unless and until some other set of
conditions supervenes, capable of re
calling it into activity, but of the exist
ence of which experience does not give
us the smallest indication.
At the same time, it is of importance
to remark that these considerations only
amount to defect of evidence; they
afford no positive argument against
immortality. We must beware of giving
a priori validity to the conclusions of
an a posteriori philosophy. The root of
all a priori thinking is the tendency to
transfer to outward things a strong asso
ciation between the corresponding ideas
in our own minds; and the thinkers
who most sincerely attempt to limit
their beliefs by experience, and honestly
believe that they do so, are not always
sufficiently on their guard against this
mistake. There are thinkers who regard
it as a truth of reason that miracles are
impossible; and in like manner there
are others who, because the phenomena
of life and consciousness are associated
in their minds by undeviating experi
ence with the action of material organs,
think it an absurdity per se to imagine it
possible that those phenomena can exist
�IMMORTALITY
under any other conditions. But they
should remember that the uniform co
existence of one fact with another does
not make the one fact a part of the
other, or the same with it. The relation
of thought to a material brain is no
metaphysical necessity, but simply a
constant co existence within the limits
of observation. And when analysed to
the bottom on the principles of the
Associative Psychology, the brain, just
as much as the mental functions, is, like
matter itself, merely a set of human
sensations either actual or inferred as
possible—namely, those which the anato
mist has when he opens the skull, and
the impressions which we suppose we
should receive of molecular or some
other movements when the cerebral
action was going on, if there were no
bony envelope and our senses or our
instruments were sufficiently delicate.
Experience furnishes us with no example
of any series of states of consciousness
without this group of contingent sensa
tions attached to it; but it is as easy to
imagine such a series of states without
as with this accompaniment, and we
know of no reason in the nature of
things against the possibility of its being
thus disjoined. We may suppose that
the same thoughts, emotions, volitions,
and even sensations which we have
here, may persist or recommence some
where else under other conditions, just
as we may suppose that other thoughts
and sensations may exist under other
conditions in other parts of the universe.
And in entertaining this supposition we
need not be embarrassed by any meta
physical difficulties about a thinking
substance. Substance is but a general
name for the perdurability of attributes ;
wherever there is a series of thoughts con
nected together by memories, that consti
85
tutes a thinking substance. This absolute
distinction in thought and separability
in representation of our states of con
sciousness from the set of conditions
with which they are united only by con
stancy of concomitance is equivalent in
a practical point of view to the old
distinction of the two substances, Matter
and Mind.
There is, therefore, in science no
evidence against the immortality of the
soul but that negative evidence, which
consists in the absence of evidence in
its favour. And even the negative evi
dence is not so strong as negative
evidence often is. In the case of witch
craft, for instance, the fact that there is
no proof which will stand examination
of its having ever existed is as conclu
sive as the most positive evidence of its
non-existence would be ; for it exists, if
it does exist, on this earth, where, if it
had existed, the evidence of fact would
certainly have been available to prove
it. But it is not so as to the soul’s
existence after death. That it does not
remain on earth and go about visibly or
interfere in the events of life is proved
by the same weight of evidence which
disproves witchcraft. But that it does
not exist elsewhere there is absolutely
no proof. A very faint, if any, presump
tion is all that is afforded by its dis
appearance from the surface of this
planet.
Some may think that there is an
additional and very strong presumption
against the immortality of the thinking
and conscious principle, from the analysis
of all the other objects of Nature. All
things in Nature perish, the most beau
tiful and perfect being, as philosophers
and poets alike complain, the most
perishable. A flower of the most ex
quisite form and colouring grows up
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THEISM
from a root, comes to perfection in
weeks or months, and lasts only a few
hours or days. Why should it be other
wise with man? Why, indeed. But
why, also, should it not be otherwise ?
Feeling and thought are not merely
different from what we call inanimate
matter, but are at the opposite pole of
existence, and analogical inference has
little or no validity from the one to the
other. Feeling and thought are much
more real than anything else; they are
the only things which we directly know
to be real, all things else being merely
the unknown conditions on which these,
in our present state of existence, or in
some other, depend. All matter apart
from the feelings of sentient beings has
but an hypothetical and unsubstantial
-existence; it is a mere assumption to
account for our sensations ; itself we do
not perceive, we are not conscious of it,
but only of the sensations which we are
said to receive from it; in reality it is a
mere name for our expectation of
sensations, or for our belief that we can
have certain sensations when certain
other sensations give indication of them.
Because these contingent possibilities
of sensation sooner or later come to
an end and give place to others, is it
implied in this that the series of our
feelings must itself be broken off? This
would not be to reason from one kind of
substantive reality to another, but to
draw from something which has no
reality except in reference to something
else, conclusions applicable to that
which is the only substantive reality.
Mind (or whatever name we give to
what is implied in consciousness of a
continued series of feelings) is, in a
philosophical point of view, the only
reality of which we have any evidence;
and no analogy can be recognised or
comparison made between it and other
realities, because there are no other
known realities to compare it with.
That is quite consistent with its being
perishable; but the question whether it
is so or not is res integra, untouched by
any of the results of human knowledge
and experience. The case is one of
those very rare cases in which there is
really a total absence of evidence on
either side, and in which the absence of
evidence for the affirmative does not, as
in so many cases it does, create a strong
presumption in favour of the negative.
The belief, however, in human immor
tality in the minds of mankind generally
is probably not grounded on any scien
tific arguments either physical or meta
physical, but on foundations with most
minds much stronger—namely, on one
hand the disagreeableness of giving up
existence (to those at least to whom it
has hitherto been pleasant), and on the
other the general traditions of mankind.
The natural tendency of belief to follow
these two inducements, our own wishes
and the general assent of other people,
has been in this instance reinforced by
the utmost exertion of the power of
public and private teaching; rulers and
instructors having at all times, with the
view of giving greater effect to their
mandates, whether from selfish or from
public motives, encouraged to the utmost
of their power the belief that there is a life
after death, in which pleasures and suffer
ings far greater than on earth depend
on our doing or leaving undone while
alive what we are commanded to do in
the name of the unseen powers. As
causes of belief these various circum
stances are most powerful. As rational
grounds of it they carry no weight at all.
That what is called the consoling
nature of an opinion—that is, the pleasure
�IMMORTALITY
we should have in believing it to be true—
can be a ground for believing it is a
doctrine irrational in itself, and which
would sanction half the mischievous
illusions recorded in history or which
mislead individual life. It is sometimes,
in the case now under consideration,
wrapped up in a quasi-scientific language.
We are told that the desire of immor
tality is one of our instincts, and that
there is no instinct which has not corre
sponding to it a real object fitted to
satisfy it. Where there is hunger there
is somewhere food, where there is sexual
feeling there is somewhere sex, where
there is love there is somewhere some
thing to be loved, and so forth : in like
manner, since there is the instinctive
desire of eternal life, eternal life there
must be. The answer to this is patent
on the very surface of the subject. It
is unnecessary to go into any recondite
considerations concerning instincts, or to
discuss whether the desire in question
is an instinct or not. Granting that
wherever there is an instinct there
exists something such as that instinct
demands, can it be affirmed that this
something exists in boundless quantity,
or sufficient to satisfy the infinite craving
of human desires ? What is called the
desire of eternal life is simply the desire
of life; and does there not exist that
which this desire calls for? Is there not
life? And is not the instinct, if it be
an instinct, gratified by the possession
and preservation of life? To suppose
that the desire of life guarantees to us
personally the reality of life through all
eternity is like supposing that the desire
of food assures us that we shall always
have as much as we can eat through
our whole lives, and as much longer as
we can conceive our lives to be pro
tracted to.
The argument from tradition or the
general belief of the human race, if we
accept it as a guide to our own belief,
must be accepted entire : if so, we are
bound to believe that the souls of
human beings not only survive after
death, but show themselves as ghosts to
the living; for we find no people who
have had the "one belief without the
other. Indeed, it is probable that the
former belief originated in the latter,
and that primitive men would never have
supposed that the soul did not die with
the body if they had not fancied that it
visited them after death. Nothing could
be more natural than such a fancy ; it is,
in appearance, completely realised in
dreams, which in Homer, and in all ages
like Homer’s, are supposed to be real
apparitions. To dreams we have to add
not merely waking hallucinations, but the
delusions, however baseless, of sight and
hearing, or, rather, the misinterpreta
tions of those senses, sight or hearing
supplying mere hints from which imagi
nation paints a complete picture and
invests it with reality. These delusions
are not to be judged of by a modern
standard: in early times the line be
tween imagination and perception was
by no means clearly defined; there was
little or none of the knowledge we now
possess of the actual course of nature,
which makes us distrust or disbelieve
any appearance which is at variance
with known laws. In the ignorance of
men as to what were the limits of nature,
and what was or was not compatible
with it, no one thing seemed, as far
as physical considerations went, to be
much more improbable than another.
In rejecting, therefore, as we do, and as
we have the best reason to do, the tales
and legends of the actual appearance of
disembodied spirits, we take from under
�88
THEISM
the general belief in mankind in a life
after death, what in all probability was
its chief ground and support, and
deprive it of even the very little value
which the opinion of rude ages can ever
have as evidence of truth. If it be said
that this belief has maintained itself in
ages which have ceased to be rude, and
which reject the superstitions with which
it once was accompanied, the same may
be said of many other opinions of rude
ages, and especially on the most im
portant and interesting subjects, because
it is on those subjects that the reigning
opinion, whatever it may be, is the most
sedulously inculcated upon all who are
born into the world. This particular
opinion, moreover, if it has on the whole
kept its ground, has done so with a
constantly increasing number of dis
sentients, and those especially among
cultivated minds. Finally, those culti
vated minds which adhere to the belief
ground it, we may reasonably suppose,
not on the belief of others, but on
arguments and evidences; and those
arguments and evidences, therefore, are
what it concerns us to estimate and
judge.
'Fhe preceding are a sufficient sample
of the arguments for a future life which
do not suppose an antecedent belief in
the existence, or any theory respecting
the attributes, of the Godhead. It re
mains to consider what arguments are
supplied by such lights, or such grounds
of conjecture, as Natural Theology affords
on those great questions.
We have seen that these lights are but
faint; that of the existence of a Creator
they afford no more than a preponder
ance of probability; of his benevolence,
a considerably less preponderance ; that
there is, however, some reason to think
that he cares for the pleasures of his
creatures, but by no means that this is
his sole care, or that other purposes do
not often take precedence of it. His
intelligence must be adequate to the
contrivances apparent in the universe,
but need not be more than adequate
to them, and his power is not only not
proved to be infinite, but the only real
evidences in Natural Theology tend to
show that it is limited, contrivance being
a mode of overcoming difficulties, and
always supposing difficulties to be over
come.
We have now to consider what infer
ence can legitimately be drawn from
these premises, in favour of a future life.
It seems to me, apart from express
revelation, none at all.
The common arguments are, the good
ness of God; the improbability that he
would ordain the annihilation of his
noblest and richest work, after the greater
part of its few years of life had been
spent in the acquisition of faculties
which time has not allowed him to turn
to fruit; and the special improbability
that he would have implanted in us an
instinctive desire of eternal life, and
doomed that desire to complete dis
appointment.
These might be arguments in a world
the constitution of which made it pos
sible without contradiction to hold it for
the work of a Being at once omnipotent
and benevolent. But they are not argu
ments in a world like that in which we
live. The benevolence of the divine
Being may be perfect, but, his power
being subject to unknown limitations,
we know not that he could have given
us what we so confidently assert that he
must have given ; could (that is) without
sacrificing something more important.
Even his benevolence, however justly
inferred, is by no means indicated as the
�IMMORTALITY
interpretation of his whole purpose; and
since we cannot tell how far other pur
poses may have interfered with the
exercise of his benevolence, we know
not that he would, even if he could, have
granted us eternal life. With regard to
the supposed improbability of his having
given the wish without its gratification,
the same answer may be made: the
scheme which either limitation of power,
or conflict of purposes, compelled him to
adopt may have required that we should
have the wish, although it were not
destined to be gratified. One thing,
however, is quite certain in respect to
God’s government of the world : that he
either could not, or would not, grant to
us everything we wish. We wish for
life, and he has granted some life; that
we wish (or some of us wish) for a
boundless extent of life, and that it is not
granted, is no exception to the ordinary
modes of his government. Many a
man would like to be a Croesus or an
Augustus Caesar, but has his wishes
gratified only to the moderate extent of a
pound a week or the secretaryship of his
Trade Union. There is, therefore, no
assurance whatever of a life after death,
on grounds of natural religion. But to
any one who feels it conducive either to
his satisfaction or to his usefulness to
hope for a future state as a possibility,
there is no hindrance to his indulging
that hope. Appearances point to the
existence of a Being who has great
power over us—all the power implied in
the creation of the Kosmos, or of its
organised beings at least—and of whose
goodness we have evidence, though not
of its being his predominant attribute;
and as we do not know the limits either
of his power or of his goodness, there is
room to hope that both the one and the
other may extend to granting us this
gift, provided that it would really be
beneficial to us. The same ground
which permits the hope warrants us in
expecting that, if there be a future life, it
will be at least as good as the present,
and will not be wanting in the best
feature of the present life—improvability
by our own efforts. Nothing can be
more opposed to every estimate we can
form of probability than the common
idea of the future life as a state of
rewards and punishments in any other
sense than that the consequences of our
actions upon our own character and sus
ceptibilities will follow us in the future as
they have done in the past and present.
Whatever be the probabilities of a future
life, all the probabilities in case of a
future life are that such as we have been
made or have made ourselves before the
change, such we shall enter into the life
hereafter; and that the fact of death will
make no sudden break in our spiritual
life, nor influence our character any
otherwise than as any important change
in our mode of existence may always be
expected to modify it. Our thinking
principle has its laws, which in this life
are invariable, and any analogies drawn
from this life must assume that the same
laws will continue. To imagine that a
miracle will be wrought at death by the
act of God making perfect every one
whom it is his will to include among his
elect, might be justified by an express
revelation duly authenticated, but is
utterly opposed to every presumption
that can be deduced from the light of
Nature.
�THEISM
90
Part
IV.—REVELATION
The discussion in the preceding pages
respecting the evidences of Theism has
been strictly confined to those which
are derived from the light of Nature. It
is a different question what addition has
been made to those evidences, and to
what extent the conclusions obtainable
from them have been amplified or modi
fied, by the establishment of a direct
communication with the Supreme Being.
It would be beyond the purpose of this
essay to take into consideration the
positive evidences of the Christian or
any other belief which claims to be a
revelation from Heaven. But such
general considerations as are applicable,
not to a particular system, but to
Revelation generally, may properly find
a place here, and are, indeed, necessary
to give a sufficiently practical bearing
to the results of the preceding investi
gation.
In the first place, then, the indications
of a Creator and of his attributes which
we have been able to find in Nature,
though so much slighter and less con
clusive even as to his existence than the
pious mind would wish to consider
them, and still more unsatisfactory in
the information they afford as to his
attributes, are yet sufficient to give to the
supposition of a Revelation a standing
point which it would not otherwise have
had. The alleged Revelation is not
obliged to build up its case from the
foundation; it has not to prove the very
existence of the Being from whom it
professes to come. It claims to be a
message from a Being whose existence,
whose power, and to a certain extent
whose wisdom and goodness, are, if not
proved, at least indicated with more or
less of probability by the phenomena of
Nature. The sender of the alleged
message is not a sheer invention; there
are grounds independent of the message
itself for belief in his reality; grounds
which, though insufficient for proof, are
sufficient to take away all antecedent
improbability from the supposition that
a message may really have been received
from him. It is, moreover, much to the
purpose to take notice that the very
imperfection of the evidences which
Natural Theology can produce of the
Divine attributes removes some of the
chief stumbling blocks to the belief
of a Revelation; since the objections
grounded on imperfections in the Reve
lation itself, however conclusive against
it, if it is considered as a record of
the acts or an expression of the wisdom
of a Being of infinite power combined
with infinite wisdom and goodness, are
no reason whatever against its having
come from a Being such as the course of
nature points to, whose wisdom is pos
sibly, his power certainly, limited, and
whose goodness, though real, is not
likely to have been the only motive
which actuated him in the work of
Creation. The argument of Butler’s
Analogy is, from its own point of view,
conclusive : the Christian religion is open
to no objections, either moral or intel
lectual, which do not apply, at least,
equally to the common theory of Deism;
the morality of the Gospels is far higher
and better than that which shows itself
in the order of Nature; and what is
�REVELATION
morally objectionable in the Christian
theory of the world is objectionable only
when taken in conjunction with the
doctrine of an omnipotent God; and
(at least as understood by the most
enlightened Christians) by no means im
ports any moral obliquity in a Being
whose power is supposed to be restricted
by real though unknown obstacles,
which prevented him from fully carrying
out his design. The grave error of
Butler was that he shrank from admit
ting the hypothesis of limited powers ;
and his appeal consequently amounts
to this : The belief of Christians is
neither more absurd nor more immoral
than the belief of Deists who acknow
ledge an Omnipotent Creator; let us,
therefore, in spite of the absurdity and
immorality, believe both. He ought to
have said : Let us cut down our belief
of either to what does not involve
absurdity or immorality; to what is
neither intellectually self-contradictory
nor morally perverted.
To return, however, to the main sub
ject : on the hypothesis of a God, who
made the world, and in making it had
regard, however that regard may have
been limited by other considerations, to
the happiness of his sentient creatures,
there is no antecedent improbability in
the supposition that his concern for
their good would continue, and that he
might once, or oftener, give proof of it
by communicating to them some know
ledge of himself beyond what they were
able to make out by their unassisted
faculties, and some knowledge or pre
cepts useful for guiding them through
the difficulties of life. Neither on the
only tenable hypothesis, that of limited
power, is it open to us to object that
these helps ought to have been greater,
or in any way other than they are. The
91
only question to be entertained, and
which we cannot dispense ourselves from
entertaining, is that of evidence. Can
any evidence suffice to prove a Divine
Revelation ? And of what nature, and
what amount, must that evidence be ?
Whether the special evidences of
Christianity, or of any other alleged
revelation, do or do not come up to the
mark, is a different question, into which
I do not propose directly to enter. The
question I intend to consider is, what
evidence is required; what general con
ditions it ought to satisfy; and whether
they are such as, according to the known
constitution of things, can be satisfied.
The evidences of Revelation are com
monly distinguished as external or in
ternal. External evidences are the testi
mony of the senses or of witnesses. By
the internal evidences are meant the
indications which the Revelation itself
is thought to furnish of its divine origin ;
indications supposed to consist chiefly in
the excellence of its precepts, and its
general suitability to the circumstances
and needs of human nature.
The consideration of these internal
evidences is very important, but their
importance is principally negative : they
may be conclusive grounds for rejecting
a Revelation, but cannot of themselves
warrant the acceptance of it as divine.
If the moral character of the doctrines
of an alleged Revelation is bad and
perverting, we ought to reject it from
whomsoever it comes, for it cannot come
from a good and wise Being. But the
excellence of their morality can never
entitle us to ascribe to them a super
natural origin; for we cannot have con
clusive reason for believing that the
human faculties were incompetent to find
out moral doctrines of which the human
faculties can perceive and recognise the
�92
THEISM
excellence. A Revelation, therefore,
cannot be proved divine unless by ex
ternal evidence—that is, by the exhibi
tion of supernatural facts. And we
have to consider whether it is possible
to prove supernatural facts, and, if it
is, what evidence is required to prove
them.
This question has only, so far as I
know, been seriously raised on the
sceptical side by Hume. It is the ques
tion involved in his famous argument
against miracles—an argument which
goes down to the depths of the subject,
but the exact scope and effect of
which (perhaps not conceived with per
fect correctness by that great thinker
himself) have in general been utterly
misconceived by those who have at
tempted to answer him. Dr. Campbell,
for example, one of the acutest of his
antagonists, has thought himself obliged,
in order to support the credibility of
miracles, to lay down doctrines which
virtually go the length of maintaining
that antecedent improbability is never a
sufficient ground for refusing credence
to a statement, if it is well attested. Dr.
Campbell’s fallacy lay in overlooking a
double meaning of the word “impro
bability”; as I have pointed out in my
Logic, and, still earlier, in an editorial
note to Bentham’s treatise on Evidence.
Taking the question from the very
beginning, it is evidently impossible to
maintain that, if a supernatural fact really
occurs, proof of its occurrence cannot be
accessible to the human faculties. The
evidence of our senses could prove this
as it can prove other things. To put
the most extreme case : Suppose that I
actually saw and heard a Being, either
of the human form or of some form
previously unknown to me, commanding
a world to exist,, and a new world
actually starting into existence and com
mencing a movement through space,
at his command. There can be no
doubt that this evidence would convert
the creation of worlds from a speculation
into a fact of experience. It may be
said I could not know that so singular
an appearance was anything more than
a hallucination of my senses. True,
but the same doubt exists at first re^
specting every unsuspected and surpris
ing fact which comes to light in our
physical researches. That our senses
have been deceived is a possibility which
has to be met and dealt with, and we do
deal with it by several means. If we
repeat the experiment, and again with
the same result; if at the time of the
observation the impressions of our senses
are in all other respects the same as
usual, rendering the supposition of their
being morbidly affected in this one par
ticular extremely improbable; above all,
if other people’s senses confirm the testi
mony of our own; we conclude, with
reason, that we may trust our senses.
Indeed, our senses are all that we have
to trust to. We depend on them for the
ultimate premises even of our reason
ings. There is no other appeal against
their decision than an appeal from the
senses without precautions to the senses
with all due precautions. When the
evidence on which an opinion rests is
equal to that upon which the whole con
duct and safety of our lives is founded,
we need ask no further. Objections
which apply equally to all evidence are
valid against none. They only prove
abstract fallibility.
But the evidence of miracles, at least
to Protestant Christians, is not, in our
own day, of this cogent description. It
is not the evidence of our senses, but of
witnesses, and even this not at first
�REVELATION
hand, but resting on the attestation of
books and traditions. And even in the
case of the original eye-witnesses, the
supernatural facts asserted on their
alleged testimony are not of the trans
cendent character supposed in our ex
ample, about the nature of which, or
the impossibility of their having had a
natural origin, there could be little
room for doubt. On the contrary, the
recorded miracles are, in the first place,
generally such as it would have been
extremely difficult to verify as matters of
fact, and, in the next place, are hardly
ever beyond the possibility of having
been brought about by human means or
by the spontaneous agencies of nature.
It is to cases of this kind that Hume’s
argument against the credibility of
miracles was meant to apply.
His argument is: The evidence of
miracles consists of testimony. The
ground of our reliance on testimony
is our experience that, certain conditions
being supposed, testimony is generally
veracious. But the same experience
tells us that, even under the best condi
tions, testimony is frequently either inten
tionally or unintentionally false. When,
therefore, the fact to which testimony is
produced is one the happening of which
would be more at variance with experi
ence than the falsehood of testimony,
we ought not to believe it. And this
rule all prudent persons observe in the
conduct of life. Those who do not are
sure to suffer for their credulity.
Now, a miracle (the argument goes on
to say) is, in the highest possible degree,
contradictory to experience; for if it
were not contradictory to experience it
would not be a miracle. The very
reason for its being . regarded as a
miracle is that it is a breach of a law
of nature—that is, of an otherwise invari
93
able and inviolable uniformity in the
succession of natural events. There is,
therefore, the very strongest reason for
disbelieving it that experience can give
for disbelieving anything. But the men
dacity or error of witnesses, even though
numerous and of fair character, is quite
within the bounds of even common
experience. That supposition, therefore,
ought to be preferred.
There are two apparently weak points
in this argument. One is, that the evi
dence of experience to which its appeal
is made is only negative evidence, which
is not so conclusive as positive, since
facts of which there had been no pre
vious experience are often discovered,
and proved by positive experience to
be true. The other seemingly vulner
able point is this. The argument has
the appearance of assuming that the
testimony of experience against miracles
is undeviating and indubitable, as it
would be if the whole question was
about the probability of future miracles,
none having taken place in the past;
whereas the very thing asserted on the
other side is that there have been
miracles, and that the testimony of
experience is not wholly on the negative
side. All the evidence alleged in favour
of any miracle ought to be reckoned as
counter-evidence in refutation of the
ground on which it is asserted that
miracles ought to be disbelieved. The
question can only be stated fairly as de
pending on a balance of evidence: a
certain amount of positive evidence in
favour of miracles, and a negative pre
sumption from the general course of
human experience against them.
In order to support the argument
under this double correction, it has to be
shown that the negative presumption
against a miracle is very much stronger
�94
THEISM
than that against a merely new and sur
prising fact. This, however, is evidently
the case. A new physical discovery,
even if it consists in the defeating of a
well-established law of nature, is but the
discovery of another law previously un
known. There is nothing in this but
what is familiar to our experience; we
were aware that we did not know all the
laws of nature, and we were aware that
one such law is liable to be counteracted
by others. The new phenomenon, when
brought to light, is found still to depend
on law; it is always exactly reproduced
when the same circumstances are re
peated. Its occurrence, therefore, is
within the limits of variation in experi
ence, which experience itself discloses.
But a miracle, in the very fact of being
a miracle, declares itself to be a supersession, not of one natural law by
another, but of the law which includes
all others, which experience shows to be
universal for all phenomena—viz., that
they depend on some law ; that they are
always the same when there are the
same phenomenal antecedents, and
neither take place in the absence of
their phenomenal causes, nor ever fail to
take place when the phenomenal condi
tions are all present.
It is evident that this argument against
belief in miracles had very little to rest
upon until a comparatively modern
stage in the progress of science. A few
generations ago the universal depen
dence of phenomena on invariable laws
was not only not recognised by mankind
in general, but could not be regarded by
the instructed as a scientifically estab
lished truth. There were many pheno
mena which seemed quite irregular in
their course, without dependence on
any known antecedents ; and though, no
doubt, a certain regularity in the occur
rence of the most familiar phenomena
must always have been recognised,
yet even in these the exceptions which
were constantly occurring had not yet,
by an investigation and generalisation of
the circumstances of their occurrence,
been reconciled with the general rule.
The heavenly bodies were from of old
the most conspicuous types of regular
and unvarying order; yet even among
them comets were a phenomenon
apparently originating without any law,
and eclipses, one which seemed to take
place in violation of law. Accordingly,
both comets and eclipses long continued
to be regarded as of a miraculous nature,
intended as signs and omens of human
fortunes. It would have been impossible
in those days to prove to anyone that
this supposition was antecedently im
probable. It seemed more conformable
to appearances than the hypothesis of an
unknown law.
Now, however, when, in the progress
of science, all phenomena have been
shown by indisputable evidence to be
amenable to law, and even in the cases
in which those laws have not yet been
exactly ascertained, delay in ascertaining
them is fully accounted for by the special
difficulties of the subject; the defenders
of miracles have adapted their argument
to this altered state of things by main
taining that a miracle need not neces
sarily be a violation of law. It may,
they say, take place in fulfilment of a
more recondite law, to us unknown.
If by this it be only meant that the
Divine Being, in the exercise of his
power of interfering with and suspending
his own laws, guides himself by some
general principle or rule of action, this,
of course, cannot be disproved, and is
in itself the most probable supposition.
But if the argument means that a
�RE VELA TION
95
It will perhaps be said that a miracle
miracle may be the fulfilment of a law
in the same sense in which the ordinary <does not necessarily exclude the inter
events of Nature are fulfilments of laws, it vention of second causes. If it were the
seems to indicate an imperfect concep will of God to raise a thunderstorm by
tion of what is meant by a law, and of miracle, he might do it by means of
winds and clouds. Undoubtedly; but
what constitutes a miracle.
When we say that an ordinary physical the winds and clouds were either suffi
fact always takes place according to cient when produced to excite the
some invariable law, we mean that it is thunderstorm without other divine assist
connected by uniform sequence or co ance, or they were not. If they were
existence with some definite set of not, the storm is not a fulfilment of law,
physical antecedents; that whenever that but a violation of it. If they were suffi
set is exactly reproduced the same pheno cient, there is a miracle, but it is not the
menon will take place, unless counter storm ; it is the production of the winds
acted by the similar laws of some other and clouds, or whatever link in the chain
physical antecedents; and that, when of causation it was at which the influence
ever it does take place, it would always of physical antecedents was dispensed
be found that its special set of antece with. If that influence was never dis
dents (or one of its sets if it has more pensed with, but the event called mira
than one) has pre-existed. Now, an culous was produced by natural means,
event which takes place in this manner and those again by others, and so on
is not a miracle. To make it a miracle from the beginning of things; if the
it must be produced by a direct volition, event is no otherwise the act of God
without the use of means; or, at least, than in having been foreseen and
of any means which, if simply repeated, ordained by him as the consequence of
would produce it. To constitute a the forces put in action at the Creation ;
miracle a phenomenon must take place then there is no miracle at all, nor
without having been preceded by any anything different from the ordinary
antecedent phenomenal conditions suffi working of God’s providence.
For another example : a person pro
cient again to reproduce it; or a pheno
fessing to be divinely commissioned
menon for the production of which
the antecedent conditions existed must cures a sick person by some apparently
be arrested or prevented without the in insignificant external application. Would
tervention of any phenomenal antece this application, administered by a person
dents which would arrest or prevent it not specially commissioned from above,
in a future case. The test of a miracle have effected the cure? If so, there is
is: Were there present in the case such no miracle; if not, there is a miracle,
external conditions, such second causes but there is a violation of law.
It will be said, however, that, if these
we may call them, that whenever these
be violations of law, then law is violated
conditions or causes reappear the event
will be reproduced? If there were, it is every time that any outward effect is
not a miracle; if there were not, it is a produced by a voluntary act of a human
miracle, but it is not according to law; being. Human volition is constantly
it is an event produced, without, or in modifying natural phenomena, not by
violating their laws, but by using their
spite of, law.
�96
THEISM
laws. Why may not divine volition do combination of physical antecedents and
the same ? The power of volitions over a physical consequent. But this, whether
phenomena is itself a law, and one of the true or not, does not really affect the
earliest known and acknowledged laws argument; for the interference of human
of nature. It is true the human will will with the course of Nature is only not
exercises power over objects in general an exception to law when we include
indirectly, through the direct power among laws the relation of motive to
which it possesses only over the human volition; and by the same rule interfer
muscles. God, however, has direct ence by the Divine will would not be an
power, not merely over one thing, but exception either, since we cannot but
over all the objects which he has made. suppose the Deity in every one of his
There is, therefore, no more a supposi acts to be determined by motives.
tion of violation of law in supposing that
The alleged analogy, therefore, holds
events are produced, prevented, or modi good; but what it proves is only what I
fied by God’s action, than in the suppo have from the first maintained—that
sition of their being produced, pre divine interference with nature could be
vented, or modified by man’s action. proved if we had the same sort of
Both are equally in the course of Nature, evidence for it which we have for
both equally consistent with what we know human interferences. The question of
of the government of all things by law.
antecedent improbability only arises be
Those who thus argue are mostly be cause divine interposition is not certified
lievers in Free Will, and maintain that by the direct evidence of perception,
every human volition originates a new but is always matter of inference, and,
chain of causation, of which it is itself more or less, of speculative inference.
the commencing link, not connected by And a little consideration will show that
invariable sequence with any anterior in these circumstances the antecedent
fact. Even, therefore, if a divine inter presumption against the truth of the
position did constitute a breaking-in inference is extremely strong.
upon the connected chain of events, by
When the human will interferes to
the introduction of a new originating produce any physical phenomenon, ex
cause without root in the past, this would cept the movements of the human body,
be no reason for discrediting it, since it does so by the employment of means,
every human act of volition does pre and is obliged to employ such means as
cisely the same. If the one is a breach are by their own physical properties
of law, so are the others. In fact, the sufficient to bring about the effect.
reign of law does not extend to the Divine interference by hypothesis pro
origination of volition.
ceeds in a different manner from this : it
Those who dispute the Free Will produces its effect without means, or with
theory, and regard volition as no excep such as are in themselves insufficient.
tion to the universal law of Cause and In the first case, all the physical phe
Effect, may answer, that volitions do not nomena, except the first bodily move
interrupt the chain of causation, but ment, are produced in strict conformity
carry it on, the connection of cause and to physical causation; while that first
effect being of just the same nature movement is traced by positive observa
between motive and act as between a tion to the cause (the volition) which
�REVELATION
produced it. In the other case the
event is supposed not to have been pro
duced at all through physical causation,
while there is no direct evidence to con
nect it with any volition. The ground on
which it is ascribed to a volition is
only negative, because there is no other
apparent way of accounting for its exist
ence.
But in this merely speculative explana
tion there is always another hypothesis
possible—viz., that the event may have
been produced by physical causes in a
manner not apparent. It may either be
due to a law of physical nature not yet
known, or to the unknown presence of
the conditions necessary for producing
it according to some known law. Sup
posing even that the event, supposed to
be miraculous, does not reach us through
the uncertain medium of human testi
mony, but rests on the direct evidence of
our own senses; even then, so long as
there is no direct evidence of its produc
tion by a divine volition, like that we
have for the production of bodily move
ments by human volitions—so long,
therefore, as the miraculous character of
the event is but an inference from the
supposed inadequacy of the laws of
physical nature to account for it—so
long will the hypothesis of a natural
origin for the phenomenon be entitled to
preference over that of a supernatural
one. The commonest principles of
sound judgment forbid us to suppose for
any effect a cause of which we have
absolutely no experience, unless all
those of which we have experience are
ascertained to be absent. Now, there
are few things of which we have more
frequent experience than of physical
facts which our knowledge does not
enable us to account for, because they
depend either on laws which observation,
97
aided by science, has not yet brought to
light, or on facts the presence of which
in the particular case is unsuspected by
us. Accordingly, when we hear of a
prodigy, we always in these modern times
believe that, if it really occurred, it was
neither the work of God nor of a demon,
but the consequence of some unknown
natural law or of some hidden fact. Nor
is either of these suppositions precluded
when, as in the case of a miracle
properly so called, the wonderful event
seemed to depend upon the will of a
human being. It is always possible that
there may be at work some undetected
law of nature which the wonder-worker
may have acquired, consciously or un
consciously, the power of calling into
action; or that the wonder may have
been wrought (as in the truly extraordi
nary feats of jugglers) by the employ
ment, unperceived by us, of ordinary
laws, which also need not necessarily be
a case of voluntary deception ; or, lastly,
the event may have had no connection
with the volition at all, but the coinci
dence between them may be the effect
of craft or accident, the miracle-worker
having seemed or effected to produce by
his will that which was already about to
take place, as if one were to command
an eclipse of the sun at the moment
when one knew by astronomy that an
eclipse was on the point of taking place.
In a case of this description the miracle
might be tested by a challenge to repeat
it; but it is worthy of remark that re
corded miracles were seldom or never
put to this test. No miracle-work er
seems ever to have made a practice of
raising the dead; that and the other
most signal of the miraculous operations
are reported to have been performed
only in one or a few isolated cases,
which may have been either cunningly
h
�98
THEISM
selected cases or accidental coincidences.
There is, in short, nothing to exclude
the supposition that every alleged miracle
was due to natural causes; and as long
as that supposition remains possible no
scientific observer, and no man of ordi
nary practical judgment, would assume
by conjecture a cause which no reason
existed for supposing to be real, save the
necessity of accounting for something
which is sufficiently accounted for with
out it.
Were we to stop here, the case against
miracles might seem to be complete.
But, on further inspection, it will be
seen that we cannot, from the above
considerations, conclude absolutely that
the miraculous' theory of the production
of a phenomenon ought to be at once
rejected. We can conclude only that
no extraordinary powers which have ever
been alleged to be exercised by any
human being over nature can be evidence
of miraculous gifts to any one to whom
the existence of a Supernatural Being
and his interference in human affairs is
not already a vera causa. The existence
of God cannot possibly be proved by
miracles, for, unless a God is already
recognised, the apparent miracle can
always be accounted for on a more
probable hypothesis than that of the
interference of a Being of whose very
existence it is supposed to be the sole
evidence. Thus far Hume’s argument
is conclusive. But it is far from being
equally so when the existence of a Being
who created the present order of Nature,
and, therefore, may well be thought to
have power to modify it, is accepted as
a fact, or even as a probability resting on
independent evidence. Once admit a
God, and the production by his direct
volition of an effect, which in any case
owed its origin to his creative will, is no
longer a purely arbitrary hypothesis to
account for the fact, but must be
reckoned with as a serious possibility.
The question then changes its character,
and the decision of it must now rest
upon what is known or reasonably sur
mised as to the manner of God’s govern
ment of the universe; whether this
knowledge or surmise makes it the more
probable supposition that the event was
brought about by the agencies by which
his government is ordinarily carried on,
or that it is the result of a special and
extraordinary interposition of his will in
supersession of those ordinary agencies.
In the first place, then, assuming as a
fact the existence and providence of
God, the whole of our observation of
Nature proves to us by incontrovertible
evidence that the rule of his government
is by means of second causes; that all
facts, or at least all physical facts, follow
uniformly upon given physical condi
tions, and never occur but when the
appropriate collection of physical condi
tions is realised. I limit the assertion
to physical facts, in order to leave the
case of human volition an open question;
though, indeed, I need not do so, for, if
the human will is free, it has been left free
by the Creator, and is not controlled by
him either through second causes or
directly, so that, not being governed, it
is not a specimen of his mode of govern
ment. Whatever he does govern, he
governs by second causes. This was
not obvious in the infancy of science ; it
was more and more recognised as the
processes of nature were more carefully
and accurately examined, until there
now remains no class of phenomena of
which it is not positively known, save
some cases which from their obscurity
and complication our scientific pro
cesses have not yet been able completely
�REVELATION
to clear up and disentangle, and in
which, therefore, the proof that they
also are governed by natural laws could
not, in i’ne present state of science, be
more complete. The evidence, though
merely negative, which these circum
stances afford that government by second
causes is universal, is admitted for all
except directly religious purposes to be
conclusive. When either a man of
science for scientific, or a man of the
world for practical, purposes inquires
into an event, he asks himself, What is
its cause ? and not, Has it any natural
cause? A man would be laughed at
who set down as one of the alternative
suppositions that there is no other cause
for it than the will of God.
Against this weight of negative evi
dence we have to set such positive
evidence as is produced in attestation of
exceptions; in other words, the positive
evidences of miracles. And I have al
ready admitted that this evidence might
conceivably have been such as to make
the exception equally certain with the
rule. If we had the direct testimony of
our senses to a supernatural fact, it might
be as completely authenticated and
made certain as any natural one. But
we never have. The supernatural cha
racter of the fact is always, as I have
said, matter of inference and specula
tion ; and the mystery always admits the
possibility of a solution not supernatural.
To those who already believe in super
natural power the supernatural hypo
thesis may appear more probable than
the natural one; but only if it accords
with what we know or reasonably surmise
respecting the ways of the supernatural
agent. Now, all that we know from the
evidence of nature concerning his ways
is in harmony with the natural theory and
repugnant to the supernatural. There
99
is, therefore, a vast preponderance of
probability against a miracle, to counter
balance which would require a very
extraordinary and indisputable congruity
in the supposed miracle and its circum
stances with something which we con
ceive ourselves to know, or to have
grounds for believing, with regard to the
divine attributes.
This extraordinary congruity is sup
posed to exist when the purpose of the
miracle is extremely beneficial to man
kind, as when it serves to accredit some
highly important belief. The goodness
of God, it is supposed, affords a high
degree of antecedent probability that he
would make an exception to his general
rule of government for so excellent a
purpose. For reasons, however, which
have already been entered into, any
inference drawn by us from the good
ness of God to what he has or has not
actually done, is to the last degree pre
carious. If we reason directly from God’s
goodness to positive facts, no misery,
nor vice, nor crime ought to exist in the
world. We can see no reason in God’s
goodness why, if he deviated once from
the ordinary system of his government
in order to do good to man, he should
not have done so on a hundred other
occasions ; nor why, if the benefit aimed
at by some given deviation, such as the
revelation of Christianity, was transcen
dent and unique, that precious gift
should only have been vouchsafed after
the lapse of many ages; or why, when it
was at last given, the evidence of it
should have been left open to so much
doubt and difficulty. Let it be remem
bered also that the goodness of God
affords no presumption in favour of
a deviation from his general system of
government unless the good purpose
could not have been attained without
�IOO
THEISM
deviation. If God intended that man of the wonderful stories, such multitudes
kind should receive Christianity or any of which were current among the early
other gift, it would have agreed better Christians; but when they do, excep
with all that we know of his government tionally, name any of the persons who
to have made provision in the scheme of were the subjects or spectators of the
creation for its arising at the appointed miracle, they doubtless draw from tradi
time by natural development; which, let tion, and mention those names with
it be added, all the knowledge we now which the story was in the popular mind
possess concerning the history of the (perhaps accidentally) connected; for
human mind tends to the conclusion whoever has observed the way in which
that it actually did.
even now a story grows up from some
To all these considerations ought to small foundation, taking on additional
be added the extremely imperfect nature details at every step, knows well how,
of the testimony itself which we possess from being at first anonymous, it gets
for the miracles, real or supposed, which names attached to it; the name of some
accompanied the foundation of Chris one by whom, perhaps, the story has
tianity and of every other revealed re been told being brought into the story
ligion. Take it at the best, it is the itself first as a witness, and still later
uncross-examined testimony of extremely as a party concerned.
ignorant people, credulous as such
It is also noticeable, and is a very im
usually are, honourably credulous when portant consideration, that stories of
the excellence of the doctrine or just miracles only grow up among the igno
reverence for the teacher makes them rant, and are adopted, if ever, by the
eager to believe; unaccustomed to draw educated when they have already be
the line between the perceptions of come the belief of multitudes. Those
sense and what is superinduced upon which are believed by Protestants all
them by the suggestions of a lively ■originate in ages and nations in which
imagination; unversed in the difficult there was hardly any canon of proba
art of deciding between appearance and bility, and miracles were thought to be
>
reality, and between the natural and the ;among the commonest of all phenomena.
supernatural; in times, moreover, when 'The Catholic Church, indeed, holds as
no one thought it worth while to con- £an article of faith that miracles have
tradict any alleged miracle, because it inever ceased, and new ones continue to
was the belief of the age that miracles in Ibe now and then brought forth and
themselves proved nothing, since they I
believed, even in the present incredulous
could be worked by a lying spirit as well e —yet if in an incredulous generation
age
as by the spirit of God. Such were the c
certainly not among the incredulous
witnesses; and even of them we do not portion of it, but always among people
f
possess the direct testimony; the docu- v
who, in addition to the most childish
ments of date long subsequent, even on i;
ignorance, have grown up (as all do who
the orthodox theory, which contain the a
are educated by the Catholic clergy)
only history of these events, very often t
trained in the persuasion that it is a duty
do not even name the supposed eye- ti believe and a sin to doubt; that it is
to
witnesses. They put down (it is but d
dangerous to be sceptical about anything
just to admit) the best and least absurd v
which is tendered for belief in the name
�RE VELA TION
of the true religion; and that nothing is
so contrary to piety as incredulity. But
these miracles which no one but a
Roman Catholic, and by no means every
Roman Catholic, believes, rest frequently
upon an amount of testimony greatly
surpassing that which we possess for any
of the early miracles; and superior, espe
cially in one of the most essential points
—that in many cases the alleged eye
witnesses are known, and we have their
story at first hand.
Thus, then, stands the balance of
evidence in respect to the reality of
miracles, assuming the existence and
government of God to be proved by
other evidence. On the one side, the
great negative presumption arising from
the whole of what the course of nature
discloses to us of the divine government,
as carried on through second causes and
by invariable sequences of physical
effects upon constant antecedents. On
the other side, a few exceptional in
stances, attested by evidence not of a
character to warrant belief in any facts
in the smallest degree unusual or impro
bable ; the eye-witnesses in most cases
unknown, in none competent by charac
ter or education to scrutinise the real
nature of the appearances which they
may have seen,1 and moved, moreover,
by a union of the strongest motives
which can inspire human beings to per
suade, first themselves, and then others,
that what they had seen was a miracle.
The facts, too, even if faithfully reported,
are never incompatible w’ith the sup
1 St. Paul, the only known exception to the
ignorance and want of education of the first
generation of Christians, attests no miracle but
that of his own conversion, which of all the
miracles of the New Testament is the one which
admits of the easiest explanation from natural
causes.
IOI
position that they were either mere co
incidences, or were produced by natural
means, even when no specific conjecture
can be made as to those means, which
in general it can. The conclusion I
draw is that miracles have no claim
whatever to the character of historical
facts, and are wholly invalid as evidences
of any revelation.
What can be said with truth on the
side of miracles amounts only to this:
Considering that the order of nature
affords some evidence of the reality of a
Creator, and of his bearing goodwill to
his creatures, though not of its being the
sole prompter of his conduct towards
them: considering, again, that all the
evidence of his existence is evidence also
that he is not all-powerful, and consider
ing that in our ignorance of the limits of
his power we cannot positively decide
that he was able to provide for us by the
original plan of Creation all the good
which it entered into his intentions to
bestow upon us, or even to bestow any
part of it at any earlier period than that
at which we actually received it—con
sidering these things, when we consider
further that a gift, extremely precious,
came to us which, though facilitated,
was not apparently necessitated by what
had gone before, but was due, as far as
appearances go, to the peculiar mental
and moral endowments of one man, and
that man openly proclaimed that it did
not come from himself, but from God
through him, then we are entitled to say
that there is nothing so inherently im
possible or absolutely incredible in this
supposition as to preclude any one from
hoping that it may perhaps be true. I
say from hoping; I go no further; for I
cannot attach any evidentiary value to
the testimony even of Christ on such a
subject, since he is never said to have
�102
THEISM
declared any evidence of his mission
(unless his own interpretations of the
Prophecies be so considered) except in
ternal conviction; and everybody knows
that in pre-scientific times men always
supposed that any unusual faculties
which came to them, they knew not
how, were an inspiration from God; the
best men always being the readiest to
ascribe any honourable peculiarity in
themselves to that higher source rather
than to their own merits.
pART V.—GENERAL RESULT
Brom the result of the preceding exami
nation ol the evidences of Theism, and
(Theism being pre-supposed) of the evi
dences of any Revelation, it follows that
the rational attitude of a thinking mind
towards the supernatural, whether in
natural or in revealed religion, is that of
scepticism as distinguished from belief
on the one hand, and from Atheism on
the other; including in the present case
under Atheism the negative as well as
the positive form of disbelief in a God—
viz., not only the dogmatic denial of his
existence, but the denial that there is
any evidence on either side, which, for
most practical purposes, amounts to the
same thing as if the existence of a God
had been disproved. If we are right in
the conclusions to which we have been
led by the preceding inquiry, there is
evidence, but insufficient for proof, and
amounting only to one of the lower
degrees of probability. The indication
given by such evidence as there is points
to the creation, not, indeed, of the
universe, but of the present order of it, by
an Intelligent Mind, whose power over
the materials was not absolute, whose
love for his creatures was not his sole
actuating inducement, but who, never
theless, desired their good. The notion
of a providential government by an
Omnipotent Being for the good of his
creatures must be entirely dismissed.
Even of the continued existence of the
Creator we have no other guarantee than
that he cannot be subject to the law of
death which affects terrestrial beings,
since the conditions that produce this
liability wherever it is known to exist are
of his creating. That this Being, not
being omnipotent, may have produced a
machinery falling short of his intentions,
and which may require the occasional
interposition of the Maker’s hand, is a
supposition not in itself absurd nor
impossible, though in none of the cases
in which such interposition is believed to
have occurred is the evidence such as
could possibly prove it; it remains a
simple possibility, which those may
dwell on to whom it yields comfort to
suppose that blessings which ordinary
human power is inadequate to attain
may come not from extraordinary human
power, but from the bounty of an intelli
gence beyond the human, and which
continuously cares for man. The possi
bility of a life after death rests on the
same footing—of a boon which this
powerful Being who wishes well to man
may have the power to grant, and which,
�GENERAL RESULT
if the message alleged to have been sent
by him was really sent, he has actually
promised. The whole domain of the
supernatural is thus removed from the
region of Belief into that of simple
Hope; and in that, for anything we can
see, it is likely always to remain; for we
can hardly anticipate either that any
positive evidence will be acquired of the
direct agency of Divine Benevolence in
human destiny, or that any reason will
be discovered for considering the realisa
tion of human hopes on that subject as
beyond the pale of possibility.
It is now to be considered whether
the indulgence of hope, in the region of
imagination merely, in which there is no
prospect that any probable grounds of
expectation will ever be obtained, is
irrational, and ought to be discouraged
as a departure from the rational principle
of regulating our feelings as well as
opinions strictly by evidence.
This is a point which different thinkers
are likely, for a long time at least, to
decide differently, according to their
individual temperament. The principles
which ought to govern the cultivation
and the regulation of the imagination—
with a view on the one hand of prevent
ing it from disturbing the rectitude of
the intellect and the right direction of
the actions and will, and on the other
hand of employing it as a power for in
creasing the happiness of life and giving
elevation to the character—are a subject
which has never yet engaged the serious
consideration of philosophers, though
some opinion on it is implied in almost
all modes of thinking on human character
and education. And I expect that this
will hereafter be regarded as a very im
portant branch of study for practical
purposes, and the more in proportion as
the weakening of positive beliefs respect
103
ing states of existence superior to the
human leaves the imagination of higher
things less provided with material from
the domain of supposed reality. To me
it seems that human life, small and con
fined as it is, and as, considered merely
in the present, it is likely to remain even
when the progress of material and moral
improvement may have freed it from the
greater part of its present calamities,
stands greatly in need of any wider
range and greater height of aspiration
for itself and its destination, which the
exercise of imagination can yield to it
without running counter to the evidence
of fact; and that it is a part of wisdom
to make the most of any, even small,
probabilities on this subject, which furnish
imagination with any footing to support
itself upon. And I am satisfied that the
cultivation of such a tendency in the
imagination, provided it goes on pari
passu with the cultivation of severe reason,
has no necessary tendency to pervert the
judgment; but that it is possible to form
a perfectly sober estimate of the evidences
on both sides of a question and yet to
let the imagination dwell by prefer
ence on those possibilities which are at
once the most comforting and the most
improving without in the least degree
overrating the solidity of the grounds
for expecting that these rather than any
others will be the possibilities actually
realised.
Though this is not in the number of
the practical maxims handed down by
tradition and recognised as rules for the
conduct of life, a great part of the hap
piness of life depends upon the tacit
observance of it. What, for instance, is
the meaning of that which is always
accounted one of the chief blessings of
life—a cheerful disposition? What but
the tendency, either from constitution or
�104
THEISM
habit, to dwell chiefly on the brighter
side both of the present and of the
future ? If every aspect, whether agree
able or odious of everything, ought to
occupy exactly the same place in our
imagination which it fills in fact, and
therefore ought to fill in our deliberate
reason, what we call a cheerful disposi
tion would be but one of the forms of
folly, on a par except in agreeableness
with the opposite disposition in which
the gloomy and painful view of all things
is habitually predominant. But it is not
found in practice that those who take
life cheerfully are less alive to rational
prospects of evil or danger and more
careless of making due provision against
them than other people. The tendency
is rather the other way, for a hopeful
disposition gives a spur to the faculties
and keeps all the active energies in good
working order. When imagination and
reason receive each its appropriate
culture they do not succeed in usurping
each other’s prerogatives. It is not
necessary for keeping up our conviction
that we must die, that we should be
always brooding over death. It is far
better that we should think no further
about what we cannot possibly avert,
than is required for observing the rules
of prudence in regard to our own life and
that of others, and fulfilling whatever
duties devolve upon us in contemplation
of the inevitable event. The way to
secure this is not to think perpetually of
death, but to think perpetually of our
duties, and of the rule of life. The true
rule of practical wisdom is not that of
making all the aspects of things equally
prominent in our habitual contempla
tions, but of giving the greatest promi
nence to those of their aspects which
depend on, or can be modified by, our
own conduct. In things which do not
depend on us, it is not solely for the sake
of a more enjoyable life that the habit
is desirable of looking at things and at
mankind by preference on their pleasant
side; it is also in order that we may be
able to love them better and work with
more heart for their improvement. To
what purpose, indeed, should we feed
our imagination with the unlovely aspect
of persons and things ? All unnecessary
dwelling upon the evils of life is at best
a useless expenditure of nervous force:
and when I say unnecessary, I mean all
that is not necessary either in the sense
of being unavoidable, or in that of being
needed for the performance of our duties
and for preventing our sense of the
reality of those evils from becoming
speculative and dim. But if it is often
waste of strength to dwell on the evils of
life, it is worse than waste to dwell
habitually on its meannesses and base
nesses. It is necessary to be aware of
them; but to live in their contemplation
makes it scarcely possible to keep up in
oneself a high tone of mind. The
imagination and feelings become tuned
to a lower pitch ; degrading instead of
elevating associations become connected
with the daily objects and incidents of
life, and give their colour to the thoughts,
just as associations of sensuality do in
those who indulge freely in that sort of
contemplations. Men have often felt
what it is to have had their imaginations
corrupted by one class of ideas, and I
think they must have felt with the same
kind of pain how the poetry is taken out
of the things fullest of it, by mean asso
ciations, as when a beautiful air that had
been associated with highly poetical
words is heard sung with trivial and
vulgar ones. All these things are said in
mere illustration of the principle that in
the regulation of the imagination literal
�GENERAL RESULT
truth of facts is not the only thing to be
considered. Truth is the province of
reason, and it is by the cultivation of the
rational faculty that provision is made
for its being known always, and thought
of as often as is required by duty and
the circumstances of human life. But
when the reason is strongly cultivated,
the imagination may safely follow its own
end, and do its best to make life
pleasant and lovely inside the castle, in
reliance on the fortifications raised and
maintained by Reason round the outward
bounds.
On these principles it appears to me
that the indulgence of hope with regard
to the government of the universe and
the destiny of man after death, while we
recognise as a clear truth that we have
no ground for more than a hope, is
legitimate and philosophically defensible.
The beneficial effect of such a hope is
far from trifling. It makes life and
human nature a far greater thing to the
feelings, and gives greater strength as
well as greater solemnity to all the senti
ments which are awakened in us by our
fellow-creatures, and by mankind at
large. It allays the sense of that irony
of Nature which is so painfully felt when
we see the exertions and sacrifices of a
life culminating in the formation of a
wise and noble mind, only to disappear
from the world when the time has just
arrived at which the world seems about
to begin reaping the benefit of it. The
truth that life is short and art is long is
from of old one of the most discourag
ing parts of our condition ; this hope
admits the possibility that the art em
ployed in improving and beautifying the
soul itself may avail for good in some
other life, even when seemingly useless
for this. But the benefit consists less in
the presence of any specific hope than in
105
the enlargement of the general scale of
the feelings; the loftier aspirations being
no longer in the same degree checked
and kept down by a sense of the insignifi
cance of human life—by the disastrous
feeling of “ not worth while.” The gain
obtained in the increased inducement to
cultivate the improvement of character
up to the end of life is obvious without
being specified.
There is another and a most impor
tant exercise of imagination which, in
the past and present, has been kept up
principally by means of religious belief,
and which is infinitely precious to man
kind, so much so that human excellence
greatly depends upon the sufficiency of
the provision made for it. This con
sists of the familiarity of the imagination
with the conception of a morally perfect
Being, and the habit of taking the
approbation of such a Being as the
norma or standard to which to refer
and by which to regulate our own
characters and lives. This idealisation
of our standard of excellence in a Person
is quite possible, even when that Person
is conceived as merely imaginary. But
religion, since the birth of Christianity,
has inculcated the belief that our highest
conceptions of combined wisdom and
goodness exist in the concrete in a living
Being who has his eyes on us and cares
for our good. Through the darkest and
most corrupt periods Christianity has
raised this torch on high—has kept this
object of veneration and imitation before
the eyes of man. True, the image of
perfection has been a most imperfect,
and, in many respects, a perverting and
corrupting one, not only from the low
moral ideas of the times, but from the
mass of moral contradictions which the
deluded worshipper was compelled to
swallow by the supposed necessity of
�io6
THEISM
complimenting the Good Principle with
the possession of infinite power. But it
is one of the most universal, as well as
of the most surprising, characteristics of
human nature, and one of the most
speaking proofs of the low stage to
which the reason of mankind at large
has ever yet advanced, that they are
capable of overlooking any amount of
either moral or intellectual contradic
tions and receiving into their minds
propositions utterly inconsistent with
one another, not only without being
shocked by the contradiction, but with
out preventing both the contradictory
beliefs from producing a part at least of
their natural consequences in the mind.
Pious men and women have gone on
ascribing to God particular acts and a
general course of will and conduct in
compatible with even the most ordinary
and limited conception of moral good
ness, and have had their own ideas of
morality, in many important particulars,
totally warped and distorted, and not
withstanding this have continued to con
ceive their God as clothed with all the
attributes of the highest ideal goodness
which their state of mind enabled them
to conceive, and have had their aspira
tions towards goodness stimulated and
encouraged by that conception. And it
cannot be questioned that the undoubt
ing belief of the real existence of a Being
who realises our own best ideas of per
fection, and of our being in the hands of
that Being as the ruler of the universe,
gives an increase of force to these feel
ings beyond what they can receive from
reference to a merely ideal conception.
This particular advantage it is not
possible for those to enjoy who take a
rational view of the nature and amount
of the evidence for the existence and
attributes of the Creator. On the other
hand, they are not encumbered with the
moral contradictions which beset every
form of religion which aims at justifying
in a moral point of view the whole
government of the world. They are,
therefore, enabled to form a far truer
and more consistent conception of Ideal
Goodness than is possible to anyone who
thinks it necessary to find ideal good
ness in an omnipotent ruler of the world.
The power of the Creator once recog
nised as limited, there is nothing to dis
prove the supposition that his goodness
is complete, and that the ideally perfect
character in whose likeness we should
wish to form ourselves, and to whose
supposed approbation we refer our
actions, may have a real existence in a
Being to whom we owe all such good as
we enjoy.
Above all, the most valuable part of
the effect on the character which Chris
tianity has produced by holding up in a
Divine Person a standard of excellence
and a model for imitation is available
even to the absolute unbeliever, and can
never more be lost to humanity. For it
is Christ, rather than God, whom Chris
tianity has held up to believers as the
pattern of perfection for humanity. It
is the God incarnate, more than the
God of the Jews or of Nature, who, being
idealised, has taken so great and salutary
a hold on the modern mind. And what
ever else may be taken away from us by
rational criticism, Christ is still left; a
unique figure, not more unlike all his
precursors than all his followers, even
those who had the direct benefit of his
personal teaching. It is of no use to
say that Christ as exhibited in the
Gospels is not historical, and that we
know not how much of what is admir
able has been superadded by the tradi
tion of his followers. The tradition of
�GENERAL RESULT
followers suffices to insert any number
of marvels, and may have inserted all
the miracles which he is reputed to have
wrought. But who among his disciples
or among their proselytes was capable of
inventing the sayings ascribed to Jesus,
or of imagining the life and character
revealed in the Gospels? Certainly not
the fishermen of Galilee; as certainly
not St. Paul, whose character and
idiosyncrasies were of a totally different
sort; still less the early Christian writers,
in whom nothing is more evident than
that the good which was in them was
all derived, as they always professed that
it was derived, from the higher source.
What could be added and interpolated
by a disciple we may see in the mystical
parts of the Gospel of St. John, matter
imported from Philo and the Alexandrian
Platonists and put into the mouth of the
Saviour in long speeches about himself
such as the other Gospels contain not the
slightest vestige of, though pretended to
have been delivered on occasions of the
deepest interest and when his principal
followers were all present; most promi
nently at the last supper. The East was
full of men who could have stolen any
quantity of this poor stuff, as the multi
tudinous Oriental sects of Gnostics after
wards • did. But about the life and
sayings of Jesus there is a stamp of
personal originality combined with pro
fundity of insight which, if we abandon
the idle expectation of finding scientific
precision where something very different
was aimed at, must place the Prophet of
Nazareth, even in the estimation of those
who have no belief in his inspiration, in
the very first rank of the men of sublime
genius of whom our species can boast.
When this pre-eminent genius is com
bined with the qualities of probably the
greatest moral reformer, and martyr to
107
that mission, who ever existed upon
earth, religion cannot be said to have
made a bad choice in pitching on this
man as the ideal representative and
guide of humanity; nor, even now,
would it be easy, even for an unbeliever,
to find a better translation of the rule of
virtue from the abstract into the concrete
than to endeavour so to live that Christ
would approve our life. When to this
we add that, to the conception of the
rational sceptic, it remains a possibility
that Christ actually was what he sup
posed himself to be—not God, for he
never made the smallest pretension to
that character, and would probably have
thought such a pretension as blasphe
mous as it seemed to the men who con
demned him—but a man charged with
a special, express, and unique commis
sion from God to lead mankind to truth
and virtue; we may well conclude that
the influences of religion on the character
which will remain after rational criticism
has done its utmost against the evidences
of religion are well worth preserving,
and that what they lack in direct strength
as compared with those of a firmer belief
is more than compensated by the greater
truth and rectitude of the morality they
sanction.
Impressions such as these, though not
in themselves amounting to what can
properly be called a religion, seem to me
excellently fitted to aid and fortify that
real, though- purely human, religion,
which sometimes calls itself the Religion
of Humanity and sometimes that of
Duty. To the other inducements for
cultivating a religious devotion to the
welfare of our fellow-crtatures as an
obligatory limit to every selfish aim, and
an end for the direct promotion of which
no sacrifice can be too great, it superadds
the feeling that, in making this the rule
�10S
THEISM
of our life, we may be co-operating with
the unseen Being to whom we owe all
that is enjoyable in life. One elevated
feeling this form of religious idea admits
of, which is not open to those who
believe in the omnipotence of the good
principle in the universe, the feeling of
helping God—of requiting the good
he has given by a voluntary co-operation
which he, not being omnipotent, really
needs, and by which a somewhat nearer
approach may be made to the fulfilment
of his purposes. The conditions of
human existence are highly favourable
to the growth of such a feeling, inasmuch
as a battle is constantly going on, in
which the humblest human creature is
not incapable of taking some part,
between the powers of good and those
of evil, and in which every, even the
smallest, help to the right side has its
value in promoting the very slow and I
often almost insensible progress by which
good is gradually gaining ground from
evil, yet gaining it so visibly at consider
able intervals as to promise the very
distant, but not uncertain, final victory of
God. To do something during life, on
even the humblest scale if nothing more
is within reach, towards bringing this
consummation ever so little nearer, is
the most animating and invigorating
thought which can inspire a human
creature; and that it is destined, with or
without supernatural sanctions, to be the
Religion of the Future I cannot entertain
a doubt. But it appears to me that
supernatural hopes, in the degree and
kind in which what I have called rational
scepticism does not refuse to sanction
them, may still contribute not a little to
give to this religion its due ascendancy
over the human mind.
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Text
VHAT T© READ
ggestions for the Better Utilisation of
Publio Libraries
a
Substance of an
address delivered before the
TYNESIDE SUNDAY LECTURE SOCIETY
JOHN M. ROBERTSON
[issued for the rationalist press
association, limited]
WATTS & CO.,
JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.
'
1904
•■Sr*» - ■£
V-.-..'“‘?5Price Fourpence
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NATIONALSECULARSOCIETY
WHAT TO READ
SUGGESTIONS FOR THE BETTER UTILISATION
OF PUBLIC LIBRARIES
THE SUBSTANCE OF AN ADDRESS DELIVERED BEFORE THE
TYNESIDE SUNDAY LECTURE SOCIETY
BY
JOHN AL ROBERTSON
[issued for the rationalist press
association, limited]
WATTS & CO.,
17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.
1904
��WHAT TO READ:
SUGGESTIONS FOR THE BETTER UTILISATION OF PUBLIC
LIBRARIES
I.
A good many years ago I was one of a band of
amateur assistants to the librarians of the People’s
Palace in East London, upon one Sunday afternoon,
when there was tried the experiment of throwing open
the reading-room to the general public, with miscella
neous lots of books placed on all the tables. The
business of the assistants was to try to gather from the
visitors their preferences as to reading, and to supply
them with something to their taste. As was to be
expected, most comers wanted stories, and of these the
supply was abundant. At my table a few read steadily
for an hour or two, but no one, I think, the whole after
noon; and the majority kept their places for only a
short time. To have a book was- one thing, to read it
was another.
How the plan thus started has fared since I know not;
but I then received a strong impression of the need for
some more systematic and continuous guidance to the
great majority of the readers. A rich treasury lay at
their disposal; but they needed some steady help to
enable them to develop a sufficiently enduring desire to
•enjoy it. For the most part they were as sheep without
a shepherd.
Many librarians, I do not doubt, give much of the
needed assistance day by day to many readers; and in
populations less restless than those of East London
3
�4
WHAT TO READ
public libraries are probably better used than by those
in the ordinary course of things ; but my conviction
remains that in general they are not nearly as much
utilised as they might be, and it is on that view that I
want to offer some suggestions, on the one hand to any
young people who may care to listen, and on the other
hand to those elders who may accept my view and be
desirous of giving guidance to the young people of
their circle.
I would begin by planning for a boy or girl who has
just left school, about thirteen or fourteen, and who may
have, as all ought to have, some hours of leisure every
day—leisure that is apt to be either wasted or devoted
too exclusively to amusement. To all such, with access
to a public library, there is open in some degree the
possibility of becoming fairly well informed, and no less
cultured (as the phrase goes) than the majority of
middle-class people, whose schooling usually lasts a
good deal longer than that of working folks. Young
people of the working-class must not suppose that,
because they do not get a college education, they can
never be well educated. It is only too easy for a youth
to go through an English public school and university
without being well educated. Not only do the majority
never really learn the dead languages on which they
spend so much time ; they do not have their minds
well opened to the knowledge and the entertainment
that is possible to them in their own language. And
what they miss may in large measure be attained by
poorer people outside of universities.
Remember the saying of Carlyle : “ The true univer
sity of these days is a library of printed books.” Carlyle
said that what his own university did for him was to
teach him to read in various languages; and as a
matter of fact the languages through which he did most
of his work (French and German) were not in his univer
sity curriculum. You will not suppose me to deny that a.
�WHAT TO READ
5
good university—-or even a faulty university such as
Oxford or Cambridge—may do a great deal for a youth
who takes an interest in his studies. And you will not
suppose me, on the other hand, to be satisfied with the
education given in our ordinary popular schools, or with
the social state of things in which young people have to
begin (as I began) to work for a living at thirteen, or
with the amount of leisure that is thus far possible to the
mass of the workers at any age. I am far from being
content on any of these points. But what I seek to do
now is to help some to make more use of the limited
possibilities that do exist, even for working folks’
children.
II.
Taking the ordinary boy or girl of thirteen, then, and
assuming only an ordinary degree of intelligence, I
would try to set up a habit of reading by offering stories.
That is the natural way for ninety-nine out of a hundred:
you must operate on curiosity, and you must first take it
as you find it. The great thing is to set up the simple
sense of pleasure in reading. Let the stories be as
juvenile as you please ; let them even be school-boy
serials, so long as they are not mere romances of high
way robbery, such as some traders are not ashamed to
put in the way of poor boys. I do not know much
about present-day literature for the young ; but in my
own early boyhood I spent many happy hours in
reading the books of the late R. M. Ballantyne, and I
should think these cannot yet be superseded. They are
for many reasons much to be preferred to some later
literature in which the young idea is in a disastrously
literal sense taught to shoot, and to think of bloodshed
as the most admirable of human activities. Ballantyne’s
books have for young people both interest and informa
tion : they recount both adventures and facts, giving
them a fairly true idea of some aspects of actual life—the
�6
WHAT TO READ
life of explorers, hunters, firemen, railway-men, and so
forth—with enough of episode and excitement to keep
them enthralled. I still keep an affectionate recollection,
too, of a certain work of the last century entitled The
Swiss Family Robinson. It tells how a Swiss pastor
and his family were wrecked on an island—one much
better stocked than that of Robinson Crusoe ; and the life
they lived, as I recollect it, came as near the level of
Paradise as a healthy boy or girl wants to reach. They
found everything they wanted, in the light of the father’s
amazing knowledge—meat and drink, sago in a fallen
sago-palm, natural lemonade in the green cocoanuts
(which they tempted the monkeys to throw down at
them), turtles, bread fruit, material for clothing, for
housing, for luxury ; every day brought a new dis
covery ; and when, after years of this boundless happi
ness, the eldest son of that family discovered a neigh
bouring island on which there was a shipwrecked
young lady, and left his Paradise to go and get married
and settle down in Europe, no words could express my
juvenile contempt for his bad taste.
Well, after a boy has read such a book as that he is
better fitted to appreciate our own Robinson Crusoe,
which is really a much greater book, going deeper into
human character, and, what is very important, written
in finer English than the other, which is an ordinary
translation.
I doubt whether this sense of literary quality can be
too soon appealed to in young people—at least, after
thirteen. As soon as the boy reader can be got away
from stories like Fenimore Cooper’s and W. G. Kingston’s
and Mayne Reed’s and Henty’s, and the girl reader
from her equivalent pleasures, let them try, or try them
with, the works of Dickens—first the more amusing, later
the more serious. I admit—though I am not at all a.
Dickens-worshipper—that a boy or girl of fifteen cannot
properly appreciate the power of Dickens ; but I do say
�WHAT TO READ
7
that when they can be brought under his spell they
have begun to taste of the fountains of the higher litera
ture ; they begin to undergo a strictly literary effect; they
begin to be concerned with character rather than with
incident, to brood on life, to realise to some extent what
society is. I can remember comparing notes, about the
age of fifteen, with a fellow clerk, on the subject of
Dickens. Our verdict was: “He makes you think”;
and we used to quote his phrases, appreciating their
dexterity, their humour, their quaintness. And if a boy
does not take to Dickens, he may take to Kingsley ; and
that will serve.
But above all, the sense of style, which is the choicest
of all the joys of reading, is to be cultivated through the
reading of poetry. Here, again, we must begin with the
simple, the easy. Let it be stories in verse—always
rhyme for the beginner—ballads, patriotic songs, any
thing that will take the youthful palate. But a boy or girl
of fourteen or fifteen can appreciate the clear charm of a
great deal of Longfellow, or the vigorous tramp of verse
like Scott’s Mannion, or his Lady of the Lake, or Lay of
the Last Minstrel; and gradually, when the ear has come
to delight habitually in cadence, a higher order of
pleasure will be found in the greater poets. Tennyson
and Mrs. Browning are perhaps more readily enjoyed
—at least as regards their rhymed verse—than Shelley ;
but any young taster of poetry will soon take delight in
such a poem as Shelley’s Cloud; and if you thereafter
get him or her to perceive the mastery and the glamour
of Keats and Coleridge, you have made a lover of poetry
who is not likely to be unfaithful.
After that, give the young reader his head in poetry :
set him at Milton, Spenser, Chaucer, Shakespeare,
Browning, Wordsworth, Arnold : so long as you start
with modern verse, and enlist the natural appetite, you
are nearly safe.
And though some people fear to
interest young readers much in poetry, you will in all
�I L.-.1X4 JI
8
WHAT TO READ
likelihood find that it makes them not less but more con
cerned for education of a more utilitarian kind.
All
fine poetry promotes at once imagination and thought;
and the sense of the delightfulness of beautiful speech is
sure to extend itself to fine prose. Certainly we must
guard against limiting culture to the aesthetic side, to the
elements of form, style, cadence, and vocabulary ; on this
I shall have something to say later ; but let us first and
foremost insist on the need to cultivate imagination, even
for the purpose of training the critical and scientific
intelligence. So practical a thinker as Buckle has gone
so far as to say that the poets are among the best trainers
of the scientific intelligence ; and you will remember that
so distinguished a man of science as Tyndall has to a
great extent corroborated him.
Even that, however, is not the final “defence of
poetry.” Its great vindication is that for all of us it
may be a life-long ministry of refined enjoyment, an
inward music that can transfigure jarring circumstance
and lighten sombre hours as nothing else can ; a music
that the poor man can command when he has no access
to the other joy of actual sound. I believe that, if you
were to ask Mr. Thomas Burt—-whose whole life does
honour to the countryside to which he belongs—what it
is in books that he has valued most since he began to
read them, he would tell you that it is poetry. And I
leave you to judge whether his love of poetry has made
him unpractical, or inexact, or careless about the
working side of life. He could get pleasure from
remembered poetry in the coal-pit, and through taking
such pleasure he was the sooner qualified to leave the
coal-pit and to work with his brain for his fellows in the
council-chamber of his country.
�WHAT TO READ
9
III.
Even then, on the side of pure enjoyment, books can
be highly and truly educative ; and if the young reader
be so hard worked that he or she does not readily take to
what we call dry reading, let not the elders be dis
couraged. To mothers in particular I would say, do
not fret if your daughter in her spare hours shows a
passion for novels. If you can only lead her taste
upwards on that path—and the best plan is always to
travel that way yourself—she will grow wiser and better,
not more flighty and indolent. A great novel is a piece
of education ; and even some that are hardly great, such
as the Little Women of Louisa Alcott, can do much to
stimulate the intellect of young people. But those who
have read Mrs. Oliphant and Charlotte Bronte and Jane
Austen and George Eliot, have gained some real serious
insight into life, and are better fitted to live it. And when
readers of either sex are able to appreciate the work of
the greatest masters of fiction—Thackeray or Hawthorne
or Meredith in England, Balzac in France, or any of
the great Russians (and they are perhaps the greatest of
all) in translation, they have acquired some really vital
culture—the kind of culture that deepens character and
adds new meaning to all experience.
But there are some people, we know, who go on
reading little else than novels all their lives—reading
them indiscriminately, of course, for no one with a good
taste can read new novels all the time ; and even if our
taste be not very good, it is well to be warned against
that sort of thing. It is a finding of delight in mere
dissipation. Let the ingenuous young reader, then, be
warned to mix “serious” reading with his literary
pleasures as often as he can bring his mind to the effort.
If he have a spontaneous taste for science, so much the
better; such a taste is a rich possession, making rela
�TO
WHAT TO READ
tively easy the attainment of kinds of knowledge that to
most people is hard of acquirement. But let not the
grown-up guide be distressed if the youngster does not
readily take to science. I can remember my father
reproaching me, when I was about twelve, for not
reading such a book as Hugh Miller’s Old Red Sand
stone in the time I was spending on Robinson Crusoe. I
am not at all sure that he was very deep in the Old Red
Sandstone himself, and the title certainly did not allure
me to geology. In a great many minds, as in mine, the
scientific interest is late to awaken.
A common and easy way of advance, however, is to
pass from literature, as such, to history. A mind that
has been interested by the novel is open to the historical
novel—Dumas, say, to begin with, or Scott, or Dickens’s
Tale of Two Cities, or George Eliot’s Romola—and from
the historical novel to the history is an easy step. At
first the young reader will care chiefly for the romance
of history—I remember being intensely interested as a
boy by Prescott’s Conqzcest of Mexico and Conquest of
Peru—and from such beginnings a boy may read history
till he begins to realise that conquest is not the noblest
side of it. Every boy, of course, should be taught the
history of his own country ; and as the ordinary school
books do little in that direction, set him as soon as may
be to read John Richard Green’s Short History of the
English People. It is not so very short, but it is none
the worse for being as long as two big novels ; and
though it has plenty of faults from a scientific point of
view, it is still the most alive history of England that
you can put in a young reader’s hands. After that, let
him try, with Freeman’s General Sketch for a finger
post—or better, if he can follow it, Mr. Bryce’s Holy
Roman Empire—to get an idea of the historical develop
ment of Europe ; and thereafter let him read all he can
of the history of the great nations, extending his know
ledge of later British history through Macaulay, whose
�WHAT TO READ
11
Essays, further, will be found among the best appetisers
for European history in general. If he have a strong
historic taste, he will turn with pleasure to Hallam for
English constitutional history, and for his general
Fzhw of Europe in the Middle Ages; but not all will
take to the subject so kindly. The essential thing is
that the reader be interested. If he is not concerned
about history on a larger scale, try him with Carlyle’s
French Revolution. It will not exactly make him under
stand the Revolution, but it will set his mind and
imagination to work ; and political comprehension can
come later.
If interest be once thus roused, history may be made
a much more interesting thing than it usually is by
taking large views of it. When you have got past the
stage of reading it for its romance, you are not neces
sarily prepared to read with close attention the ordinary
chronological narrative, in which kings and queens and
generals and statesmen still count for so much, and the
masses of men and women for so little. If you feel like
this, let me counsel you to go to my early master,
Buckle, for the most rousing stimulus that is yet avail
able to the beginner in historical studies. From his
Introduction to the History of Civilisation in England
you will learn that there are large meanings in history ;
that the broad movement of civilisation can become as
fascinating as any story of conquest ; that the welter of
historic events, which looks like a great chaos or
measureless sea, has its laws, its intelligible sequences,
as truly as any department of nature ; and that as you
begin to understand these laws the events themselves
become newly interesting, even as all plants or forms of
life or landscapes do when once you have got a grasp of
botany, or biology, or geology.
And Buckle has this further merit, that he interests
you in the natural sciences in the act of interesting you
in the science of human affairs, were it only because he
�12
WI-IAT TO READ
is himself so intensely interested in them all. For him
history is not a mere series of battles and conquests,
of kings and dynasties, and religious or political
quarrels ; it is also a series of advances in knowledge,
of appearances of wise men, of thrilling discoveries,
great inventions, aye, and of great books. And when
once he has held you with his glittering eye, his glitter
ing rhetoric, it is only lack of time that will withhold
you from trying to follow him on all the paths he has so
eagerly trodden. He is steeped in literature as such ;
he delights in poetry ; he cannot contain himself when
he writes of Shakespeare ; and all the while he is closely
intent on the progress of the sciences, which he follows
in every detail.
IV.
Let us not count too hopefully, however, on the
deepening of our young reader’s tastes ; or, rather, let
us allow reasonable time for his growth in seriousness.
After all, the young mind, as a rule, turns more
spontaneously to the artistic than to the scientific side of
things ; and our concern should be not to have things
otherwise, but to see to it that the normal line of move
ment is followed in a progressive fashion. If the young
reader cares specially for the charm of literature, for
poetry, for drama, for romance, for style, let him be
helped to get the best from all these. Show him,
to begin with, that they can be studied critically,
and with exactitude. What marks the scholarly study
of any subject is just painstaking, the making sure of
understanding all the details ; and to that end the young
reader, after first getting his enjoyment from the poetry
as such, should read his Shakespeare, his Milton, his
Chaucer, in the annotated editions that are now
common, mastering the obscure allusions, the peculiar
idioms, the special uses of words, the archaisms. In
this fashion he can give himself, with no great strain, a
v
�what to read
13
good deal of the kind of discipline that is undergone by
careful students at the universities.
If, further, he is to get the best from literature, he will
do well to read the good critics. Quite young readers
can get much stimulus from the essays of Hazlitt.
Later, they will get an abundance of both stimulus and
guidance from the essays of James Russell Lowell, from
those of Matthew Arnold, from the Hours in a Library
of Sir Leslie Stephen, from the volumes of the late
Professor Minto, and last, but not least, from the
History of English Literature by the distinguished
Frenchman Taine. I rather think that Taine and the
American Lowell make English literature more vividly
interesting than do any of our own critics and his
torians. And as all good criticism is a criticism of life
as well as of books and styles, the young reader is in
this way also led to the deeper meanings of things. He
will go to Emerson as literature, and he will find bracing
counsel for life : seeking fine writing he will get great
precepts, and the atmosphere of a noble spirit—the best
thinking that has yet been yielded by the life of the New
World. It is not exactly a coherent philosophy, but it
is something nearly as great—an example in consistent
magnanimity, incomparably stimulating to young minds.
And Emerson gives a kind of introduction to literature
that no one else supplies—an introduction to its spirit
rather than to its forms, which leaves a sense of special
intimacy of appreciation.
No man, of course, is an efficient guide on all paths ;
and in some directions Emerson is a little narrow, so that
you would not learn from him to value Goethe or Gibbon
or some other great masters.
The young student,
accordingly, must learn to give his attention to different
prompters, and to care as much as he can for all
literatures. If he will learn a foreign language or two,
so much the better ; it is no very hard undertaking, and
in all large towns there are facilities for it. It is a much
�14
WHAT TO READ
simpler thing to learn French or German, or even Latin
or Greek, than to become a master of the violin or the
piano ; and many men spend on billiards an amount of
attention and effort that would in a year or two give
them fluency in Sanskrit. I might add that a command
of foreign languages ought to be, in our country, a
means of commercial advancement, for we are nationally
deficient in that matter, though we have special need to
be proficient. But I limit my appeal, at present, to the
interests of the intellectual life, urging simply that the
power to read in other languages is an opening of new
windows upon life, and a means to mental pleasures that
are otherwise hardly attainable. Poetry, in particular,
hardly bears translation ; there is a fragrance that
evaporates, a beauty that vanishes ; they must be found
in the original tongue, if at all. Many excellent books,
besides, do not get translated ; it is well worth while, in
such a case, to be independent of help. But whether you
are so or not, make it a part of your aspiration to know
something of other literatures than your own ; and
whether or not you master the classic dead languages,
make it a point to know something of the classics, and to
realise how men thought and felt in other ages, with
other beliefs and sanctities, under other skies.
There is no great danger, I think, that the ordinary
unscholarly man who rises above mere novel-reading will
in this way be led to care unduly for what we call belleslettres, fine letters, and to see culture solely in the
knowledge of that. Such miscalculation is the mistake,
mainly, of literary men and university dons ; the
ordinary citizen is usually withheld from such one
sidedness.
If, however, our young reader should
chance to be specially biassed to the purely literary
view of things, let him be warned that even that is,
after all, an ignorant view ; and that literary men who
know only poetry and artistic or entertaining prose, or
at most the literature of unscientific human experience,
�WHAT TO READ
r5
are simply ill-educated men. There can be no sound
culture in these days without some connected knowledge
of the subject-matter of the natural sciences ; just as, on
the other hand, there can be no truly scientific thinking
on social and political matters without a good knowledge
of “ humane letters ”—the lore of feeling and aspiration
—as well as of history. In both directions we see many
men miscarry. Some, versed only in poetry and fiction,
the literature of taste and feeling, passionately seek to
impose their essentially ignorant ideals upon the world of
politics, where they are only more refined specimens of
the average man of passion. A poet who, by force of
natural nobleness, transcends that average, is a great
aider of civilisation ; a poet who merely turns into song
the passions of commonplace men is but a blind guide
of the blind. But when a cultivator of the physical
sciences in turn thinks to rank as a guide in problems of
public conduct on the mere strength of his knowledge of
physics, he is no better accredited. There is far more of
true political wisdom in a Shelley, with all his vagaries,
than in a Tyndall, with all his science. The science of
civic life is to be mastered only from the side of civics ;
though every science may indeed help to the mastery of
every other.
It is by bringing to bear on civic problems the
temper, the patience, and above all the veracity which
builds up the natural sciences, that the gains of modern
“ science ” in general are to be socially reaped. Human
society, the crown or flower of animal life, is to be
understood not by interpreting it in terms of the special
laws of the lower grades of evolution, but by learning to
see it as a further evolution, for every step of which the
laws have to be newly generalised. Sociology is not
simple “Darwinism”; and Darwin is only partially a
sociologist. He even miscarried through assuming
that his generalisation of the conditions of formation of
species yielded a final prescription for the control of the
�i6
WHAT TO READ
human species. But if our politicians, who are by way
of being the specialists of social science, would but
bring to their problems a moiety of the vigilant patience
with which Darwin surveyed his own field, to say
nothing of the benign temper in which he worked, they
would be on the way to a signal betterment of public
action. And towards such progress the disinterested
study of science is potentially a precious discipline.
V.
Nor is this all.
No man of fair intelligence and
strength of character can reach manhood without spend
ing some thought on the ultimate problems of life—
those which are stated on the one hand through religion
and on the other hand through philosophy. To be
indifferent on the great issues of life and death is to be
wanting in the essential seriousness which is needed to
make a human being either good or wise ; and some of
the special force of the words “ religion ” and “reli
gious ” in the past has come from the feeling that mere
indifference on these matters implies shallowness. Now,
if there is anything made clear by the discussions of the
past century, it is that the standing debate on religious
questions can be efficiently entered on only on a basis of
knowledge of the generalisations of the sciences—the
“ human,” that is, as well as the natural. To this con
clusion all the capable disputants come. Orthodox
religion is latterly being defended, not by rejecting the
sciences, but by seeking to found on them ; and that
lately evolved science in particular which we broadly
term Anthropology is being included in the orthodox
purview no less than the sciences of Biology and
Physics. To know something of Tylor and Lubbock
and Spencer and Frazer, or of what they have estab
lished, is becoming an acknowledged need on all hands,
�WHAT TO READ
17
even as it has long been an acknowledged need to know
the drift of Darwinism.
To have religious or philosophical opinions worth
mentioning, then, we must found on some scientific
knowledge of those aspects of life and nature which first
moved men to frame religions and philosophies. Begin
ning in this way, the young student will haply stick to
the true path of inquiry, which is the historical; that is
to say, he will look always to the historical evolution of
beliefs in order to shape aright his assent or dissent.
And in that way, there is cause to hope, he will best
learn the great lesson of tolerance. One thing becomes,
I think, quite certain to all students who in any degree
proceed upon critical reason—that on each side in every
great intellectual strife there has been some error.
Whichever side may be relatively right, it has some
“blind spot,” some misbelief; and sometimes, looking
back, it is much easier to see error on both sides than
truth on either.
To realise this is to feel, surely, that absolute rightness
is no more attainable than absolute happiness, and that
the working ideal for thoughtful men is simply that
of loyalty to reason, which means constant concern to
avoid the snares of prejudice that beset us all, and
willingness to admit that, as the best general is said to
be merely the one who makes fewest blunders, so the
truest thinker is the one who takes most precaution
against error. He who has learned this lesson will not
readily become a persecutor; and to abstain steadfastly
from persecution is a great part of civic wisdom and
virtue.
VI.
In getting knowledge and broadening his mind, then,
•our young reader is preparing not only to make the
best of life for himself, but to better it somewhat for
others. For no culture is truly sound, scientifically
�i8
WHAT TO READ
speaking, that does not tend to make men and women
better citizens. Of what ultimate avail are individual
culture and book knowledge if they do not save or
further civilisation ? What profits it men in general
if they gain their own souls, so to speak, and lose their
world ?
As I put it before, the problem of civic or corporate
well-being is as truly matter of science as any subject
matter commonly so-called. The trouble is that this,,
the very science of sciences, the ultimate practical
problem for men, is so seldom studiously approached.
You must spend tedious years in exact study, and give
proof of having learned something in them, before you
are permitted by law to prescribe medicines for the
troubles of the mere individual body. But for the
immensely complicated “body politic,” so hard to
anatomise and understand, every elector is as it were a
chartered physician. How many men ever doubt their
own fitness to doctor it? How many men take any pains
to know scientifically the nature of the frame they pre
scribe for? In any one of the principal political disputes
of the day, how many deem it necessary to make a
careful study before they form an opinion and cast a
vote ? To take the principal issue of the present moment,
how many on either side of the fiscal controversy have
felt the necessity of carefully studying economics before
coming to their conclusions ? I fear they are but a small
percentage.
Yet for an industrial State such as ours, economics,
‘‘ political economy,” is plainly the key science. Every
elector should try to get some grasp of it. I am not.
going in this case to prescribe manuals : it it well to
read more than one, comparing one with another; and
if you should begin with the splendid rhetoric of Ruskin,
who teaches rather as a prophet than as a man of
science, there is no harm, provided you remember that
eloquence is not necessarily truth, and that it is well to-
�WHAT TO READ
I9'
take further counsel. As to the different economic
schools, guidance can best be given otherwise ; but I
will offer the suggestion, which I have in some measure
tested in teaching, that the young reader should try to
take up his economics with his history. Here Buckle
will help him. Let him remember that economics is the
science of how things actually happen in industry and
commerce, in the production and the distribution of
wealth, in the creation of riches and poverty. To’
understand these things is a main part of the interest of
history ; and the true understanding of them works out
as economics. Political economy, in fact, to be worthy
of its name, should be a comprehension of some of the
main forces which are shaping the history of our own
day. And to do this all round, I need hardly say, is the
practical end of the science which we call Sociology—
that which I have already called the science of sciences—on the practical or human side, even as philosophy
is the science of all the sciences on the cosmic side.
The young listener or reader may perhaps smile if I
call this a fascinating science ; and I do not expect him
to be allured to it all at once, though he will find such a
book as Spencer’s Study of Sociology surprisingly interest
ing ; but I promise him—and her—that the day comes
when it grows to be fascinating for all who really take
any happiness in thinking. And to take happiness in
thinking is the gain that comes to all who have been
concerned to make any worthy use of that great
heritage of books. You may attain it, of course, in
other ways as well—in looking on the face of Nature ;
in studying flower and rock and tree and cloud ; in
watching the pageant of the stars. All of these things,
however, you will see better with the help of books ; and
if you grow, as we all should, equally on the side of
thought and feeling, of heart and head, you will find in
the troublous drama of the human life around you your
most lasting practical concern. You will care more and
�.20
WHAT TO READ
more to mend matters, to succour the feeble and the
wretched, to bring it about that there shall be less of
wretchedness and more of joy. And the scientific way
of going about that task—the way of the trained
physician as against that of the ignorant amateur or the
■quack—lies in thoroughly understanding how the social
body is constituted, how civilisation grows, how States
•and races prosper or wane. Such knowledge is
sociology.
VII.
When all is said, however, the good of life to ourselves
is to be had in the living of it; and while the desire to
better the world for the sake of others is the most
sustaining of aspirations, it would hardly be so if in
cherishing it we did not find our own inner lives made
better for us by the effort. And here it is that the
attempt to grasp and master the science of human
affairs, the science of society, yields to us that personal
reward which is the peculiar ministry of all good
literature. It is one of the ways in which we can best
triumph over life’s frustrations. Of these there is an
abundant supply for all of us; but when you look
reflectively in the face of frustration, you realise that it
stands for the mere coincidence of things as well as for
your own miscalculation ; and against that blind and
purposeless face of fortune you have in yourselves the
resource of mind, which must prevail, if only you decline
to surrender. Thus, for him or her who will use it,
literature is a heritage which nothing can take away.
The great French writer Montesquieu, who in his
•chief works did so much towards the scientific interpre
tation of social development, has left to us the declara
tion that he never in his life had a chagrin which half an
hour’s reading would not put away. It is to be feared
that he was not a very sensitive soul ; he must have
been a good deal at his ease in Zion, and he can hardly
�WHAT TO READ
21
have been much given to caring about other people’s
sorrows. And, indeed, however insensitive he was, he
must have been exaggerating somewhat in that assertion:
we cannot go through life, any of us, on such easy terms.
But, after due deductions have been made, Montesquieu’s,
avowal remains for us the revelation of a precious secret.
He has pointed to one of the great anodynes for the
pains of the mind.
And this anodyne, remember, is not a thing purchas
able by wealth ; it is the treasure of the poor, if they will
steadfastly claim it. I have read that a distinguished
American millionaire has recently declared that he would
give a million dollars for a new stomach. Well, that
too is a point at which millions of poor men have the
better of him ; but possibly his million may buy him
relief. The doctors can do wonders with our stomachs
now ; lately, I read of their taking a man’s stomach out
and somehow mending it or making him develop a new
one ; and happily they can help us by less extreme
measures also. Of another American millionaire it is
told that, finding himself growing blind, he has offered a
million dollars to anyone who will save his eyesight for
him ; and here again, though the case is more nearly
desperate, wealth may one day buy what would now
seem a miracle, such astonishing advances do our
oculists make in their mastery of their mystery. But I
am very sure that, if a millionaire should offer all his
fortune for a new mind, there is no human skill that can
supply him ; for the making of a mind that is to be
worth having in old age must be the work of all our
preceding years. He might buy condensed information,
or an assortment of ready-made opinions ; but what he
cannot buy is the thinking and judging faculty, the
power to enjoy the stores of wisdom and beauty treasured
up in books.
It is only the perverse, or those who cannot appreciate
what they disparage, who make light of books ; either
�.22
WHAT TO READ
they are ungratefully ignoring what books have done for
themselves, or they have not the patience to compass the
boon they depreciate. Consider what a library is. It
contains so many thousand books, many written merely
to entertain, many merely to make money, many by dull
people, but also many written by the wise and the witty,
the good and the learned, with the purpose of making
permanent their best thoughts and their happiest fancies.
Sift down your store to these, and what do you possess ?
The best thinking and the most felicitous utterance of
the people best worth knowing ; living with them, you
live in “the best of all good company.” All that they
have is yours. Turning your back on the noise and
■emptiness which makes up so much of daily life, you can
■dwell with them in an enchanted air. While the storm
blows outside you can sit with the curtains drawn, and
be led by Gibbon, at your own will, through the tremen
dous drama of the ancient world, or by Darwin, through
the far vaster vistas of those dim ages in which the
human world took its rise. Shelley will sing for you ;
Keats will pipe on his Grecian flutes ; and Milton will
roll forth for you the strains of his great organ. If the
fancy take you, you can be in Mayfair with Thackeray ;
in the New England woods with Hawthorne ; or in the
mapless Europe of Shakspere, behind whose magic
•curtain there goes on forever a transfigured life, which
is that of humanity turned into poetry. You may chop
logic with Mill, and argue your fill with Herbert
Spencer ; and you have this comfort all round, that when
you dispute with the writer you read, whether you be
right or wrong, he will always leave you the last word.
Nay, believe me, it is no fairy tale I am telling you.
The fairy gold, in the stories, turns into dead leaves ;
but those dead leaves of books reverse the magic, and
pay you spiritual gold everytime you have faith to draw.
All you need is to care about it. It is given to few of us
to save much money ; but it is open to the poorest to
�WHAT TO READ
23
save a.great deal of time. You do it by turning time
into knowledge, a deposit of which no fraud or com
mercial disaster can deprive you. And if you still shake
your head, and say that fine words butter no parsnips,
let me ask you in final challenge how you expect the
world’s parsnips are ever to be buttered better than now
if men do not attain to a better comprehension of their
own existence ? And how are they to rise to that unless
they read more, remember more, and think more?
Whatever the nations of the world have too little of,
there is one thing they all have in superfluity : be their
population dense or thin, growing or dwindling, they all
have too many blockheads to the square mile. And I
notice that on one point the politicians of all our parties
are agreed. Whatever they advocate or oppose, what
ever they say of each other, they all admit that in high
places and in low we want more of what they call
“efficiency.” And whatever end they may have in
view, we may be certain of this, that higher efficiency
means more knowledge, more study, more comprehen
sion, more intelligence, more brains. Then let us all do
what we can, each for himself, to get some.
�PRINTED BY WATTS AND CO.,
17, Johnson’s court, fleet street, London, e.c-
��IN THE PRESS.
Courses of StudC
By J. M. ROBERTSON.
This work is expected to extend to between four and five huh J
pages. It is an attempt to provide some systematic guidance to pi '
students on all the main lines of book-knowledge. The scheme
originated over a dozen years ago from the frequent requests mat
the editor of the National Reformer—which post Mr. Robertson held
after Mr. Bradlaugh, until the cessation of the journal—for advi* a
lines of reading. Such requests seemed to show a commonly fev r. '
and it was partly met by a series of “ Courses ” published from tin *
time in the journal in question. About the same period this need
recognised by the publication of Messrs. Sargant & Whishaw
Book to Books and the first of Mr. Swan Sonnenschein’s
bibliographies; but it has been felt that the original plan of “ Cotu^M^gj
is worth reviving.. Those published have accordingly been Care^
revised, and expanded by inclusion of the latest literature of impoiand a much larger number of entirely new courses has been uAJS
completing the undertaking. The book does not claim to be a.
Wii3!
complete bibliographies for specialists, but by its aid any diligent.
who has access to a fair public library can so follow up his studifiM
the main branches of knowledge as to attain competence therein, -y
Courses, cover anthropology, mythology, hierology (with special cofirS^^^^
on Judaism and Christianity), mental and moral philosophy, psycholr
logic, philology, aesthetics, history (in a series of separate corn •
I
political economy, sociology, histories of literatures, and the n</’
sciences.
■;
fljl
w
III
w
ggg&_
AGENTS FOR THE RATIONALIST PRESS ASSOCIATION, LTD.:
WATTS & GO., 17,JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON^W
�
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What to read : suggestions for the better utilisation of public libraries
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Robertson, J. M. (John Mackinnon) [1856-1933]
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Text
LECTURE
ON
VEGETARIANISM.
BY EMERITUS PROFESSOR F. W. NEWMAN.
[Delivered at Gloucester, December 2, 1870; J/r. Price, M.P., in the Chair,
and reprinted from the Dietetic Reformer, January, 1871.]
LONDON:
F. PITMAN, PATERNOSTER ROW.
1871.
Price One Penny, or Five Shillings per Hundred.
�THE VEGETARIAN SOCIETY.
ESTABLISHED A.D. 1847.
$rmtant.
J. Haughton, Esq., J.P., Dublin.
i
Vice^wsi&ents.
i
W. G. Ward, Esq., Ross.
Professor Newman.
i
SrrasuiTf.
John Davie, Esq., Dunfermline.
P^onoratg Sewtsm.
Mr. T. H. Barker, Manchester; Rev. James Clark, 126, Cross Lane, Salford.
g>ecrctarg.
Mr. R. Bailey Walker, 13, Cathedral Close, Manchester.
SLocal specretanes,
i
I
i
London.................
Leeds....................
Glasgow................
Colchester ..........
Dunfermline ......
Hull .............. .
Perth....................
Bury.......................
Plymouth.............
Dublin...................
Bradford.............
Cardiff.................
Mr. G. Dornbusch, 11, Grove-street Road, South Hackney, N.E.
Mr. John Andrew, 14, Bishopgate-street.
Mr. J. Smith.
Mr. John Beach, Military Road.
Mr. J. Clark.
Mr. T. D. Hardgrove, 1, Rutland Place.
Mr. Henry MTntosh, 36, South Methven-street.
Mr. William Hoyle, Tottington.
Mr. E. H. Poster, Homoeopathic Chemist.
Mr. J. A. Mowatt.
Miss M. A. Kellett, Paradise Green, Great Horton.
Mr. J. K. Collett.
^Foreign CTonrsponlRng SwretariYs.
I
Mr. Emil Weilshaeuser, Neustadt, Silesia.
Baboo Keshub Chunder Sen, Calcutta.
Mr. Alfred von Seefeld, Hanover.
Rev. Dr. Taylor, 349, North Ninth-street, Philadelphia.
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ipHE OBJECTS of the Society are, to induce habits of abstinence from the Flesh |
i
means of tracts, essays, and lectures, proving the many advantages of a physical,
intellectual, and moral character, resulting from Vegetarian habits of Diet; and thus,
to secure, through the association, example, and efforts of its members, the adoption
of a principle which will tend essentially to true civilisation, to universal brotherhood,
and to the increase of human happiness generally.
Constitution. — The Society is constituted of a President, a Treasurer, an
Executive Committee, a Secretary, Local Secretaries, Foreign Corresponding Secre
taries, and an unlimited number of Members in the United Kingdom, and HonoraryMembers abroad, above the age of fourteen years, who have subscribed to the
Declaration of the Society.
Declaration. —“I hereby declare that I have Abstained from the Flesh of
Animals as Food, for One Month, and upwards ; and that I desire to become a
Member of the Vegetarian Society; and to co-operate with that Body in promul
gating the knowledge of the advantages of a Vegetarian Diet.”
The Subscription is Two Shillings and Sixpence per year, which entitles a mem
ber to a copy of the Dietetic Reformer, quarterly, post free.
All inquiries, and applications for information, should be addressed to the
Secretary of the Vegetarian Society, 13, Cathedral Close, Manchester.
i L of Animals as Food, by the dissemination of information upon the subject, by i
.
�LECTURE ON VEGETARIANISM,
BY EMERITUS PROFESSOR F. W. NEWMAN.
[Delivered at Gloucester, December 2, 1870; Afr. Price, M.P., in the chair.]
“ What shall we eat
is really a question of first importance: but it .is seldom so
treated. In general, the rich eat what they like, and the poor what they can;
neither the one nor the other studies what is best. Besides, there is a perverse
influence at work of which few seem to be aware. Rich men are ashamed to give
cheap food to their friends, even when the cheap is better than the^dear. London
sprats are, in the opinion of many, superior to Greenwich whitebait: yet those who
eat sprats in private, and prefer them, dare not offer them to their friends, because
they are cheap. This does but illustrate a pervading principle. It is a baneful
folly to think, that what is rare, what is difficult, and what is out of season, is
best. And when the richer, who can well afford it, aim at expensive food because
it is expensive, the poorer, who ill afford it, imitate them, and get worse food at
greater cost. I cannot treat the subject of food, unless you will, at least for a little
while, consent to look at things with fresh eyes, and refuse to be blinded by fashion
and routine.
I have called my lecture Vegetarianism; but, as the word does not wholly
explain itself, you may justly ask me for its meaning. Many suppose it to mean,
a diet consisting of table vegetables. It is true, that these are an essential part of
Vegetarian diet, yet they are by no means the most important. Vegetarian food
consists mainly of four heads—farinacea, pulse, fruit, and table vegetables.
1. The foremost is farinacea; they are the “staff of life.” They are chiefly
wheat, barley, oats, maize, perhaps rye; also potatoes, yams, rice and sago,
tapioca, and such like. Vegetarians seldom endure baker’s bread; they always
become fastidious about bread, as teetotalers about water; and very often prefer
unleavened cakes, as Scotch scones, or biscuits not too hard; else, macaroni, also
oatmeal porridge. The makers of aerated bread find that four per cent of the
material is wasted in fermentation. Besides, we have delicious Oswego or rice
blancmange, or it may be hominy and frumenty. I guarantee to you all, that no one
loses a taste for nice things, by vegetarian food, however cheap.
2. Under pulse we practically understand peas, beans, and lentils. They have
excellent feeding qualities, but also a particular defect, which is chiefly remedied
by onions adequately mixed,
3. The word fruit speaks for itself; only it may be well to add that the dearer
fruits are j ust of the least importance for food. Apples might be much cheaper
than they are; and no fruit is more universally serviceable. The cheaper figs,
French, Italian, and Spanish, are less cloying and more feeding than the luscious
Smyrna fig of the shops. Raisins and dates are now supplied in cheerful abundance.
But peculiarly, as I believe, nuts are undervalued as substantial food. We do them
great injustice. We put them on the table as dessert, to be eaten when the stomach
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VEGETARIANISM.
is full, and then slander them as indigestible, because the stomach groans under
an excess of nutriment. We call them heavy, because they are nutritious. In
Syria, walnuts and coarse dry figs make an admirable meal. Filberts I count better
than walnuts, and Brazil nuts better still. Chestnuts have the disadvantage of
needing to be cooked, and being hard to cook uniformly well; but when rightly
dressed, perhaps of all nuts accessible in England they are the most valuable.
Cocoanuts, when we are wiser, will be better applied, than to tempt a jaded appetite
to hurtful indulgence. Almonds are too dear to be available as food; yet concerning
almonds, a physician who is no Vegetarian gave me interesting information the
other day. “No man,” said he, “need starve on a journey, who can fill his
waistcoat pocket with almonds. If you crush almonds thoroughly and duly mix
them with water, no chemist in Europe can distinguish the substanee from milk,
and milk we regard as the most perfect food.” This suggests moreover, that nuts,
to become wholesome, must be very thoroughly crushed and bitten. As to other
fruits, I barely add; that the delicious grape, noblest of the fruits in our latitude,
will be hereafter redeemed by teetotalers from corruption, and will become a general
food. But no fruit must be eaten for amusement, and taken on a full stomach ; or
it will not be food at all.
4. A few words on table vegetables. Potatoes and pulse I have noticed, and
now pass them by. Mushrooms are by far the most delicious, and abound with
nitrogen ; a rare advantage : but we have them too seldom in the market. On the
whole I regard those vegetables to be most important which supply flavour
or correct defects in other food; pre-eminently the tribe of onions, also celery,
parsley, sage, savory, mint, with the foreign articles ginger and pepper. Onions
and celery we do not cook half enough ; indeed cabbage and cauliflower are eateih
half raw by the English ; on which account we do not know their value. Much
the same may be said of what the farmer calls roots, i,e., turnips, carrots, parsnips,
beet. Do not think that I despise any of these, when I insist that this class of food
stands only fourth. One who confines himself to these four heads of diet is indis
putably a Vegetarian.
Yet in fact few Vegetarians do confine themselves to this diet, and herein
consists my difficulty in definition. We are open to the scoff of being, not Vegeta
rians, but Brahmins, who do not object to animal food, but only to the taking of
animal life. Few of us refuse eggs, or milk and its products. This is highly
illogical, if we seek consistency with an abstract theory. I do not shut my eyes
to it. The truth is, that in cookery we need some grease, and it is hard to eat dry
bread without butter or cheese. Our climate does not hitherto produce oils. It is _
not easy to buy oil delicate enough for food, and oil (to most Englishmen) is
offensive, from tasting like degenerate butter. Cheese, like nuts, is maligned as
indigestible, barely because it is heaped on a full stomach. However, since most
Vegetarians admit eggs and milk, I define the diet as consisting of food which is
substantially the growth of the earth, without animal slaughter. If you prefer to
call this Brahminism, I will not object. It is a respectable name.
We shall all admit that the food which is natural to man is best for man ; but
we are not agreed how to find out what is natural. I cannot wholly accede to the
students of comparative anatomy, that the line of argument which they adopt is
decisive; yet it is well to know what it is, and How far it carries us. They assume
that as in wild animals we see instinct unperverted, and as such instinct is a test
of what is natural, we have to compare the structure of the human teeth and
�VEGETARIANISM.
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digestive apparatus with those of brutes, and thereby learn what is natural to man.
Since unluckily certain sharp teeth of ours are called canine, superficial inquirers
jumped to the conclusion that our teeth were made to rend flesh; and on discovering
that the alimentary canal, of the sheep is much longer than of the lion, longer also
than of the man, they inferred that we are not naturally herbivorous, but carnivor
ous. Vegetarians easily refute these arguments. They reply, that our sharp teeth
are ill-called canine, for they do not lap over one another. Such teeth are larger
and stronger in the ape than in the man. I believe they are chiefly useful to crack
nuts, of which monkeys are very fond. Be this as it may, no monkey naturally
eats flesh; if even, when tame, some may be coaxed into eating it. And it is
undeniable that the digestive apparatus of the monkey comes very near to that of
the man: hence Vegetarians generally infer that flesh meat is unnatural to us.
The same thing follows from the doctrine of the old naturalists, who thought the
pig and the man to have marked similarities ; but wild swine certainly will not eat
flesh, therefore man ought not. As to the length of the alimentary canal, there
also the Vegetarians are easily triumphant. The length of it in the man, as in the
monkey, is between two extremes, the lion and the sheep; therefore the human
constitution for food is intermediate. Man is neither herbivorous, as the sheep and
horse, nor carnivorous, as the lion ; but is frugivorous, as the monkey.
There is another argument of Vegetarians which I must not omit, though I do
not undertake to say how much it proves. They allege that carnivorous animals
never sweat, but man certainly does sweat; therefore he is not carnivorous. Here
I feel myself uncertain as to fact. Carnivorous animals, made to prowl by night,
have thick loose skins for defence against cold and wet, even in hot climates. In
consequence sweat would not easily relieve them from internal heat. How is it
with the sheep ? can they sweat ? I find I do not know. But in truth this whole
side of argument from the comparison of animals seems to me but of secondary
value. We cannot find by it what is natural to us ; for, universally, you cannot
find out the characteristics of the higher being by studying the lower being. The
assumption that you can is the main cUuse why external philosophy gravitates into
materialism and atheism. The specific difference of man and brute lies in the
human mind; and this, at once and manifestly, has an essential bearing on the
question of human food. No known animal lights a fire, or fosters a fire when
lighted. However tender their affections, however warm their gratitude or their
resentment, however wonderful their self-devotion, however they may deserve our
fond protection and our reciprocal gratitude, there is not one that understands the
relation of fuel to fire ; therefore there is not one that can cook. On this account
the old logicians called man “the cooking animal;” and though, happily, this
description does not exhaust the capacity of our nature, it affords (on the lower side
of nature) a sufficient criterion, distinguishing us from all known brutes. Without
our power of cookery, we could not make half the use that we do of Vegetarian food.
What would a potato be to us uncooked ? I fear it might turn out to be a narcotic
poison, like the potato-apple. Of how little avail would onions and cauliflower,
turnips and beans, or even corn itself, be without fire ? We can no more conceive
of man without power of cooking than of man without power of sowing, reaping,
and grinding. It may fairly be maintained by the advocate of flesh eating that if it
pleased the Creator to develop the gorilla’s brain, and give him a little more good
sense, without altering his digestive organs or his teeth, the creature would begin
by roasting chestnuts and broiling mushrooms, and go on to discover that roast
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VEGETARIANISM.
flesh has many of the qualities of those princely fungi, in whose praises enthusiastic
votaries rave to us. Now, if I have to admit that a gorilla might perhaps become
a flesh-eater, if he had only the wit to cook, you may think that I abandon the
cause of Vegetarianism. Nay ; but my cause is so strong that I can afford not to
overstrain a single argument.
If man had not the power of cooking, and had a natural incapacity for eating
raw flesh, his command of food would be so limited, that he could not have over
spread the earth as he has done. He certainly never could’have found food in
arctic regions ; scarcely would he have found it adequate for his sustenance in the
temperate zone, when he alighted on a country covered with forest and swamp.
The operations of agriculture require long time and much co-operation before a
wild land can be tamed ; and meanwhile, on what is the first cultivator to live ?
We know what has been the course of history in nearly all countries. Only in
a few, as China, India, Assyria, Egypt, the banks of the great ^navigable
rivers, with alluvial or inundated land, gave such facility to the sower, that
there is not even tradition of the time when tillage began. But in general,
wild men in a wild country ate whatevei’ they could get,—or get most
easily. In the woods wild game abounded—everywhere something, though
varying from continent to continent. Besides birds innumerable, endless tribes
of antelope and deer in one place, of kine in another,—whether the cow or
the buffalo or the bison—of sheep in a third, allured the hunter; and cookery
made the flesh of all eatable. We certainly can eat uncooked oysters. It
is dangerous to deny that savage stomachs, when half-starved, could live on raw
flesh and raw fish. But whether it be cause or effect, the tribes which have come
nearest to this state have been either very degenerate or very primitive specimens
of humanity. If very primitive, they do but display undeveloped man, and they are
the smallest fraction of the human race. The second stage in human civilization, is,
to rear tame cattle; if there are wild animals capable of being tamed. In the old
world the sheep, the cow, the reindeer, or the buffalo became domesticated, time out
of mind; also the camel; and in South America the llama ; but the bison of North
America, it seems, is untameable, so that the pastoral state did not there develop
itself. The transition from pasture to agriculture is a serious difficulty. To defend
crops is most arduous; in fact, is impossible to the private cultivator, unless he is
armed with formidable weapons of war which the savage cannot get. Agriculture
must ordinarily be, in the first instance, the act of the tribe collectively, and the
crops be their common property, protected by their joint force. Until there is a
powerful public executive, armed to defend private property, agriculture is too
dangerous foran individual. On this account certain tribes have abhorred cultivation
and fixed dwellings, as exposing the industrious man to slavery under marauders.
Thus the Nabatheans of old, thus Jonadab the son of Rechab, forbade their children
to build houses, or sow seed, or plant vines, because it interfered with wild liberty.
Tribes who live by hunting only, need a vast space of land in which their game
may live quietly; from a small area it would quickly be frightened away: hence
such tribes have always been a very sparse population, and insignificant in the
world’s history. Those who live by pasturage, driving their flocks and herds from
place to place, and building no houses, have generally been marauders: indeed the
Tartars and Scythians, who used the waggon as their home, in all earlier ages were
the great military nations, the conquerors of the more civilised. Though they
might begin by living on the flesh and milk of their cattle, they soon learned to
�VEGETARIANISM.
5
obtain grain, either by cultivating it themselves (for they were strong enough to
protect it) or by purchasing it from neighbours by giving cattle in exchange or by
extorting it as tribute from peaceful but weaker cultivators. And in proportion as
they lived on grain, they were capable of becoming more populous ; thus population
became denser, step by step, as flesh meat was superseded by wheat and barley, by
maize and rice. In the far north, where Finns and Lapps dwell almost side by side,
the Lapps feed as of old, on the products of the sea, or on the milk and flesh of the
reindeer; but the Finns have introduced corn culture, and live upon grain. The
Finns are the stronger, larger, and handsomer men. At any rate their diet has
agreed with them, even in that latitude; but I do not mean to say that men may
not retain perfect health and strength on either food, so far as health can be tested
by the surgeon. The ancient Germans practised but little agriculture, says Caesar.
By intercourse with Rome, especially on the Roman frontier, they became cul
tivators. In our own island, as we well know, agriculture has existed before Saxon
times; but at the Norman conquest, and long after, the land devoted to cattle or
left in a state of nature vastly predominated. In those days the poorest ate much
more flesh meat than now. There has been a continual diminution of flesh meat,
and far larger supplies of Vegetarian food. This is neither from unjust institutions
nor from unfair taxation ; but it is a normal result of increased population. It is
inevitable on an island, sensibly limited in size: for to produce as much human
food as one acre of cultivated land will yield, three, or even /owr acres of grazing land
are needed. That era had its own disadvantages. The cattle had then little winter
food ; they were killed and salted down in the close of autumn. Much salt meat
and salt fish was eaten, and fresh vegetables were few in species and scarce.
Parsnips are said to have been long the only root, before there were turnips or
carrots : potatoes, we know, came in from America. Native fruit was very limited,
and our climate was thought hardly capable of bearing more sorts ; foreign fruit
was not in the market. Now, what I want to point out, is this : that the diet of
flesh meat belongs to the time of barbarism—the time of loiv cultivation and thin popu
lation; and that it naturally, normally, decreases with higher cultivation. We see the
same thing in ancient civilisation and modern. The Brahmins in India, who stood
at the head in intellect and in beauty, were wholly or prevalently Vegetarians. I
believe, much the same was true of ancient Egypt. Men of lower caste ate flesh,
and the lowest most: and among these principally foul diseases of the skin prevailed ;
no doubt, because, where population is dense, the poorer classes, if they eat flesh
meatat all, are sure to get a sensible portion of their supply diseased and unwholesome.
And now let me say. what is the true test of anything being natural to man.
He is a progressive being; you must test it by his more mature, not by his
immature era; by his civilisation, not by his barbarism. Flesh meat helped him
through his less developed state; it then existed around him in superfluity, while
vegetarian food was scarce ; moreover, the beasts slain for food were then generally
in a natural and healthy condition. But to attempt to keep up in the later and
more developed stage the habits of the earlier and ruder is in many ways perni
cious. At first each man kills his own game, or slaughters a beast of his own
flock; and long after that time is passed, the animals wander in the field or
mountain, or under the forest. The pig eats beech-nuts and oakmast and horse
chestnuts. The steer browses on soft leaves and on grass. There is no stuffing
with oilcake, no stall-feeding nor indoors life. The beast of the field abides in the
field. When the herds abound, and the supply is easily adequate to the human
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VEGETARIANISM.
population, the market is not likely to be tampered with. Neither roguery, nor
artificial management of the animal is to be feared. Great Oriental communities put
the slaughter of cattle for food under religious regulation. With the Jews, and
indeed with the earliest Romans, the butcher was a priest; and anxious distinctions
were made of clean and unclean beasts, to exclude the eating of such flesh as either
was supposed to be unwholesome or was forbidden for some economic reason. Now
ij in fact,—owing, as I believe, to the great pressure for milk in a populous nation,—
i the cow is of a peculiarly feeble constitution with us. This is manifest in her
liability to suffer severely in calving, which is certainly a striking phenomenon.
But surely it is only what might be expected from the very artificial and unnatural
demand that we make on her, to give us milk in quantity far beyond anything
needed for her calf, and for a length of time so prolonged. So intimate is the
relation of calving to milk-giving that to overstrain one side of the female system
must naturally derange the other. But to this is added stall-feeding and cramming,
instead of the open field and natural herbage. Though these practices may save
money to the grazier and produce more pounds of meat and of unhealthy fat, they
cannot conduce to the robustness of the animal, nor of the man who eats it. A
worse thing is now revealed. I lately read in a newspaper that many farmers
believe they have found out the cause of what is called the foot and mouth disease;
namely, they ascribe it to the fact that the animals are bred from parents too
young. Now I lay no stress on their opinion that they have here discovered the
cause of that disease. Their opinion may be erroneous, but they cannot be mistaken
in what they state as a fact; namely, that in eagerness to supply the meat market,
and gain the utmost return to their capital, they artificially bring about a premature
breeding of the cattle. The moment it is mentioned, one sees what the temptation
must be to a breeder; one sees also that the offspring is sure to be feeble, and
therefore liable to any or every disease. It is well known that in Bengal, for
religious reasons, the Brahmin girls are prevalently married at a very tender age,
so that great numbers of mothers are hardly more than children themselves ; and
to this is ascribed the peculiar delicacy and frequent small stature in such classes.
I do not assume that such offspring need be unhealthy; but unless protected as
only men can be protected, if exposed as cattle must be exposed, one must expect
them to catch any epidemic that may be abroad, and more and more to propagate
feebleness. Municipal law struggles in vain against such tricks of the market.
They go on for many years without the persons who practise them being aware of
their harm. Prohibitions are hard to execute ; they are sure to come too late ; and
after they are enacted, some new artifice equally bad grows up. While the pressure
for flesh-meat is great, unless the Government will take into its own hands both
the slaughtering and the sales, it seems impossible to keep the sausage trade under
control. In last Monday’s Daily News I see there is a man to be brought to trial
for boiling up old horses for sausage meat. There is nothing intrinsically wrong
in that, if it were avowed to be horse-flesh; but since all is done by stealth,
evidently far more horrid substances are likely to enter the market.
The United States have a vast abundance of soil, a very thin population : hence
they might, like our ancestors, have flesh meat and milk of a natural kind. But
they have large towns, to be fed on a great scale by enterprising capitalists ; so that
many of the same evils grow up among them as with us. In New York a distiller
of spirits added to his trade the trade of cowkeeping, having learned that co»vs, fed
upon the refuse grains of a distillery, give more milk. It is true that they do ; but
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the milk is inferior in quality ; and the cows gradually become diseased—whether
by the food, or by the unwholesome confinement in the cellars beneath the distillery,
I cannot say. But the complaints of the milk are bitter : moreover, the cowkeepers
in the country around have followed the evil example ; and it is positively stated
that the mortality of children in New York is enormous; which is a suspicious
coincidence. These are but single instances and illustrations of the evils to which
we are exposed, from the tampering of the grazier with the animals in whose flesh
or milk he deals.
But I return to my point. With the progress of population Vegetarianism
naturally increases. I do not say, which is cause, and which is effect: they react
on one another. When more food is wanted, and the price of corn rises, there is a
motive to break up new land. Pasture is diminished. Perhaps by artificial grasses
and by cultivation of roots the quantity of cattle is nevertheless sustained; yet if
the process goes on, as in China (for an extreme case), the larger cattle will not at all
increase in proportion to the population. Nor indeed among ourselves has it increased
proportionally. The English roast beef that foreigners talk of is rarely indeed the
diet of our villagers. Thirty years ago even our town artizans ate little flesh meat.
Bacon, principally fat, was nearly the sole animal food consumed by our peasants,
whose state has but little altered. They may almost be called Vegetarians ; for fat,
like oil, supplies only animal heat, not the substance of muscle. Nevertheless, it
is now taught, that on animal heat vital force depends, which muscle will not give.
Now lest you should pity our peasants too much, I must state that we have the
decisive testimony of the most eminent scientific men to the sufficiency of a purely
Vegetarian diet; men, not themselves Vegetarians, nor intending to urge the
practice. Our society has printed a handbill, with extracts from Haller, Liebig,
Linnaeus, Gassendi, Professor Lawrence, Professor Owen, Baron Cuvier, and many
others. Hear a few illustrations how those speak, who mean to be our opponents.*
Dr. 8. Brown writes: “We are ready to admit that Vegetarian writers have
triumphantly proved, that physical horse-like strength is not only compatible with,
but also favoured by, a well-chosen diet from the vegetable kingdom, and likewise,
that such a table is conducive to length of days.” Dr. W, B. Carpenter writes :
“ We freely concede to the advocates of Vegetarianism, that as regards the endurance
of physical labour there is ample proof of the capacity of [their diet"| to afford the
requisite sustenance.” He adds that if it is sufficiently oily, “ it will maintain the
powers of the body at their highest natural elevation, even under exposure to the
extreme of cold.” Thus the labourer, according to these high authorities, is not at
all dependent on flesh meat. And of this we have abundant proof in foreign nations.
We have no stronger men among our flesh-dieted “navvies” than the African
negroes of the U.S. who were fed, while slaves, on yams, maize, and other vegetable
food. We perhaps cannot anywhere produce a class of men to equal the porters of
Constantinople. The London Spectator., not long back (though it is anything but
Vegetarian in purpose) wondered at the ignorance of men who doubted whether
Vegetarian food was compatible with the greatest strength; for a Constantinople
porter (said the writer) would not only easily carry the load of any English porter,
but would carry off the man besides. Mr. Winwood Reade, a surgeon who has
travelled much in Africa; Mr. A. F. Kennedy, once Governor of Sierra Leone, and
Captain P. Eardley Wilmot, attest that the Kroomen of Western Africa are eminent
in endurance. Mr. Kennedy says “ their power and endurance exceeds that of any
race with which I am acquainted.” Mr. Winwood Reade expresses himself even
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VEGETARIANISM.
more pointedly : “ The Kroomen are, I believe, the strongest men in the world.’’
Yet the Krooman, he adds, lives on a few handfuls of rice per day ; and rice has not
been supposed by our chemists to be at all favourable to human strength. They
depreciated it, as giving too great a proportion of animal heat; but they did not
know that animal heat gives vital force also. It may be said, that these cases
bejong to hot climates ; but indeed Constantinople can be anything but hot. And
we can further appeal to Northern Persia, where the winter is intensely cold. The
English officers at Tabriz, the northern capital,—who for a long series of years had
the drilling of Persian troops,—were enthusiastic in their praises, and testified that
they make the longest marches, on nothing but bread, cheese, and water, carrying
three or four days’ provisions in their sash. These, however, are not strictly
Persians, but of Turkoman race. I did not need to go to Persia for illustration.
The Italians of the north, or anywhere on the Apennines, would have served my
argument. Bread, with figs or raisins, are their sufficient food ; and they were old
Napoleon’s hardiest soldiers round Moscow. Indeed, in every civilised country the
strongest class of men are the peasants, who are everywhere all but Vegetarians.
Dr. E. Smith, who reported to the Privy Council on the food of the three kingdoms,
comes to the conclusion that the Irish are the strongest, next to them the Scotch,
next the northern English; after the southern peasants ; lowest of all, the
towns-man; and that their Vegetarianism is graduated in the same way, the
strongest being the most Vegetarian, and the townsfolk, who are the weakest, being
the greatest eaters of flesh. I do not mean to assert that the diet is the only cause
of strength or weakness : it is sufficient to insist that Vegetarianism is compatible
with the highest strength. The old Greek athlete was a Vegetarian : Hercules,
according to their comic poets, lived chiefly on pease pudding.
But what of health? The testimony of scientific men is here still more
remarkable. Haller, the great physiologist, writes thus: “ This food then, in
which flesh has no part, is salutary, inasmuch as it fully nourishes a man, protracts
life to an advanced period, and prevents or cures such disorders as are attributable
to the acrimony or grossness of the blood.” That eminent physician, Dr. Cheyne
of Dublin, who some forty years ago was at the head of his profession, declared:
“ For those who are extremely broken down with chronic disease I have found no
other relief than a total abstinence from all animal food, and from all sorts of strong
and fermented liquors. In about thirty years’ practice, in which I have (in some
degree or other) advised this method in proper cases, I have had but two cases in
whose total recovery I have been mistaken.” A remarkable instance is attested,—
that of Professor Fergusson, the historian,—who at the age of sixty-one had a
dangerous attack of paralysis. He called in his friend Dr. Black, the celebrated
discoverer of latent heat. Dr. Black, though not a Vegetarian, prescribed total
abstinence from flesh-meat. Professor Fergusson obeyed, and not only recovered
entirely and never had a second attack, but was a remarkably vigorous old man at
ninety, and died at ninety-three.* In such cases I think we have an explanation of
the success of some things called quack remedies,—as, the grape-cure of the
Germans. I am ready to believe that it is not so much the grapes that cure, as the
abstinence from a gross and evil diet. Dr. A. P. Buchan teaches that a diet of
farinacea, with milk and fruits, is the most hopeful way of curing pulmonary
consumption : many examples of such cure in an early stage of the disease, says
he, are recorded. He adds: “ If vegetables and milk were more used in diet, we
A gentleman present corrected 93 into 95.
�VEGETARIANISM.
9
should have less scurvy, and likewise fewer putrid and inflammatory fevers.”
Drs. Craigie and Cullen are very strong as to the power of Vegetarianism to preserve
one from gout. Drs. Marcet, Oliver, and other physiologists, declare that human
chyle, elaborated from flesh meat, putrifies in three or four days at longest; while
chvle from vegetable food, from its greater purity and more perfect vitality, may
be kept for many days without becoming putrid. We need not therefore wonder
that Vegetarians are so little liable to fever, or to any form of putrid disease. It is
asserted, indeed, that such a thing is not known, as that a Vegetarian should suffer
cholera. On the other hand, it is also asserted that none but Vegetarians have
attained the age of 100: undoubtedly a majority of centenarians have held to
this diet.
Now I know some persons will answer quick : “I do not want to live to a 100
but remember, I pray you, what such longevity implies. The man who lives to a
100 is generally as strong at eighty, and as perfect in all his faculties, as are the
majority of men at sixty-five ; and he is not as much worn out at ninety as the man
who lives to eighty-two or eighty-three is at eighty. It is not the last seven years,,
of the centenarian which give him advantage, but the twenty years which precede
these seven. However, wish what you please about long life; it remains, that
long life, if it exist in a class of men, implies that that class excels in vital force; is
superior therefore in health, probably in strength ; and health is more valuable than
strength. Once more ; reflect what is contained in the avowal that pulmonary
consumption is best treated, and is sometimes cured, by abstinence from flesh-meat
and wine. Consumption is notoriously a disease of weakness. Hence we must
infer that more strength is given by Vegetarian diet than by that which is called
stimulating. All the arguments converge to the same point. Vital force is
measured by length of life, and by power of recovering from dangerous wounds.
Vegetarianism conduces at once to length of life, and to success in such recovery,
I have mentioned that Dr. Cheyne and Dr. Black trusted in it as a recipe when the
constitution was broken down ; how much more must it be a preservative of
strength to the healthy? Dr. S. Nicolls, of the Longford Fever Hospital, wrote in
1864, after sixteen years’ experience in the hospital, that the success of treatment
by a total withdrawal of flesh-meat and of alcoholic liquors gave him the greatest
satisfaction. The long and short is, that whatever is inflammatory is weakening ;
the highest vigour is got out of that food and drink which gives the maximum pf
nutrition and the minimum of inflammation. We allow ourselves to be cheated by
calling inflammation stimulus. Further, I will ask, of the English race, what
portion is most unhealthy ? Beyond question, the English of the United States.
And they are also the greatest flesh-eaters.
Now let me add a word concerning the North American Indian. It is long
since a few of the tribes introduced the cultivation of maize, ascribed to Hiawatha
in Longfellow’s poem. The Cherokees adopted an agricultural life while yet in
Georgia; but the distant and the roaming tribes continue to dhpend on hunting,
and even their boys and girls must live chiefly on flesh. How solid is the national
constitution is strikingly shown in the strength of the women, who, in the journeyings of a tribe, if visited by child-birth, need but half-a-day’s rest, and then start
on the march, carrying the infant on their back. I lately read a letter from the
well-kno5yn Mrs. Lydia Maria Child, in which she details how an Indian woman
trudged to Mrs. Child’s house through many miles of deep snow, and next day
came the same journey, carrying an infant which she had brought to light in the
i
�10
VEGETARIANISM.
interval. The vigour and activity of the Indian continues unimpaired till within a
short time (perhaps till within a fortnight) of natural death, when he is made
aware of weakness and death approaching. Now some one might quote these facts as
a clear testimony to the value of a flesh diet; but against it there are two draw
backs. If disease arise in an Indian, it is apt to be exceedingly violent; smallpox
may carry off a whole tribe; they seem to be very inflammatory; but I speak under
correction. Further, no one attributes to them peculiarly long life. They are said
to die worn out at eighty. Again, I do not speak confidently; for it is hard to
be sure of facts. Yet I believe they are less longlived, and recover worse from
disease than the Vegetarian Africans dwelling on the same land; less longlived
also than the Arabs, who live more on milk and less on meat. On the whole, I
think that life in the open air, a cautious choice of healthy places for encamping,
and consequent purity of blood, gives to those men and women their great robustness.
All food comes alike to such stomachs, as regards its power of nourishing ; but if
the flesh meat produces a more inflammable habit, it shortens natural life, as well
as intensifies disease.
I have tried your patience long, in the attempt to develop facts. It remains to
draw my conclusion. I first have to insist, that ever since 1847, we have been
striving to reverse the natural current of affairs—an enterprize which will necessarily
entail disease and a vast train of calamity. In the first 45 years of this century, the
population of the three kingdoms more than doubled itself in spite of emigration.
Great areas of land were broken up for cultivation, partly under the allurements of
a high price for corn, partly to take advantage of the Tithe Commutation Act. But
after the abolition of the Corn Laws in 1847, the increased prosperity of the manu
facturing towns led, not only to an importation of corn, but also to a remarkable
demand of the artizan population for flesh-meat. Cattle were brought from abroad
in great numbers. Prices still went up. A great stimulus was given to cattlebreeding. The markets of England were supplied from Scotland (and Ireland as
well as from foreign ports, until in Ireland land was thrown out of culture, and taken
up for grazing. The clamour for flesh continuing, we bring it from Australia and
from South America, artificially preserved. From importing instead of raising food,
our worst evils are increased. Rustic industry is not developed. The new births
of the country can find no employment there, and flock into towns. Masses of
population become liable to starvation from a displacement of foreign markets, or
from the imprudence of their employers ; and when personal prudence has less
reward, improvidence prevails. Town-life is less robust; sanitary conditions are
harder to fulfil. A nation fed from foreign markets suffers convulsion through
other people’s wars. And when more and more the land is occupied by large
estates, by parks, by wildernesses kept for sheep or deer, while huge towns prevail,
we have the type of national decay. Our statesmen look on helplessly, while a
robust peasantry is supplanted by a feeble and unhealthy town-population. Our
sage sanitarians want to bring water to our cities from Welsh, Scotch, or Cum
berland lakes, for fear we should remember that it is as possible for the country to be
occupied and cultivated by men, as to be grazed by cattle. England will not long
hold up her head in Europe, if she allow the system of empty country and everincreasing towns to prevail. There are other causes of the evil, I am aware, besides
this zeal for flesh meat. We have to open our eyes to more things than one; and
a hard battle perhaps has to be fought. But in regard to flesh-meat, each family has
the remedy in its own hands. The waste of its resources is caused by an attempt to
�VEGETARIANISM.
11
bring back the condition of things belonging to comparative barbarism, and make us
a flesh-eating nation again, when the era of flesh-eating is naturally past. And
what is the consequence ? I repeat a sentence which I have already uttered,
Where the population is dense, the poorer classes, if they eat flesh meat at all, are sure
to get a sensible portion of their supply in an unwholesome state. What said Dr.
Letheby, inspector of the London markets, to the Social Science Association lately?
“The use of unsound meat,” he said, “was more injurious than that of any other
unsound food. In the three city markets there are 400 tons of meat received and
sold daily. With a staff of but two inspectors it was hardly possible to make a
sufficient and satisfactory supervision; but nevertheles they seized from one to two
tons of diseased meat every week. The seizures last year (1867) amounted to no
less than 288,0001bs., or 129 tons.” But he says, in the country at large the case
is vastly worse. Taking all the markets in the country, it had been calculated
“that only one part in every Jive sent to market was sound.” Now, I think the last
statement must be exaggerated. I cannot say that I believe it; yet how very bad
the case must be, to allow of such a statement being made ! If instead of one-fifth
of the meat being unwholesome, it were every day one fiftieth, the case would be
awful enough. For remember, that where one ton is condemned, there is sure to
be a margin of three tons which is suspected, but cannot be condemned; and
importers or graziers, to save themselves from great loss, are driven to disguise
disease as well as they can. This suspected meat is sold at half-price,
and by its cheapness attracts the poor. Hence disease is certain to arise.
Smallpox has surprized us by virulent outbursts; yet what reason is there for
surprize? Do not Pariahs in India, and a like class in Egypt, by eating flesh or fish in
an unwholesome state bring on leprosy and smallpox and other foul con
tagious diseases? How do our doctors suppose that the smallpox arose for
the first time ? They say it came from China, and that it cannot, come to us unless
we catch it from a human being. Was ever anything so imbecile? The first
patient did not catch it from an earlier patient, but brought it on himself by foul
diet or some uncleanness ; and of course, if any of us use the same foulness, he is
liable to bring it on himself without anyone to transmit it to him. Paris is the
city that cooks up and disguises offal; Paris can generate smallpox as well as
China. Our doctors divert us from the true scent. For fear that we should discover
what is our uncleanness of living, they tell us that smallpox comes because we are
not vaccinated—and that also is not at all true. Indeed none are oftener vaccinated
than French soldiers, and no part of the French population suffers worse from
smallpox than the soldiers. Bad diet and unclean herding together must be the
cause. Diet? why, if we are to believe our newspapers, for a fortnight past
gentlemen have been eating in Paris the rats from the sewers, not from any real
deficiency of wholesome food, but from an infatuated determination to get flesh
meat. And at the same time, in the same letter, the correspondent who praises
the flavour of the rat, tells us that the smallpox has broken out again during
the siege; and now, says he, in the week ending November 5th the deaths from
smallpox were 380; in this last week [ending November 12th] they were 419.
Perhaps it is needless to say, why the animals brought to market must be diseased.
It is not natural to an ox to get into a steamer, or into a railway car, nor
to walk through the streets, nor to take his place quietly as in a pew at the
market. A great deal of beating and terrifying him is needed. His
fatigue in a long journey—manage it as you will—is necessarily great; he suffers
�12
VEGETARIANISM.
also from thirst. The cars and steamers cannot be cleanly. In short, it would be
wonderful if forty-nine in fifty arrived in tolerable health. Ho long as there is a
forced market, the cattle brought from a distance will be like the miserable Africans
carried in slave ships ; and all our cattle will be of a feeble constitution, liable to
diseases from slight cause, because bred artificially and reared artificially. The
poorer classes suffer, first and inevitably, in the squandering of their resources;
secondly, a fraction of them by disease, and many more by infection from the sick.
And those who evade disease do not get more strength, and do get a somewhat
more inflammatory habit from the flesh meat. At the same time, by eating more
expensive food they cannot afford so healthy habitations. Such are the evils on the
side of health and economy.
But besides, the evils of inhumanity in the slaughter of larger cattle are very
terrible. No one has yet found a remedy for the clumsiness of butchers’ boys. 1
cannot now dwell on this acutely painful part of my subject: I will only say, it
quite reconciles me to be called a Brahmin. At the same time, recurring to the
inconsistency of milk and eggs with strict Vegetarianism, I will observe, that by
the avowal of medical science, milk has none of the inflammatory properties of
flesh meat; in so far, it is akin to Vegetarian food. But undoubtedly the pressure
of dense population for milk is an evil, and tends to the adulteration of the milk, to
a deterioration of it by giving to the cow whatever will increase its quantity, and
to an enfeebling of cows generally, by asking too much milk of them, and by breeding
them too quickly. Therefore I take pains to make no increased use of milk since I
am a Vegetarian, nor yet of eggs. We have not yet learned to get substitutes
from oleaginous nuts. We are in a state of transition. A future age will look back
on this as barbarism ; yet we are moving towards the higher and nobler development,
in becoming even thus partial Vegetarians.
Finally, I must not omit one topic, the evils of over-feeding, which flesh-eating
induces. A Vegetarian may eat too much, yet it is more difficult to him, from the
bulk of his food; nearly all over-feeding is practically caused by flesh, fish, and
fowl. The late witty Sydney Smith, wishing to reprove this vice, jocosely said:
“ As accurately as I can calculate, between the ages of ten and seventy I have
eaten forty-four waggon loads of food more than was good for me.” Every ounce
that a man eats more than he needs, positively weakens him, for his vegetable forces
use up his energy in getting rid of the needless food. The gormandizing in great
towns is despicable, from one side, but from another is afflicting ; when one thinks
of countless disease engendered in the classes who eat too much, while there are so
many who get too little. Yet to the poorer a far worse evil than the deprivation
of flesh is, that they are incited to long for it when they see that all who can afford
it will pay any price rather than go without it. Our working classes will not attain
the elevation which is possible to them, until they put on the sentiment of Brahmins
and look down upon flesh-eating as a lower state.
[Reprinted fromfthe Dietetic Reformer, Jan., 1871.]
A. IRELAND AND CO., PRINTERS, MANCHESTER.
�VEGETARIAN
PUBLICATIONS.
May all be had from the Secretary, 13, Cathedral Close, Manchester.
Published on the 1st of January, 1871, Price 3d., No. XLI. of The
Dietetic
reformer and vegetarian messenger.
Contents:—Twenty-second Annual Meeting: Business Proceedings —
Annual Soiree. Only in Heaven (Poetry). Lecture by Professor Newman.
The Return to Nature. Dr. Bellows on the Philosophy of Eating. Follow
Thou Me (Poetry). Correspondence ; Obituary; Intelligence; Reports, &c.
Just Published, Price Id.
i
□THOUGHTS, FACTS, AND HINTS ON HUMAN DIETETICS.
_L Mr. Thomas H. Barker. Reprinted from “ The Dietetic Reformer,” July,
1865. Friends desirous of aiding the circulation of the above tract will be supplied
with them at half price.
REPRINT OF DR. TRALL’S ADDRESS.
Now ready, Price Threepence; or Six Copies sent post free for One Shilling.
SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF .VEGETARIANISM: An Address
O delivered at the Eleventh Annual Meeting of the American Vegetarian Society,
by Dr. TRALL, of New York.
Reprinted from the Dietetic Heformer.
Royal 32mo, price Id. per packet, or 13 for Is.; also in Sixpenny packets,
Three Series of
VEGETARIAN MESSENGER TRACTS. These Tracts are adapted
. * for extensive distribution, and any one Tract may be had separately by order
ing a Sixpenny Packet, and stating the number required ; or, if no particular number
be specified, “Assorted” Packets will be sent.
A Fifth and Improved Edition of
ipHE PENNY VEGETARIAN COOKERY : Or Vegetarianism
JL adapted to the Working Classes; containing an Introduction, showing the
economical and beneficial tendency of Vegetarian habits; an Invalid’s Dietary
Table (being suggestions for Dyspeptic patients); a Family Dietary Table; a
Bachelor’s Dietary Table ; a Marketing Table ; a Chemical Table, and instructions
and recipes for upwards of fifty different articles of food.
296 pp., Foolscap 8vo., Reduced price 2s. 6d. (by post 3s.), cloth boards, the Fifth
Edition of
VEGETARIAN COOKERY. By a Lady. This edition of VegetaT . rian Cookery has been carefully revised and entirely re-written. Many new
Recipes have been added to those already published, and the work now contains—an
Introduction, explanatory of Vegetarian Principles; an Exposition of Vegetarian
Practice, describing three Styles of Cookery, which are illustrated by plans of Tables
and Bills of Fare, with numerous references to the Recipes ; upwards of seven
hundred and fifty Recipes, and a copious Index.
PRIZE ESSAYS.
rpHE PRIMITIVE DIET OF MAN. By Dr. F. R. Lees. !
JL
Price Fourpence.
OW TO PROMOTE STABILITY AND ZEAL AMONG THE !
H
MEMBERS of the VEGETARIAN SOCIETY. By R. Gammage.
Fourpence. Tubbs and Brook, Manchester. Caudwell, London.
Price j
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�
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Lecture on vegetarianism
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Newman, Francis William
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Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Signature on front cover: Moncure D. Conway. Delivered at Gloucester, December 2, 1870; Mr. Price, M.P., in the Chair. Reprinted from the Dietetic Reformer, January, 1871. List of publications on vegetarianism on final page. Printed by A. Ireland and Co., Manchester. Objectives and constitution of the Vegetarian Society (established 1847) outlined inside front cover.
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Vegetarianism
Health
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Diet
Health
Nutrition
Vegetarianism
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Text
Haeckels
Coptributicp
To Religiop
A. S. MORIES,
Author of “A Religion that Will Wear”
[issued
for the rationalist press association, limited]
WATTS & CO.,
17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET. LONDON, E.C.
1904
��*
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CONTRIBUTION
RELIGION
S. MORIES
Author of “ A Religion that Will Wear
[ISSUED FOB TSE RATIONALIST PRESS ASSOCIATION.> limited]
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WATTS & co.,
17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.
1904
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TO THE MEMORY OF
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WILLIAM HASTIE, D.D.,
PROFESSOR OF DIVINITY, UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW,
SCHOLAR, THINKER, AND POET,
WHOSE GENEROUS AND STIMULATING FRIENDSHIP
I DESIRE THUS TO ACKNOWLEDGE.
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�CONTENTS
PAGE
CHAPTER I.
What
is the
Essence of Religion?
7
CHAPTER II.
Haeckel’s Contribution
of
Science
to
Religion—The Contribution
------
13
CHAPTER III.
Herbert Spencer’s Contribution to Religion—The Con
tribution of
Agnosticism
-
-
*
27
CHAPTER IV.
Hegel’s Contribution to Religion—The Contribution of
Psychology
-
-
-
*.
.
*
48
CHAPTER V.
The Mystics’ Contribution ’uo Religion—The Contribu
tion of
Spiritual Insight
.
.
-
.
59
CHAPTER VI.
Wanted—A New Butler
69
�PREFACE
“ Too far East is West ” is a proverb which has its
counterpart even in philosophy. One object of this little
volume is t® show, however inadequately, that a rigorously
applied Materialism ends of necessity in Idealism—that,
however they may seem to differ in their methods, Science
and Religion are in the end inseparable.
The title adopted does not cover the full scope of the
argument, but it draws the reader’s attention to its most
important illustration.
Professor Loofs, in his Anti-Haeckel (English edition),
makes it plain that he does not deal at all with Haeckel’s
“standpoint,” nor with his “view of the world,” but
merely with “ the audacious statements he has made regard
ing Christianity and its history.’1 My purpose is exactly
the reverse. It is of Haeckel’s “ view of the world ” that I
propose to treat. For that is the one essential matter in his
whole argument. It is there that he has to be met, not in
his incursions into theology, a subject which he frankly
admits “in the strict sense is quite out of my line.” I aim
here at supplying a corrective to the anti-religious interpre
tations that have been put on Haeckel’s main thesis, and
at supplying that corrective in his own words, as well as
5
�6
PREFACE
by means of the analogous and most deliberate declarations
of Herbert Spencer.
While I take the contention here expounded to be
Haeckel’s own contention, I desire to make it clear that
for the opinions here expressed the Rationalist Press
Association is to be held in no way responsible. That
Association has justified its title to the name Rationalist by
its catholicity in allowing this expression of opinion to be
published under its auspices.
A. S. Mories.
�Chapter I.
WHAT IS THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION?
“ Philosophy is life’s one match for Fate.”—Meredith.
Withes u ch an object before us as is indicated in the
following pages, it might seem more fitting to post
pone the attempt to answer this question to the close
than to deal with it at this early stage. But while it
is clear that the answer we propose to suggest cannot
have its full force at the outset, it is almost necessary to
indicate here the line we propose to follow, so that the
leading illustrations of which the various succeeding
chapters consist may be the more intelligible and
their force be the better appreciated.
These illustrations, as will be seen, are taken from
types of thought and methods of investigation widely
separated, some of them being often regarded as
mutually exclusive.
But as the religious instinct is, in one form or
another, inherent in the human mind, and can be
met with at its best in the strongest minds of each
age, we take these extreme illustrations designedly.
We have endeavoured to reduce their hard-won con
victions to what may be called their common denomi
nator—to the conceptions, that is to say, which are
vital and common to them all; and these we claim as
the essence of religion—that of which all its historical
forms are more or less refracted images.
There is nothing new, of course, in the idea of the
simplification and condensing of religious belief. The
process is a familiar one in the history of the Church.
There is Jiardly a doctrine of the ancient creed that
7
�8
WHAT IS THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION ?
has not been eviscerated of that which its pious
holders once regarded as sacred and essential. In the
days of the first Apostles themselves the process was
already in full force. The “ Second Coming,” which
for a time was looked for at any moment, and in the
most realistic form, had, perforce, to merge itself in
the larger, and to them more prosaic, movement of
human history
The story of the Final Judgment, the “ Dies iron
dies ilia,” with all its lurid realism, has overpowered
the imagination of the Church for ages in a way that
no attempt to unfold the eternal issues of human
character will perhaps ever do, so that the minds of
the diplomatists of Church dogma may remain com
paratively easy. And yet the story is a parable from
beginning to end. Anselm’s “ Cztr Deus Homo ?” with
its forensic exactitude and logical presumption, so
long dominating the Church’s thought, has been
superseded by the more searching question, “ Quomodo
Deus Homo?” the answer to which is really the crux
of modern Christianity.
This revolution, however, has. been intramural.
But the course of modern thought has carried us far
beyond the internal controversies of Church or creed.
The Churches have always been the home of miracle.
And nothing so characterises the whole course of
modern thought as the decay and steady disappear
ance of miracle.
Outside the bounds of the Church no well-educated
person dreams of accepting any miraculous narrative.
He is convinced that “whatever happens or ever
happened happens naturally.” This difficulty in
Scripture is steadily growing. It covers not merely
the miraculous narratives themselves, but the “ in
spiration” of the books which contain those narra
tives. Thus the very “ seat of authority” in religion
�WHAT IS THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION?
9
has been undermined, and we are driven to look else
where for the essence and foundation of the faith.
Religion, we are compelled to admit, is one of the
natural outcomes of the human spirit. From the
point of view of ordered thought, then, where is the
essence, not merely of Christianity, but of religion
itself to be found, and in what does it consist ?
Many have been the attempts to define the essence
of religion. That essence, we believe, can only be
found in some conception or conceptions that are
perfectly consistent with reason and in harmony with
observed facts, and are at the same time the most
universal expression of the religious instinct. Such
observed facts, explanatory of and illustrated in the
various historical and traditional religions, and
expressed in their most condensed form, we find to be
these :—
(1) The perception of the intelligibility, and finally
of the unity, of the universe—“ The One.”
(2) The consciousness, more or less vivid, of man’s
own kinship with this “ Unity ” or “ One.”
These two conceptions will be found to form a
touchstone for the classification of the various phases
of religious belief.
Those forms which the religious instinct has
assumed, and which are known as Fetichism, Poly
theism, and finally Monotheism, will be found to
resolve themselves, from the speculative point, of
view, into more or less effective and consistent modes
of realising the first of these. This great series of
religions which culminate in Judaism and Moham
medanism have as their common feature the tendency
towards the worship of an objective and transcendent
God—a God external to the worshipper, and exercising
an authority kin to that of a lawgiver.
For examples of the second we turn to Brahmanism,
�10
WHAT IS THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION?
Buddhism, and all the various forms of ancient and
modern mysticism. Their predominating thought
has been the more or less vivid consciousness of the
soul’s own kinship with the eternal—with God. The
strength of Christianity lies in its combination of
both, and especially in the firmergrasp and the bolder
assertion of the latter of these two truths. The
feelings which gave birth to these two complementary
forms of the religious instinct seem to be, as it were,
engrained in the nature of man.
For we find them in very early stages of his
development. Their appearance in history does not
seem to be a question merely of time. We cannot say
that either is the precursor or the resultant of the
other. And though classifications of national or racial
thought are elastic, not mechanical, the one is no doubt
more characteristic of certain great divisions of the
human race, and the other of others.
But both satisfy profound aspirations and answer
constant demands of the human spirit. Both are
undoubted manifestations of the Divine through the
human heart.
If we are to give each its place in the hierarchy of
ideas, we cannot hesitate to accord the place of
honour to the latter of the two—npt as a matter of
mere individual preference, but as its spiritual and
even philosophical right.
For immanence is more profound and commanding
than transcendence. Kinship and sonship are more
purely spiritual conceptions than mere acknowledged
dependence on a creator.
The human heart yearns for that which it long
since learned to call a Divine Fatherhood. That
Fatherhood is the pictorial and most endearing name
for a kinship which is dynamic and fundamental.
And even though the thought of it should be veiled
�WHAT IS THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION?
11
under the cold philosophical garb of “ Unity,” the
warrant for all that we mean by Fatherhood is still
there- Science, and even philosophy, may know
nothing directly of a Divine Fatherhood ; but science
and philosophy combine to establish a principle of
what they call “cosmic unity,” which not only covers
it, but in some respects may be said to bring it nearer
still to our hearts than any but the most saintly
mystic has ever dared to conceive. For it represents
us as not only kin with the Divine, but one with it.
In doing so, Science certainly raises other and
serious questions. To these we shall refer later.
The one thing we desire to emphasise here is that
these two main types of religious thought are not
only not mutually incompatible, but are beginning to
disclose their fundamental harmony, and to be seen
as complementary aspects of a thought which is
deeper than either and embraces both. The true
Catholic religion is that which finds room for both.
In doing so, it faithfully reflects the very texture of
our innermost nature. For we ourselves are living
epitomes of these two principles or forms of thought.
We are both immanent in, and transcendent to, our
selves. And the religion that is to satisfy the rounded
thought of man inust assimilate and embody both.
The conception of transcendence satisfies the indi
vidualistic, objectivating element of our being. That
of immanence ministers to a still deeper need, and
witnesses to a still deeper truth—that of our conscious
possession of, and kinship with, the Divine. In face
of modern thought, the faith that embodies and
balances both these principles is the faith of the
future. Such a faith is entirely consonant with
science, and, at the same time, expansive enough
for the most devout believer. It consecrates science
and makes faith rational. Further, we hope also to
�12
WHAT IS THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION ?
show that these two conceptions are but the religious
embodiments of two still more fundamental concep
tions which have exercised, and still exercise, an
equal command over philosophic thought. The
cleavage which their application has caused in the
sphere of religion is matched in the world of thought
by a similar phenomenon.
The earliest problem which presented itself to the
minds of thinking men was how to explain the rela
tion between nature and that which was recognised
as above nature, between the visible and the invisible,
between the objective world and the subjective ego.
The philosophies of the world have oscillated age
after age round this problem. Of this oscillation and
steady evolution we shall give a rapid sketch in
Chapter IV.
The two main types of mental outlook there set
forth are the very same types which are illustrated
in the great divisions of religions which we have indi
cated here.
The world’s religious thinking and the world’s
philosophic thinking are thus seen to be but the
appropriate expressions, in their respective spheres,
of the inherent, mental outlook.
If this be so, it becomes evident that religion is an
equally fit subject for analysis with philosophy ; and
the religion that aims at expressing the highest
reason of man is the ideal religion. Christianity, if
it is permanently to hold the field, must fulfil this
condition. In order to effect this, it must be purged
of its non-essentials. Towards this consummation
modern Rationalism and science have given valu
able aid.
The typical and leading examples of this aid we
proceed to consider.
�Chapter II.
HAECKEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION—
THE CONTRIBUTION OF SCIENCE
“ Le philosophe doit tater toutes choses, meme les plus poetiques, avec
les antennes de la pensee froide et curieuse.”—Nietzsche.
Strong minds sum up in their own comprehensive
and condensed experience the more scattered and
timid thoughts of common men. It is this that con
stitutes such men not only the result and expression
of the generation they are born into, but the most
dominant intellectual force of their day. In the
scientific world there have been many such men, who
not only stood for the prevailing thought of their time,
but, by a happy exercise of the imagination, discounted
the future, and set other and less venturesome minds
on new and prolific lines of thought. Of this type
Haeckel is probably to-day the most pronounced
instance that could be cited. He has been a scien
tific man all his days. He has lived through a time
when the floodgates of scientific discovery have been
wide open, and he has indulged the daring gift of
generalisation to an extent which places him among
the thinkers as wrell as the observers of his time. On
what ground, however, do we speak of his “ Contribu
tion to Religion ”? And what is the nature of that
contribution, if any?
To enable us to answer this question it is not
necessary to give any resume of Haeckel’s scientific
work. That is written at large in many well-known
13
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14
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HAECKEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
works, and spread over a long series of years. It is
sufficient for our purpose to take up the parable at the
point, or points, where his latest works begin to
impinge, as is generally believed, on the central con
ception of religion. The only proviso we make at this
stage is that the man who insists on treating the
current dogmatic tenets of the Church as the central
conceptions of religion need proceed no further with
us here. The conflict of the day is not with these,
but with something far more vital. It is the citadel
that is at stake, not the outworks. The “ miraculous ”
outworks of religion are to-day, indeed, ignored. Like
the German colonies, they cost more to defend than
they are worth. They are a constant drain on the
reserves of faith. Gradually scientific discovery and
literary investigation have succeeded in banishing the
miraculous from shelter after shelter. One of the
most persistent refuges was the sphere of what is
called organic nature. Here, at least, it was believed
a divine intervention must be accepted as indispensable.
Life must be a special creation, and the occasion of
its first appearance a red-letter day in the annals of
the divine. Alas ! even here Miracle found no rest
for the sole of her foot. All clear demarcation
between organic and inorganic disappeared, and we
were thrown back on the all-embracing doctrine of
evolution, which in its protean application covers
everything, from the inanimate clod to the most perfect
human frame. But even then there was one unques
tioned reservation to which for long no one had
dreamt that science could ever assert a claim. The
soul of man was surely beyond the reach of physical
science. Even the keenest scientific investigators
were content at this point to accept the apparently
inevitable. Mind, they seemed to agree, was sui
generis. And a new genus such as this presupposed
�HAECKEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
15
a new effort of the generator. Here again, however,
latest science maintains, in the words of Haeckel,
that “ Man has no single mental faculty which is his
exclusive prerogative.” “ Man’s power of conceptual
thought and of abstraction has been gradually evolved
from the non-conceptual stages of thought and ideation
in the nearest related mammals,” and differs from
them “ only in degree and not in kind, quantitatively
not qualitatively.” One of the last barriers for faith
seems here to be broken down, and the very soul of
man made continuous with the instincts of the brute
creation, and all these in their turn merely the out
come of a material combination.
But the last word of Haeckel is more searching still.
The hitherto undisputed assumption of science has
been dualistic. The sharpest investigation and keenest
criticism agreed on the two fundamental factors of
the universe, matter and force, or matter and motion.
Given these, science could construct the universe—
matter as the raw material, and energy or force as
the moving power. It is here that Haeckel comes in.
With him any form of dualism is intolerable. Unity
or Monism is his all-embracing principle. And his
special contribution to the everlasting riddle of the
universe is to transfer the whole ultimate issue down
to one clear point, beneath even the accepted funda
mentals of his scientific brethren. The way, indeed,
has been to some extent prepared for the admission
of a larger and more profound conception. Physicists
themselves have declared that it is becoming more and
more difficult to determine the supposed immutable
boundary between matter and energy. The forms of
matter are found to be so rarefied and impalpable that
we pass insensibly from matter to energy, and from
energy to matter. Haeckel combines the two prin
ciples of the persistence of matter and the conservation
�16
HAECKEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
of energy under a single generalisation, which he
calls “ the law of substance.” The discovery and
establishment of this law is, he maintains, “ the
greatest intellectual triumph of the nineteenth
century, in the sense that all other known laws of
nature are subordinate to it.” “ Substance ” is thus
defined by Haeckel to be that original unitary whole
whose first differentiation is into what he declares are
really but two phases or conditions of itself—viz.,
ponderable matter and ether. The difference between
these two things is described as merely a difference in
the intensity of the condensation of the original
simple “ substance.” This point in his exposition is,
to all appearance, an assumption. It is of essential
importance to the argument, however, to note that this
ponderable matter and ether “ are endowed with sensa
tion and will,” though naturally of the lowest grade ;
they “ experience,” they “ strive,” they “ struggle.”
This definition is so far satisfactory, inasmuch as
all that evolution afterwards shows to have been
taken out of “ matter ” is here declared to be originally
in it. And probably there is no part of his latest
book so interesting, from the philosophical point of
view, as that in which he sets forth with the keenest
appreciation the remarkable anticipation of his funda
mental conception of “substance” in the work of
“ the great philosopher, Baruch Spinoza.” And the
astonishing thing is that Mr. McCabe, his British
champion, totally ignores this vital part of his teaching,
and does not even name Spinoza. Now, Spinoza was
a passionate Monist before the term was heard
of. And the striking thing is that that powerful
thinker had not had the advantage which the advance
of modern science has given to the philosopher of
to-day. What they are driven to by the steady com
pulsion of wider and wider generalisation of physical
�HAECKEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
17
laws Spikoza reached, we may say, through intuition,
the sheer force of the higher reason. His phraseology
for the two great phases of the world-substance is
different from that of Haeckel and his school.
Spinoza called matter and spirit but two comple
mentary aspects or attributes of the one substance,
which is identical with God. Material things and
immaterial ideas are both but modes of the eternal
substance, which is as close a paraphrase as possible
of the philosophical position of Haeckel, while the
phraseology is richer and warmer and more kin with
our religious instincts. Both believe, though they
express it a little differently, in “ the divine nature of
the world.” Spinoza’s own words are strikingly in
accord with the teaching of Haeckel. “ Nescio,” he
writes, “ cur materia divina, natura indigna esset,”
meaning by materia, of course, not the ponderable
matter of the physicist, but that reality which may be
regarded as the basis of the phenomenal world.1 And
this agreement contains much that is of large promise
fowthe future of modern thought.
This is the point in the teaching of Haeckel which
negatives entirely the charge of Materialism and
Atheism so persistently hurled against him. Monism
is neither Materialism nor Atheism. It is really the
denial of both. And if any reader should doubt the
fact as characteristic of Haeckel, let him read that
1 David Hume himself, the most unmystical of men, when labour
ing with the cosmological argument, asks at one point, “ Why may
not the material universe be the necessarily existent Being?”—surely
the brightest flash of mystic feeling of which Hume’s severely
analytical mind was capable. Or consider the strong, reverent
language of the devout Lord Gifford in his own lecture on “ Sub
stance
“Said I not that the word Substance was perhaps the
grandest word in any language ? There can be none grander. It is
the true name of God. Do you not feel with me that it is almost
profane to apply the word Substance to anything short of God ? God
must be the very substance and essence of the human soul ” (quoted
by Dr. Hutcheson Stirling in his Gifford Lectures, p. 207).
C
�18
HAECKEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
writer’s reference to Spinoza and note the un
restrained enthusiasm with which he proclaims his
agreement with the most spiritual of all our modern
philosophers, the “ God-intoxicated” Spinoza. “ In
his stately pantheistic system,” writes Haeckel, “ the
notion of the world (the universe or the cosmos) is
identical with the all-pervading notion of God—is at
one and the same time the purest and most rational
Monism and the clearest and most abstract Mono
theism. This universal ‘ substance,’ this ‘ divine
nature of the world,’ shows us two different aspects of
its being, or two fundamental attributes—matter (in
finitely extended substance) and spirit (the all-em
bracing energy of thought). All the changes which
have since come over the idea of substance are
reduced on a logical analysis to this supreme thought
of Spinoza’s. With Goethe, I take it to be the loftiest,
profoundest, and truest thought of all ages” (p. 76).
And he declares succinctly (p. 8), “We adhere firmly
to the pure, unequivocal Monism of Spinoza.”
The thinker who can speak in terms such as these,
and can do so, as Haeckel does, in the name of the
most advanced modern science, so far from being a
Materialist or an Atheist, makes a contribution to
religion that is of the highest importance to modern
thought, and must prove to be of permanent value in
helping to explain “ the riddle of the universe.”
Haeckel, indeed, in one of the closing paragraphs
of his book, plaiifly admits all this. 1 I must not,
however,” he writes, “ take leave of my readers without
pointing out in a conciliatory way that this strenuous
opposition [of Monism to Dualism] may be toned
down to a certain degree—may, indeed, even be con
verted into a friendly harmony. In a thoroughly
logical mind, applying the highest principles with
equal force in the entire field of the cosmos—in
�HAECKEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
19
both organic and inorganic nature—the antithetical
positions of theism and pantheism, vitalism and
mechanism, approaeh until they touch each other.”
In almost the exact words of Herbert Spencer, he
says (p. 134) : “ We must even grant that this
essence of substance becomes more mysterious and
enigmatic the deeper we penetrate into the knowledge
of its attributes, matter and energy, and the more
thoroughly we study its countless phenomenal forms
and their evolution.” And his “ conclusion ” is a tacit
admission that the “riddle” is, after all, more in
name than in reality. “ Only one comprehensive
riddle now remains,” he says “—the problem of ‘ sub
stance.’ What is the real character of this mighty
world-wonder that the realistic scientist calls Nature
or the Universe, the idealist philosopher calls ‘ sub
stance ’ or the Cosmos, the pious believer calls
Creator or God?” Is anything further required to
show how striking and valuable a defender Haeckel
shows himself to be of the central conception of
religion? Could a purely scientific writer, as such,
possibly supply a more direct and unequivocal contri
bution to religion than such a declaration ?
But there is more involved in Haeckel’s teaching
than even this.
One of the most important bearings of this funda
mental conception is on the nature and meaning of
consciousness. And it is here where, it seems to us,
Haeckel and his school do not rise to the level of their
own doctrine. The question (of which so much is
made) whether consciousness is a physiological or a
transcendental problem is comparatively needless.
Consciousness is both. Science shows that conscious
ness is dependent for its appearance on “ the normal
structure of the corresponding psychic organ, the
brain.” But, whatever be the physiological method
�20
HAECKEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
by which consciousness is enabled to appear, the
content of consciousness is essentially transcendental.
And to say so is not really inconsistent with the
essence of the Haeckel doctrine. On the contrary, it
seems to us to be its fitting and culminating expres
sion. The physiological machinery of consciousness
is but the frame of the telescope by which we see back
and down into the infinite “ substance ” on which it
and all things rest. The human consciousness is
simply the divine “ substance ” of the world coming
to self-consciousness. That of which our conscious
ness is conscious is the divine “ substance ” itself.
This is where the divinity of human nature, so con
sonant with the teaching of Haeckel, is seen to be the
true solvent of all such philosophic difficulty. We are
touching the divine at every point, and whether we
call it world-substance or cosmos, or by any other
title which the advance of science may render more
accurate and intelligible, the reality predicated is the
same. We are not only in touch with the Divine ; we
are divine. As has been well said, “ There are unfathom
able depths in the human soul, because God himself
is at the bottom of it.” The transcendental in this
deep sense cannot be avoided. It is easy for the hard
materialist to say that this is mere hallucination, for
no human mind can actually come into conscious
contact with the Infinite. But no more can Haeckel
lay his scientific finger on that “ substance ” which
he nevertheless regards as the underlying basis of all
things. “ Substance,” so far as scientific objectivity
is concerned, is a figment of the imagination ; but it
is vital to his intellect, and we accept it at once as a
sufficient name for that to which both science and
philosophy point. On exactly similar lines we contend
that the united, continuous, determinate conviction of
the richest human minds as to the content of the
�HAECKEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
21
higher consciousness is not to be lightly brushed
aside. The “ ideas ” of the human mind are, on the
showing of the Haeckel school themselves, literally the
final efflorescence of the whole evolving cosmos.
They are the culminating point, so far as known, of
the one undivided “ substance ” from which sprang
ultimately the whole sum of created ” things. How
are they related to this substance ?—which, after all, is
but Haeckel’s name for what we call God. We main
tain that it is absolutely consistent with the line of the
Haeckel teaching to hold that these “ ideas ” of ours
are what we call divine—that self-consciousness is
consciousness of that which is part and parcel of the
divine “ substance.” And if this be so, we have a firm
scientific basis for faith and for true idealism in all
its outlets, untrammelled by “ dualism” of any kind.
To Haeckel “ substance ” is the final, irreducible
element of the universe, the fans et origo of all. And
the name we may give to this final irreducible is a
matter of very little moment. We call it God, and
believe ourselves to be part of this divine element.
Haeckel does the same under another name. Monism
does not abolish, it only reaffirms, the continuous vital
connection between the “ substance ” and its offshoots,
between the human and the Divine.
This is the only truth that can preserve to us our
“ immortality.” To Haeckel, the immortality of the
soul is “ the highest point of superstition.” To our
thinking it is the direct suggestion of his own prin
ciple. His doctrine of “ substance,” indeed, rather
guarantees than weakens the doctrine of the immor
tality of the soul. He himself, for example, accepts
“ the idea of immortality in its widest sense.” “ The
indestructibility and eternal duration of all that exists
is not merely acceptable, but self-evident to the
monistic philosopher ” (p. 68).
�22
HAECKEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
His difficulty, of course, is with the immortality of
the individual soul. But this, when analysed, simply
means that the feeling of individuality or personality
which we associate with the spiritual life is apparently
lost at death.1 Now, there is no subject on which it
is so rash to dogmatise as this. The scientific man
deals admittedly with appearance only. Of un
challengeable knowledge on the subject he is as
destitute as anyone else. But, in the absence of any
possible demonstration, it is surely a striking fact
that this loss of conscious personality is the very thing
which, as we shall see later, our great mystics declare
to be characteristic of their ecstatic experience. They
lose the consciousness of personality. They, in
fact, scout the idea of its permanence in the con
crete, individualistic sense in which we are accustomed
to use the word “personality.” They seem to feel the
clinging to individual personality to be a forfeiture of
the highest bliss and a profanation of the beatific
vision. The scientific mind, approaching the subject,
of course, from the purely physical side, declares
against such a thing as a continuous personal existence
after death. The factors of personality, it declares,
are dissolved and disappear.
The spiritual mind professes to reach the subject
from the other side, and, curiously, they meet each
other half way, and find that in this thought of the
disappearance of individual consciousness they are on
common ground. May not the Haeckel doctrine on
this point really connote just what the experience of
the mystics of all time declares to be fact ? Even the
changing forms of matter are redeemed from annihila
tion by the doctrine of the conservation of energy.
Similarly, the change which we call loss of conscious
1 All the monistic philosophers of the century are thanatists (Riddle
of the Universe, p. 69).
�HAECKEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
23
personality by no means invalidates the idea of
persistence after death. With that change the mystics
have long since made us familiar as matter of personal
experience here and now. It is absolutely consistent
with reason and science, we contend, to regard the
scientific Monist’s absorption into the eternal “ sub
stance ” as simply his way of describing what the
spiritual Monist calls absorption into the Divine
Spirit. Nirvana, in short, is the spiritual realisation
of Monism. If a human spirit can so abstract itself
from the purely physical condition of its ordinary life,
and so enter into the unseen as to lose all sense of
individuality and become one with the All, may this
not be a perfectly natural anticipation and foretaste
of the condition which the materialist perfers to speak
of as dissolution and disappearance ? Involution, we
must remember, not dissolution, is the true antithesis
of evolution. And even if we were entitled to assume
that this mysterious involution takes place at death,
can any scientific man justly challenge the mystic’s
unvarying personal experience when it is put forward
as an indication of what the involution or re-absorption
really is ?
Such an involution may be called death, and is
at least death in the ordinary sense of the word as we
know it. But it may be death only in the sense in
which the new-born babe dies to its previous state,
that state being henceforth to it as if it had never
been. In the Monist’s creed there can be no death in
the sense which he endeavours to impose upon the
word. Life is universal. The whole question is as to
the particular form or character of that life at any
particular stage of being.
The old apothegm of Paul, “In Him we live and
move and have our being,” was surely admirably
suited to the scholarly audience he addressed at
�24
HAECKEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
Athens. It is marvellously suited to the tendency of
latest thought. It has a philosophical as well as a
spiritual side, and is equally suited to express the
faith of a Monist as of a mystic.
“In water lives the fish, the plant in the earth,
The bird in the air, in the firmament the sun,
The Salamander resides in fire,
And the heart of God is Jacob Bohme’s element.”
If in the mystic’s case the loss of self-consciousness
is found to be part and parcel of the soul’s experience,
why should it be thought incredible in this other case?
If not incredible, then surely in this respect extremes
meet, and wisdom is justified of all her children.
Besides, as Haeckel tells us (p. 94), “ the life of the
animal and the plant bears the same universal char
acter of incompleteness as the life of man. Evolution
seems, on the whole, to be a progressive improvement
in historical advance, from the simple to the complex,
the lower to the higher, the imperfect to the perfect.”
And as the merely physical evolution of man seems to
be completed, it can only be to his psychical evolution
that we must look for the further continuation of that
great process. To such a continuation of evolution
who will dare to set limits ? To trace the past
development of the physical organisation of man, and
even the efflorescence of mind as science does, is but
one half of the task prescribed by the doctrine of
evolution. The mystical phenomena of human
nature are a necessary consequence of human nature.
These phenomena point prophetically to the future. It
is quite an arbitrary proceeding to accept the theory
of evolution, but at the same time to detach from it
its weightiest consequence. The field of man’s future
evolution is the psychical. The materialistic scientists
who make so much of man’s past evolution, but ignore
his future evolution, resemble people who retail an
�HAECKEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
25
anecdote, but forget the point (Carl du Prel, The Philo*
sophy of Mysticism).
One of the most slashing critics, and at the same
time self-restrained thinkers (M. J. Guyau), says:
“ If the unknown activity that lies at the basis of the
natural world has produced in the human race a con
sciousness of goodness and a deliberate desire for it,
there is reason to hope and to believe that the last
word of ethics and metaphysics is not a negative.”
May we not with equally modest assurance say that,
if the “ substance ” that lies at the basis of the natural
world has produced in the human race the conscious
ness of a condition of thought and feeling that rises
far beyond the range of common experience, that is
open to all, and of which the element of conscious
time is no part, and has produced at the same time
in the best minds everywhere a deliberate and
passionate desire for, and delight in, that conscious
ness, there is reason to hope and to believe that the
last word of the most perfect evolutionary science does
not negative the idea of the continuance of that life
hereafter in some intensely real, though necessarily
indefinable, manner?
To such a life we may give what formal name we
choose. The more we realise it here, the more
indifferent we become to all attempts at defining it,
the more catholic in welcoming every form of
expressing it, that may commend itself to the medi
tative soul. For such a union with the Divine
immortality is quite an intelligible word. It is a
word that attempts to describe, under the one category
of endless time, a life and a condition of thought
which in our own actual experience transcend time.
Where demonstration is impossible, we must perforce
be satisfied with the indications which our own highest
^experience gives us of the possibility and naturalness of
�26
HAECKEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
a life for which such words as “ immortal ” and “ eter
nal ” are as permissible and suggestive as any other.
If religion, then, means essentially recognition of
the unity of the universe, and of our kinship with
that unity, even the “ materialist ” Haeckel makes a
contribution to religion that, in the present state and
direction of educated thought, is of high importance.
His recent book, The Riddle of the Universe, may seem
at first sight to give the lie to such an estimate of his
teaching as is here put forward. And the orthodox
world has certainly represented it as hopelessly
inimical to religion. With some of his references to
the origin of Christianity we have no sympathy. But
while there is no denying that Haeckel’s teaching is
quite incompatible with the authorised dogmatic faith
of the Church, the fact remains that his fundamental
position is essentially religious, and, as he says him
self, identical with the teaching of the most spirituallyminded philosopher that ever lived—the God-intoxi
cated Spinoza.
�Chapter III.
HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO
RELIGION—THE CONTRIBUTION OF
AGNOSTICISM
Agnosto Theo.
“ I gazed on power till I grew blind.
On power; I could not take my eyes from that.”—Paracelsus.
Mr. Spencer was long the bete noire of a large
proportion of our religiously-minded people. Indeed,
many people, by no means ignorant, believe that the
philosophy of Mr. Spencer boasts of giving the final
quietus to everything that has hitherto been associated
in the popular mind with religion. And there can be
no question that the Synthetic Philosophy has per
manently affected our conception of the basis of
religion.
Science and philosophy in the hands of Mr. Spencer
lead us easily and unaided to the borderland of the
unseen. But when we begin “ toiling in the presence
of things which cannot be dealt with by any other
power” than that higher imagination, intuitive faculty,
call it what we will, which is the glory of our man
hood, Mr. Spencer seems to leave us to our own
resources, and to drop to earth again like a spent ball.
This is the only faculty which Mr. Spencer almost
refuses to cultivate. And yet even he cannot wholly
escape its cautious exercise.
His Synthetic Philosophy is a monument to
individual genius such as the world has seldom seen.
27
�28 HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
For, notwithstanding the prolonged labours of a host
of trained scientific collaborators, the synthesis itself
is the work of a single brain, and evinces a grasp of
detail, a dovetailing of endless material, coupled with
a comprehensiveness of generalisation, that stamp its
author as one of the thinkers of the world.
On the real issues, then, that are of never-failing vital
interest to the human soul, what has Mr. Spencer to
tell us ? What is his definite message to the world ?
Probably the shortest form in which we can
epitomise his philosophy is to say that it is the
apotheosis of evolution. What in our more serious
moments we want to know is, What or who is it that
is evolving ? Why should there be—why, indeed, is
there—such a process at all ?
That there is not behind it all or underneath it
“ some far-off divine event,” which sheds a meaning
on it, the human spirit refuses permanently to believe.
That there is at the heart of it all a presence and
a purpose of which it is but the tangible expression
is the instinctive feeling, if not the ineradicable con
viction, of every calm, clear-thinking soul.
Why, then, does not Mr. Spencer, with his massive
intellect, acknowledge and entertain this conviction ?
The truth is, that is exactly what he does, though
naturally he uses a cautious phraseology of his own
to express it. His apotheosis of evolution represents
the universe, organic and inorganic, as self-contained
and automatic.
His successive “ integration and
disintegration, ” “ evolution and involution,” are but
his hard modern form of the truth long ages ago
discovered by the Oriental thinkers, and taught by
them more poetically as the “ outbreathing ” and
“ inbreathing ” of God. It is often supposed by
those who have not examined Mr. Spencer’s meta
physical basis or First Principles that he leaves no
�HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION 29
room whatever for faith. The very reverse is the
case. If there is one thing which Mr. Spencer has
made more clear than another in this connection, it
is his unshakeable belief in a Power “ whose positive
existence is a necessary datum of consciousness,” and
which, though “not capable of being brought within
limits, nevertheless remains as a consciousness that
is positive and is not rendered negative by the nega
tion of limits.” What Kant surrendered as knowledge
he restored as belief. Spencer, strange though it
may seem, would rather reverse the process. His
never-resting analysis dissipates ordinary concrete
and apparently positive conceptions. Conscience,
“ stern daughter of the voice of God,” is but the
ever-growing moral experience of the race. Its
dictates, a priori to the individual, are a posteriori to
the race. Authoritative “ revelation,” too, is but the
symbolic representation of a purely natural process.
Nothing is at first sight more spiritually disintegrating,
more absolutely corrosive of all customary religious
teaching, than this philosophy of evolution. But even
analysis has its limits. And in the end synthesis is
triumphant. For the man who is so eagle-eyed in
tracking this universal symbolism pulls up at last
before a “certainty” which even he declares, with
intensest conviction, is “more profoundly true than
any religion supposes ”:—
Not only is the omnipresence of something which passes compre
hension that most abstract belief which is corSmon to all religions,
which becomes more distinct in proportion as they develop, and
which remains after their discordant elements have been mutually
cancelled ; but it is that belief which the most unsparing criticism of
each leaves unquestionable, or, rather, makes ever clearer. It has
nothing to fear from the most inexorable logic, but, on the contrary,
is a belief which the most inexorable logic shows to be more pro
foundly true than any religion supposes (First Principles, 5th ed.,
1890, p. 45).
Again :—
Amid the mysteries which become the more mysterious the more
�30 HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
they are thought about, there will remain the one absolute certainty
that we are ever in presence of an Infinite and Eternal Energy from
which all things proceed (Nineteenth Century, January, 1884).1
Could more be asked from the metaphysics of a
philosophy based, as Mr. Spencer’s is, on concrete
facts, and not daring to launch the human spirit on
that shoreless sea of unseen reality which, in spite of
all castrated intellectualism, is its natural element and
abiding home ?
Even in this, his unmistakeable attitude, he is
denounced as a renegade from the principles of his
own philosophy. Some of his leading disciples have
proclaimed themselves his defenders against himself—
as, indeed, more Spencerian than Mr. Spencer himself.
Mr. Frederic Harrison long since felt acutely the
importance of Mr. Spencer’s contention, and how
fatal it is to the arrogant pretensions of a superficial
Positivism.2
1 As Mr. Spencer himself says in his Facts and Comments (chapter
on Ultimate Questions), and apropos of a letter of Jowett’s, “ Con
sidering what I have written, I might reasonably have thought that
no one would call me a Materialist.”
2 And if Mr. Spencer’s doctrine of the existence of “ the Unknow
able ” has been so condemned by the straiter sect of his own followers
as supplying (to use M. Brunetiere’s words) “une base ou un fondement scientifique a la religion," how infinitely more pregnant with
religious issues is his determined declaration of the identity of this
unknowable Power with the power which we call ourselves ? If the
one conception is the fondement, the other is surely the chief corner
stone of the building itself, and is being recognised as such by discern
ing minds everywhere. M. Brunetiere has gone into this subject
more deliberately still in his article, “ La Metaphysique Positiviste ”
(in Revue des Deux Mondes, October 1st, 1902). He there quotes the
words “si souvent citees ” of Mr. Spencer to the effect that, “From
the necessity of thinking en relation, it follows that the relative is
itself inconceivable except as related to a real non-relative. If we do
not postulate a non-relative reality—an absolute—the relative itself
becomes absolute, which is a contradiction. And we see, by consider
ing the trend of human thought, how impossible it is to rid oneself of
the consciousness of une chose effective—an actuality—underlying
appearances, and how from this impossibility results our indestruc
tible belief in the existence of this thing.” _ And, as Brunettere puts
it, “ the foundation of science is metaphysical, and we see without
any effort of reflection or of reasoning, but without any contradiction,
metaphysics re-established, if I may so say, in the very heart of
Positivism.”
�HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION 31
Mr. Macpherson, Mr. Spencer’s recent biographer,
is evidently alive to the same fact, and seems to be
almost equally disappointed with Mr. Harrison.
What, then, are Mr. Spencer’s grounds for this
most profound certainty which he champions so
vigorously ?
Nothing is more striking and suggestive in the
annals of philosophical thinking than to observe its
inevitable convergence on the one testing question:
What is Consciousness, and what does it really tell
us ? This is what is called technically the Theory of
Knowledge. It is the Armageddon field of all intel
lectual analysis. Aristotle’s “ nothi seauton ” was
one of the profoundest directions ever given. For we
may truly say of the human consciousness, as
Tennyson says of the
“Little flower—if I could understand
What you are, root and all, and all in all,
I should know what God and man is.”
Mr. Spencer is characteristically careful in all that
he says on this fundamental point, but his biographer
is characteristically reluctant to give Mr. Spencer’s
phraseology its full and natural weight. “It is idle,”
Mr. Macpherson says, “ to inquire into the ultimate
nature of consciousness.”
This is not the view of Mr. Spencer. And though
he is remarkably careful of the phraseology to which
he commits himself, yet, where controversy has inter
vened, we naturally get his meaning, if possible, more
sharply defined still. This is the case on this very
point. For hear him in his “Explanations” in the
1870 preface to his Principles of Psychology :—
The aggregate of subjective states constituting the mental “I”
have not in themselves the principle of cohesion holding them
together as a whole. But the “I” which continuously survives in
the subject of those changing states is that portion of the Unknowable
Power which is statically conditioned in special nervous structures
�32 HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
that are pervaded by a dynamically conditioned portion of the Unknow
able Power called Energy.
The mind is thus not simply “ a power of recog
nising and distinguishing feelings,” which power, so
far as Mr. Macpherson’s version is concerned, may be
merely a function of matter. It is “ the I which con
tinuously survives.” It is “ a portion of the Unknow
able Power,” or Substance, to use Haeckel’s word.
The Problem of Personality, Mr. Macpherson rightly
says, is “the great difficulty which faces Idealism.”
It is here solved so far as Mr. Spencer’s conviction is
concerned. And this passage is an express refutation
of Mr. Macpherson’s contention, where he says:—
Self-consciousness, according to the New Kantian and Hegelian, is
impossible except on the assumption that in the mind there exists a
unifying spiritual principle which, so to speak, sits at the loom of
time and weaves the isolated, unrelated threads of experience into an
organised and coherent whole. Have we not here an illustration of
the tendency of the mind to personify the processes of Nature, and
convert a final product into an initial, all-controlling agent ?
This “ unifying spiritual principle ” is exactly what
Mr. Spencer insists on—“the I which continuously
survives.” And this “ I ” is directly linked on to the
“ Eternal Energy.” Mr. Macpherson says “ the
basis of the system [of Idealism] is the identity of
the human with the divine self-consciousness,” an
identity which is expressly asserted here by Mr.
Spencer—if language has any meaning.
And lest this assertion by Mr. Spencer, that “ the I
is a portion of the Unknowable Power,” should be
challenged as in this bald form a mere passing dictum,
let us follow his reasoning a little more in detail, and
we find the grounds of his “ dictum.”
There are two great philosophical paths by which
we are brought face to face with this riddle of the
universe—those, namely, of psychology and objective
science.
By the former line of investigation Mr. Spencer
�HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION 33
finds that the one thing the human mind is directly
conscious of is will, force, our own will—that is to
say, as the one form in which we directly experience
force, “ Force as we are conscious of it when by our
own efforts we produce changes.”1
By the method of objective science we reach a
similar conclusion. The conservation of energy and
the whole modern teaching of science compel us to
believe in an Eternal Energy underlying all things.
This Eternal Energy is that “ from which all things
proceed.” This is the cul de sac into which all the
wonderful unification of scientific thought lands us,
and from which there is no escape. And when Mr.
Spencer declares in most carefully-chosen language
that “it is the same power which in ourselves wells
up under the form of consciousness,” we do not
require his formal imprimatur to assure us that in
the most fundamental conception of all religion, in
that truth which has made religion possible, he is
not only “ not against us,” but “ for us.”2
Mr. Spencer says it wells up in us under the form
of consciousness, and he calls this consciousness of
force—and otherwise self-consciousness. Now, what
does this familiar word “ self-consciousness ” really
mean ? What can it mean but that we ourselves
stand, as it were, outside of ourselves, beside and
1 It is interesting to notice how the same effort to define to the
intellect the content of consciousness takes shape, in Schopenhauer’s
case, in the definition of the world as will—the “ will to live,” in
short, as the metaphysical substance of the world and of man. It is
but the same idea as that which Spencer more vaguely describes as
force. Schopenhauer approximates the force more nearly to every-day
human experience. And this apparently slight difference in expres
sion at the start leads him directly into moral considerations of the
most searching kind, and ultimately into his pessimistic philosophy.
2 Haeckel, too (as his translator and champion says), “maintains
that the forcS associated with the atom or the cell is the same funda
mentally as that which reveals itself in our consciousness ” (Haeckel’s
Critics Answered, p. 54).
b
�34 HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
apart in some way from “ ourselves,” as we still call
this “ object ” of consciousness, and feel its moving,
throbbing life in our spirits ? Is it not, in short, a
form of the God-consciousness? As T. H. Green
says : “ It is the irreducibility of this self-objectifying
consciousness to anything else that compels us to
regard it as the presence in us of the mind for which
the world exists.”
As a French writer says : “For the old doctrine of
a consciousness absolutely one, the new psychology
substitutes the formula ‘ continuity of consciousness.’”
How can we ourselves be both the subject and the
object of consciousness at one and the same moment,
except on the principle, as Mr. Spencer puts it, that
our “I” is just a “portion of the Unknowable Power”
which thus, as some writers express it, “ comes to
self-consciousness in man ” ?
Mr. Spencer himself deals thus elsewhere with the
direct psychological evidence, and seems again to
suggest, or at least imply, the same idea. He says,
First Principles, p. 88 :—
Besides that definite consciousness of which logic formulates the
laws, there is also an indefinite consciousness which cannot be
formulated. Besides complete thoughts, and besides thoughts which,
though incomplete, admit of completion, there are thoughts which it
is impossible to complete, and yet which are still real in the sense that
that they are normal affections of the intellect.
And it is specially interesting to turn to his own
version of the actual historical origin of the religious
consciousness as it slowly rises into clearness and
definiteness.
‘ Unlike the ordinary consciousness,” he says, “the
religious consciousness is concerned with that which
lies beyond the sphere of sense”; and the rise of this
religious consciousness, he contends, “ begins among
primitive men with the belief in ‘ a double^ belong
ing to each individual, which, capable of wandering
�HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION 35
away from him during life, becomes his ghost or spirit
after death ; and from this idea of a being eventually
distinguished as supernatural there develop in course
of time the ideas of supernatural beings of all orders
up to the highest.”
This conclusion is his reading of an immense
number of facts gathered from the traditions of
uncivilised peoples. It is, in short, an attempt to
trace the natural history of the God-consciousness in
man. And to challenge Mr. Spencer is, as usual, but
to bring out his meaning more clearly. “ Surely,”
exclaims Mr. Harrison, “ if the primitive belief [in a
material double] was absolutely false, all derived
beliefs must be absolutely false.”
“ This objection looks fatal,” replies Mr. Spencer ;
“ and it would be fatal were its premises valid.
Unexpected as it will be to most readers, the answer
here to be made is that at the outset a germ of truth
was contained in the primitive conception—the truth,
namely, that the Power which manifests itself in con
sciousness is but a differently conditioned form of the
Power which manifests itself beyond consciousness.”
This shows Mr. Spencer’s view to be that the earliest
form of what ultimately is seen to be God-conscious
ness is simply the direct consciousness of our own
spirits. In other words, it is through the narrow
channel of our self-consciousness that we gradually
become conscious of “ that which lies beyond the
sphere of sense,” and which we call God. The latter
consciousness is but the developed form of the earlier.
What is this but an admission that it is practically
impossible to draw a sharp line of demarcation
between the one and the other ? The Inscrutable
Power is the same in both cases. And Mr. Spencer,
so far from denying or dissipating the fundamental
ideas of religion, shows them to be stereotyped in all
�36 HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
nature and enthroned in the very citadel of our own
being. Not only is the evolution philosophy thus
robbed of its terrors for many devout souls, but it
shows us philosophy and religion joining hands in a
much more directly religious truth than that which
Mr. Spencer seems formally to enunciate—in short, in
a common declaration of the essential unity of the
Divine and human natures.1 Indeed, Mr. Spencer,
when he sums up his whole philosophy and defines its
relation to the Unseen, strains his vocabulary to find
the most unequivocal terms possible in which to assert
its intensely religious basis. Passages to this effect
might be quoted in abundance. Take this as a
sample:—
The spiritualist, setting out with the same data [as the materialist],
may argue with equal cogency that, if the forces displayed by matter
are cognisable only under the shape of those equivalent amounts of
consciousness which they produce, it is to be inferred that these forces,
when existing out of consciousness, are of the same intrinsic nature as
when existing in consciousness. And that so is justified the spiritu
alistic conception of the external world as consisting of something
essentially identical with what we call mind. (First Principles, p. 558.)
And though in this same passage he seems to accord
equal validity to the materialist argument, he seems
to us rather to overstretch his phi&seology in the
latter connection. For when he says that “ what
exists in consciousness under the form of feeling is
transformable into an equivalent of mechanical motion,
and, in consequence, into equivalents of all the other
forces which matter exhibits,” the word “ transform
able ” seems to connote more than is legitimately
implied or required. It would surely be truer to his
1 As has been well said, “ Every man is in a very true sense essen
tially of divine nature, even as Paul teaches, ‘ Theion genos
but no man is conscious of himself as divine ; otherwise expressed, in
no man does this divine energy directly identify itself in conscious
ness with the source from which it proceeds. ‘ In fact, while we say
and are compelled to say “I,’’while we speak and cannot but speak of
our Self, in reality the essential content or nature of this Self, of this
subjective noumenon, is veiled from us.’ ”
�HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION 37
own teaching to say that what exists in consciousness
is capable of being manifested in an equivalent of
motion. And when he adds that the phenomena of
consciousness are “therefore material phenomena,”
would it not be more consistent with Mr. Spencer’s
own positions elsewhere to say that these phenomena
of consciousness in the form of feeling, when looked
at from outside, are recognisable through, or suggested
by, material phenomena ?
Mr. Spencer, we submit, is fundamentally an
Idealist. He links the human with the Divine; and
this, as his biographer admits, is the “ basis of
Idealism.” He is not an Idealist, of course, to the
detailed extent to which such a thinker as Lotze and
others of the German school are. Lotze deliberately
professes to “reconstruct an idealistic philosophy on
a materialistic basis.” And he and his school do so
with very great power and on lines that are essentially
Spencerian. They point out that the inseparable
relationship of every material element to every other
by the law of what is called causal connection pre
supposes the inner unity of all material elements.
“ The scientific interest,” Lotze declares, “is satisfied
by the assumption of such elements or atoms as are
actually indivisible in our experience. But the
assumption of a plurality of extended elements, even
if they are conceived as infinitely small, can never be
a final assumption of thought. We must give up
either the unity of the atoms or their extension. We
must conceive atoms as centres of force, each of which
is a starting-point for the working of the original sub
stance.” This inter-relationship of the world accord
ing to law is the objective basis of the philosophy of
religion.
This is the fact which, so far from making the idea
of God superfluous, makes it a necessity of thought.
�38 HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION I
For even the supposed mechanical conception of
nature, if rigorously followed out, lands us in a
perfect unity, whose only rational name is God. And
Idealism thus, from this point of view, may be said to
rest on and spring from Materialism.
Nothing, however, is more persistently character
istic of Mr. Spencer, once he lays down the all-impor
tant position we have referred to, than his determined
agnosticism as to all ’beyond. The Unknowable
Power is to us—while the most absolute of certainties
—utterly inscrutable.
Our object here, presumptuous as it may seem, is
to show, if we can, that the implications of this posi
tion of Mr. Spencer are deeper and more commanding
than at first sight appears. And we are the more
convinced of this when we find a striking con
vergence going on among Christian thinkers towards
the form which this implication takes in Mr. Spencer’s
teaching. Purely Christian thinkers, of course, start
from quite a different standpoint. And the movement
of their thought is, in form at least, a movement of
surrender—in reality, a movement of retiral and con
centration. But concentration always takes place
round vital points. And the conception which is
steadily being accepted by the strongest Christian
thinkers as the most central, illuminating, and
prolific of all is just that which, we maintain, is more
than implied, is directly expressed in Mr. Spencer’s
philosophy—the essential unity of the Divine and
human natures.
We have it in the well-known passage already cited,
where he tells us that “it is this same Power which
in ourselves wells up under the form of consciousness.”2*
It is the same Power that is subjective as well as
objective. And though he here interposes the word
“form” of consciousness to indicate its subjective
�HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION 39
form, we find elsewhere, as already cited, that “ the
‘14 is that portion of the Unknowable Power...... ”
So that, making every allowance for the limitations of
language (and in no case is there less need for this
th^n in Mr. Spencer’s), the identity of the Divine and
the human is here deliberately asserted.
The importance of the fact is evident. In one
form or other Mr. Spencer is constantly insisting on
it. He speaks of the tendency towards the identifi
cation of “Being as present to us in consciousness
with Being as otherwise conditioned beyond con
sciousness.’^ His own farewell word to us is to the
same effect:—
And then the consciousness itself, what is it during the time that it
continues ? And what becomes of it when it ends ? We can only
infer that it is a specialised and individualised form of that infinite
and eternal energy which transcends both our knowledge and our
imagination, and that at death its elements lapse into the infinite and
eternal energy whence they were derived. (Facts and Comments,
p. 203.)
This contention of Mr. Spencer is one of the
bravest things yet done by strictly analytical thought.
Unfortunately, Mr. Spencer, after he discovers the
existence of this great Power, refuses to turn his gaze
on its face, or attempt to learn any more about it.
Now, this function of the human spirit, called by
metaphysicians consciousness, cannot be isolated and
castrated in the way Mr. Spencer attempts to do. To
say that the existence of this Power may be present to
us in consciousness, but that His nature as he affects
this same consciousness cannot by any possibility be
present to us there, seems more an unconscious
subterfuge of logic than a contribution to philosophy.
Mr. Spencer’s declaration clearly implies that we
are in some kind of conscious contact with God. But
on what psychological principle can he justly contend
that the only form in which this “ eternal energy
from which all things proceed ” can well up in us is
�40 HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
»
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that of a bare consciousness of His existence ? Gera
has no meaning to our minds as mere existence. /To
speak of God’s existence apart from His Being is to
be the slave of words, not the possessor of ideas./ And
the question at this stage is not whether we can form
a complete conception of the being of God in our
minds. That is at all times impossible. The ques
tion is: If God touches us at all, is it rational to
suppose that He does so as “mere ” existence ? Our
neighbour’s existence wells up in us as a fact in con
sciousness. If we can attain to a knowledge of our
neighbour’s being and character, whose existence is
so apart from our own, and draws its life directly
and independently from the same source as our own,
shall we not much more be able to attain tp some
knowledge of that eternal energy with which our own
is so interfused, and in which at every moment it
lives and moves and has its being ? On the contrary,
with the windows of our souls clear, how can we escape
that consciousness, avoid that knowledge ?
Is “the categorical imperative” not an equally
real “ welling-up ” in us of that eternal energy from
which this, as “all things” else, “proceed”? If, as
Mr. Spencer says, force in us is the “correlative” of
the universal Power beyond us, is not the ideal in our
minds the “correlative” of the ideal mind beyond
us ? (First Principles, p. 579). No theory of the slow
evolution of the human conscience from the interaction
with our environment can remove God from the process.
That environment is itself but a form of the eternal
energy. Are we to measure the depth of that well
which so fills our consciousness by the first trickle
that reveals its presence ? Shall we not rather look
for its measure in the highest moments of the highest
types of our race, those in whom the unity of the
Divine and human natures is all but a direct and
�HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION 41>
conscious experience ? The moral ideal in man is the
correlative and counterpart of the Divine Ideal outside
of man, and is as clearly and directly evidence of
God as force, as we experience it in consciousness,
is evidence of the Divine Power beyond conscious
ness.1
Mill rightly contended that, if this Divine Power is
to be understood as but the infinite degree of what
we know in our human experience as power, we are
entitled to do the same with the Divine Goodness and
Justice. Infinite Goodness, in short, must still be
goodness—which is the self-same conclusion as that
more Platonicsflly maintained by Maurice. Thus is
the essential kinship of God and man vindicated both
by philosopher and theologian.
Is the metaphysician’s cold conclusion to be taken
as the measure of the attainment of man’s spirit
towards the unseen^ and the rapt communion of the
mystic to be treated as mere hallucination ?
1 Since writing the foregoing I find the following suggestion of a
similar idea in the slashing critical work of Marie Jean Guyau,
entitled The Non-Religion of the Future, p. 386: “ According to
Spencer, the unknowable itself is not absolutely unknowable. Among
the mysteries which become more mysterious as they are more deeply
reflected upon there will remain, Spencer thinks, for man one
absolute certitude—that he is in the presence of an infinite and
eternal energy which is the source of all things. No religion can
stop with the bare affirmation of the existence of an eternal energy or
infinity of energies. It must maintain the existence of some relation
between these energies and that of the moral impulse in mankind.”
Is it not remarkable, too, to find among the earliest of the Greek
thinkers, busy with the same irresistible search after God, so close an
alter ego of Mr. Spencer as was Xenophanes ? The vivid description
of that thinker given fifty years since may be read to-day, word for
word, as a true portrait of our own great philosopher : “ Xenophanes
was no atheist, but a very earnest theist. He asserted a Being*. If
he had been asked, ‘ What Being ?’ he would have owned that he
could not reply. He could only say what he was not. He approached
the border of negation, but he approached it manfully and reverently;
therefore he did not pass it. He pointed out a void which he could
not fill. That alone would have been a reason for feeling gratitude
to him. But he also saw the way to a radical truth.” (Maurice’s
Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy, p. 110.)
�42 HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
If so, what a deliberate invitation and encourage
ment to all revelation-mongers ! The human mind
refuses to content itself with merely believing that
“ He is.” As long as thinkers take up that attitude,
so long will “ special revelations ” flourish and
abound. But let thinkers declare, as they are entitled
to do, that the mind of man is in real contact with
God, even though it should legitimate every religion
under the sun, and Christianity will then take its true
place as the high-water mark of man’s vision of God.
Ruskin had a metaphysical and analytical intellect
as keen as any man’s. Listen to his criticism of
Spencer in this connection thirty years since :—
It will not, I trust, be thought violation of courtesy to a writer of
Mr. Spencer’s extending influence if I urge on his attention the
danger under which metaphysicians are always placed of supposing
that investigation of the processes of thought will enable them to
distinguish its forms. As well' might the chemist who had exhaus
tively examined the conditions of vitreous fusion imagine himself
therefore qualified to number or class the vases bent by the breath of
Venice.
Mr. Spencer has determined, I believe, to the satisfaction of his
readers, in what manner thoughts and feelings are constructed ; it is
time for him now to observe the results of the construction ; whether
native in his own mind, or discoverable in other intellectual territories.
That is to say, the true problem is not with what
degree of consecutive exactness can we track the
process of conscious thought, but what does conscious
thought at its unmolested highest teach us ? What,
as matter of historical fact, has it taught the best and
strongest minds the world has known ?
Turn to the highest stages of human imagination.
The mystics were rarely metaphysicians. They had
and have a gift before which mere metaphysical
acumen is comparatively incompetent. Mr. Spencer’s
statistics tell of the slow trend of human thought.
The mystics read their own spirits. Mysticism
discounts the intellectual labour of later generations
and pierces straight to the truth itself. It is this
�HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION 43
thought of the identity, in some sense, of the soul
with God that has fed their souls, and lifted them
into their rapt communion. Are we to be told that
this spiritual ecstasy is but “ a bubble of the blood ”?
The keenest analysis, we have seen, discloses at last
truths which are enough to tax the powers and fire
the imagination of the most exalted mystics. Are we
to be told that just when man is at his highest he most
misses the Divine ? On the contrary, by the actual
pressure of modern thought, impelled alike by science,
psychology, and religion, are we not beginning to see that
this recognition of God in man is not only on all fours
with the most advanced scientific teaching, but solves
psychological problems and satisfies religious aspira
tions with a completeness that nothing else can match ?
Have not our philosophers and metaphysicians,
from Plato to Kant and Spencer, from whatever
point of view they try to answer the riddle of the
universe, and after each exhausting the ingenuities
of his intellect, found themselves driven at last “ in
a mathematical necessity ” to fall back on the only
Satisfying solution; found that if they calmly, as it
wtere, place their open palm on the world’s breast,
they feel the very heart of God beating through it,
and at once arise and worship ?
And although this satisfaction is only to be reached
by the sacrifice of much phraseology that is naturally
dear not only to the popular mind but to the devout
Christian soul, that is a loss which is more than made
good. The fact remains that we are capable of coming
into a true consciousness of God, and, indeed, cannot
escape from it. And as Mr. Spencer says :■—
This inscrutable existence which science in the last resort is
compelled to recognise as unreached by its deepest analysis of matter,
motion, thought, and feeling, stands towards our general conception
of things in substantially the same relation as does the creative power
asserted by theology. And when theology, which has already dropped
�44 HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
many of the anthropomorphic traits, eventually drops the last of them,
the foundation-beliefs of the two must become identical.
We do not profess to be authorised expounders of
Mr. Spencer’s definite but cautious pronouncements ;
neither would his friends’ repudiation of such a com
mentary as ours much trouble us. Mr. Spencer,
in such utterances as these, is (and he takes no
pains to hide that he is) what we Christians call
“ feeling after God, if haply he may find him.” It
is generally felt that he does not venture beyond the
vestibule of the temple, but he is on holy ground. His
striking declaration of the identity of our human con
sciousness with the Divine Presence shows him to be
very near to the centre of the deepest religious faith,
and (with reverence be it said) is but a philosophical
way of expressing the profoundest spiritual convic
tion of Jesus himself. “ I am in the Father and the
Father in me.” “ I am in my Father and ye in me,
and I in you,” the divine element overshadowing,
suffusing, and inspiring all nature. As one discerning
writer says: “ This grand and comforting doctrine
of the incarnate presence of God in each man’s con
sciousness is rapidly becoming the dominant concep
tion of God in all the greatest religious teachers.”
And faith, which in spiritual things is open vision,
may enter in and worship where philosophical intel
lectualism declines to commit itself to anything so
presumptuous.
Even Comte’s Grande Etre, Humanity, in so far as
it betokens reality at all, is but his objective method
of reaching the realisation of this God-consciousness.
It is the result of that instinctive yearning after some
permanent object of affection that can only be satisfied
by some form or other of the God-consciousness.
For, as Mr. Spencer says, “it owes whatever there is
in it of beauty to that Infinite Eternal Energy out of
�HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION 45
which humanity has quite recently emerged, and into
which it must in course of time subside.”
As has been well said, “ In that newest phase of
natural religion called Positivism there is a more
real apprehension of the natural unity of humanity,
both as to its rootage in the past and its progressive
life in the future, than is possessed by many professing
Christians; but its conception of humanity is closed
in by the gates of Hades, on both sides of the gulf
of time. Its Gospel of Humanity is wanting in
the essential element of Divinity, in which alone
can be found the reality, promise, and potency of
eternal progressive life for the individual no less than
for the race, as the Son of God. Christian faith takes
nothing away from Positive conceptions; it compre
hends, fulfils, and eternalises them.”
To Spinoza this same conviction of the presence of
God in the heart of man was irresistible. It swamped
all else, and earned for him the title of the “ Godintoxicated ” man.
Was this conception of the unity of the Divine and
human natures not just the essence, too, of the famous
early controversy over the person of Christ ? In the
light of modern Christian development we come to see
that Athanasius and his victorious allies digged deeper
than they knew, and that (to change the metaphor) in
the casket of their triumphant dogma they succeeded
in preserving intact to later ages the symbol of a
truth which nothing else could have so well preserved.
The instinct of the Church’s strongest thinkers pre
vailed, and they succeeded in stamping on the Church’s
heart for the ensuing fifteen hundred years the
tremendous truth that very God and very man had, in
that unique form at least, come together. The God
man became to believing souls the intelligible symbol
of the Divine Presence in the race of which he and
�46 HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
they were alike members; and that achievement was
worth all the struggle it entailed.
Mineralogists tell us that the most precious diamond
is but a condensed globule of intensely heated vapour,
thrown up in one of those wild eruptions to which our
earth is subject; and they point us, in evidence, to the
fact that very often, when transplanted from its native
bed to the colder and more temperate regions, the
diamond bursts into a thousand fragments, and merges
itself with the circumambient air.
So with the triumphant dogma of Athanasius.
Called into being by the deep need of the human soul,
it was cradled in wild controversy and matured on the
field of battle. It has been the object of the Church’s
passionate attachment ever since. Though it has
assumed degraded forms in degraded times, it has
survived intact, to become at last the object of the
coolest and most unrelenting criticism, until now it
begins to burst its limits and expand into a universal
truth, revealing in our human nature an inherent
glory else unseen, and lifting all humanity into
Divine fellowship and communion.
On Mr. Spencer’s own showing, then, and utilising
his own deliberate admissions, we see no ground on
which he can consistently object to the construction
of earnest practical religious faith. For we are then
merely following his own principle, and “interpret
ing this great single induction deductively.” Subject
always to the inevitable Spencerian rider that man is
in no sense “ the measure of the Infinite,” or to
the equally decisive declarations of Paul that He
“ dwelleth in light which no man can approach unto,”
“ whom no man hath seen or can see,” there is nothing
theoretically inconsistent with a strong rational reli
gious faith. The Spencerian faith, that final truth
of the Spencerian philosophy, is really what is called
�HERBERT SPENCER’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION 47
Panentheism. It is a consciousness of God which, to
use his own words, “ gives the religious sentiment the
widest possible sphere of action.” “ Every man may
properly consider himself as one of the myriad
agencies through whom works the Unknown Cause.
And when the Unknown Cause produces in him a
certain belief, he is thereby authorised to profess and
act out that belief.” Such a faith by no means
banishes the thought of God’s transcendence, properly
understood; but it brings God so near to us as to
irradiate our whole life with his presence, and make
us rejoice in his perpetual inspiration. To the man
who holds this faith
“ Earth’s crammed with heaven
And every common bush afire with God.”
Mr. Spencer would probably have scouted all asso
ciation with so distinctly religious a conception as
this. But the unity of the Divine and human natures
is a religious as well as a philosophical idea. And the
quotations here given, and the considerations naturally
suggested by them, show, we submit, that to the pro
mulgation of this doctrine Mr. Spencer must be
acknowledged as directly contributory. His phrase
ology is characteristically metaphysical, and his
caution is consistently Agnostic. But the thing
signified is essentially the same. And, if this conten
tion be sound, Mr. Spencer has earned that which he
neither wrought for nor hoped for—the lasting thanks
of every Christian thinker.
�Chapter IV.
HEGEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION—
THE CONTRIBUTION OF PSYCHOLOGY
“ The soul in some way—how, we know not—identical with God.”
—Tennyson.
In previous chapters we endeavoured to show that the
great modern exponents of the purely scientific and
materialistic attitude of mind had reached a conclusion
so profound and suggestive as to constitute the basis
of an idealistic philosophy.
Spencer’s declaration of the identity of the power of
which we are conscious in ourselves (as force, will, or
energy) with the great Power or energy outside of us,
strikes one, when we first encounter it in his writings,
as a boulder from a higher latitude, a meteoric stone
from a world beyond his philosophical range. Yet
there it is—propounded and reiterated—though not,
we venture to think, with his full customary realisa
tion, or at least admission, of its philosophical import.
The object of this chapter is to show that this same
conclusion was reached long ago by minds equally
powerful with that of Spencer, and on lines perfectly
distinct from his, and at first sight apparently quite
opposed in their direction. Purely psychological
thinkers, occupying a position of perfect aloofness
towards all schools of thought, and dealing directly
with the elemental energies of human nature, have in
their more abstract way been equally compelled to
proclaim the same truth, which we cannot but regard,
48
�49'
HEGEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
therefore, as the greatest generalisation of modern
times.
The long, slow outcome of Western thought, from
the days of Plato, and even Thales, to those of Kant
and Hegel, and the whole modern schools of Western
Europe, is just the slow but steadily growing appre
hension of this same truth, veiled, no doubt, in the
garb of metaphysics and psychology, but, when
stripped of its technicalities and cleared from its haze,
seen to be absolutely one with the truth discerned
by Haeckel and Spencer. Nay, more. By the very
necessity of the case, the purely psychological
thinker, when he does reach his conclusion, states
it in a form that is more comprehensive still than
either of the others, and shows them to be but illus
trations in their own sphere of a great dynamic fact
that is part and parcel of the very being of man.
It would be endless to attempt to trace in detail the
long, slow movement of human thought which has
finally culminated in this conclusion. But, in order
to make the conclusion more intelligible, it is almost
necessary to point out the two main lines on which
the movement has proceeded, dealing, as they do,
respectively with the objective and the subjective worlds
—with the thinking being and the object thought.
At one time, and among particular nations, and
especially in the earlier stages of thought, the in
fluence of the objective world naturally predominated,
at another the subjective. In both cases the human
spirit was searching for the same thing—seeking more
or less consciously an access to the Divine Spirit.
It is the generalisation which both have finally
peached that now throws back a light that gives every
step of the movement a meaning, and shows them all
to have been directly or indirectly contributing to the
slowly evolving conclusion.
E
�50
HEGEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
In Egypt, for example, the objective world was
fatally victorious. There was not sufficient intel
lectual reaction in the Egyptian mind. The thinking
spirit was dwarfed and intimidated by the terrors and
immensities of Nature. Egypt, therefore, cannot be
said in strictness to have left us any philosophy.
In India it was exactly otherwise. The Indians pro
duced no history. Their writings, which are psycho
logical and religious, are really their history. Their
spiritual passion, their joy in the soaring, seeing power
of the human spirit, is the special and valuable contri
bution of India to the world’s grasp of the Divine.
In China, on the other hand, the sense of the invisible
and ideal seems almost to have been absent. But this
cannot really be the case. Laotse’s teaching was kin
with Indian and later Western thought. But Confucius
was the typical Chinese mind. And the teachings
of Confucius are not a philosophy at all. They are
but the hard-baked fossils from a soil on which a long
anterior philosophy once flourished. Practical maxims
and ceremonial directions are not philosophy ; neither
are they religion. They are but—in Bacon’s phrase
—its translation into the vulgar tongue. Confucius
inculcated reverential forms. The ancient thinkers of
China had more or less clearly discerned that, in whose
presence reverence was the only fitting attitude of
spirit. Confucius taught rules of conduct between
man and man. The ancient thinkers had grasped
the principle of reason and justice of which all rules
of conduct are but working formulae. This reason was
the divinest thing Confucius knew. This is not a
large or very vitalising contribution to human thought.
But it contained an element of the ideal. It sprang
from the moral vision of that ancient people. A
great nation has lived on it for ages. Even at the
lowest estimate, it is an illustration on a large scale
�HEGEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
51
of the saying that “it is marvellous in what a com
paratively exhausted receiver the Divine spark will
continue to burn.” At the highest estimate, it was
an illustration of astonishing devotion, not to the
vivid conception of a Divine Being, but to what we
may call the metaphysical principle (the idea, as Plato
afterwards called it) of law, order, duty. And in so
far it entitles Chinese thought to a humble place in
the pantheon of Philosophy.
To the Persian mind, again, the spiritual world
seems to have been its native atmosphere. And it
is surely striking to notice that it was through the
exercise of their naturally keen moral sense that they
rose to the conception of the Eternal Spirit. Is it
not in reality a curious anticipation of one of the
modern declarations of European philosophy, in
which Kant acknowledges the Categorical Imperative
as the most commanding evidence to man of the
Eternal Spirit, of which our own is an abiding echo ?
Was its highest spiritual conception, of which the
most fitting symbols they could find were light and
fire, not an anticipation even of the Christian con
ception of Him “ Who is Light, and in Him is no
darkness at all ” ? Yet Zoroaster failed to find a
solution of the moral difficulty of the world. But
who are we, with our Satan and our story of the Fall,
that can afford to smile contempt at the Ahriman of
the Persian theology ?x
i<n a book on The Ideals of the East, just published by a Japanese
author (London : John Murray; 5s. net; 1903), is to be found a very
discerning confirmation of the general view here taken. The author,
Kakasu Okakura, emphasises the unity of Asia," the love for the ultimate
and universal which is the common thought and inheritance of every
Asiatic race,” and finds in “Arab chivalry, Persian poetry, Chinese
ethics, and Indian thought a common life, bearing in different regions
different characteristic blossoms, but nowhere capable of a hard and
fast dividing line.” Speaking of his own special subject, the art of
Japan, he says: “The history of Japanese art becomes the history of
�52
HEGEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
Buddhism, again, was the great Protestantism of the
East. And in its philosophical aspect our Western
Protestantism pales its ineffectual fires before it
altogether. Buddhism not only reasserted with a
vehemence and passion that have astonished the
world, the truth of which its ancient predecessor had
been a great efflorescence—the truth, namely, that
there was a Divine strength in the human spirit, a
power of piercing to the unseen, and of true com
munion with the Eternal Spirit. It carried that faith
to a point not even yet dreamed of by the ordinary
Western mind.
As F. D. Maurice says :—
European sages in the last century and in the present have cried
out: “When will philosophy break loose from the fetters which
priests have imposed upon it ?” Philosophy in Asia performed that
task 2,000 years ago. It threw off the yoke which was become quite
intolerable. It affirmed that man’s soul is capable of unlimited
expansion. It claimed for that soul the homage due to a divinity.
It made no mere idle boast of power. It actually won the allegiance
of multitudes. (Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy, p. 53.)
Or, to use the words of Professor Rhys Davids:—
For the first time in the history of the world, Buddhism proclaimed
a salvation which each man could gain for himself, by himself, in
this world, during this life, without having the least reference to God
or Gods, either great or small.1
This conviction was a tremendous advance on
anything previously attained or attempted. The only
thing that can give it a reasonable explanation to our
minds is the belief that its founder, at least, and his
Asiatic ideals—the beach where each successive wave of Eastern
thought has left its sand and ripple as it beat against the national
consciousness.”
1 Not only so, but, as M. Guyau says, “the Hindu books are the
most extraordinary example of moral symbolism. The entire world
appears to the Buddhist as the realisation of the moral law, sine© in
his view beings take rank in the universe according to their virtues or
vices, mount or descend on the ladder of life according to tbeir moral
elevation or abasement. Buddhism is, in certain respects, an effort to
find in morals a theory of the universe.” (Non-Religionof the Future,
p. 170.)
�HEGEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
53
immediate followers, felt the passionate inspiration of
this very principle, whose slow possession by the
human spirit we are attempting to trace, the affinity
of their own spirits with the Eternal Spirit. In this
light what has often been called mere Atheism was
but Mysticism become conscious of itself, and exer
cising the spiritual strength which intense conscious
ness of the Divine always supplies.
Even when we come to Greece, the great forerunner
and inspirer of the European intellect, what a long
process of vacillating thought do we find ! The philo
sophical and scientific and psychological instincts are
all there. At all hazards the Greek felt that he must
find the reason or cause or single idea (if there was
one) that lay at the root of things. Water, air, earth,
fire, even number, were successively set forth as the
one secret of the visible universe. But these early
Greek physicists were more poets than physicists.
They looked, and dreamed, and allegorised; but the
era of patient observation was not yet. By-and-bye,
however, they began to be conscious of laws or an
order which seemed to govern the inner world of their
own minds. And this conception of the laws of
thought is of interest here, not for its details, but
because it was, so far as it went, a true intuition—a
direct attempt at the analysis of human consciousness.
As such, it was the opening of a new and most
suggestive channel of inspiration as to the very Being
that is at the centre of the universe. “ Know
thyself ” contained the possibility of a true knowledge
of the Divine.
Plato was the first mediator between the two great
factors of the world of thought. He set forth in the
strength of his own spirit, and endeavoured to enter
and breathe the atmosphere of the Divine. Plato the
Seer came down from the Mount like Moses the
�54
HEGEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
Legislator, but not with tables of stone to be a work
ing code for a hard-hearted people. Plato, too, felt
the Spirit of the Eternal coursing through his own
soul, and, with the instinct of the poet and the seer,
he bodied it forth in thoughts that have ever since
been the accepted foundation of all spiritual philo
sophy. As has been well said of him, “ Plato’s
abstractions seem to become for him not merely
substantial things in themselves, but little short of
living persons, and constituting together a sort of
divine family or hierarchy with which the mind of the
individual, so far as it is reasonable and really knows,
is in communion and correspondence.” Plato faced
the problem of duality, and minimised no side of the
difficulties connected with it. He set all his suc
cessors on the right track towards its solution. From
Plato down, it would be a task too minute to attempt
to follow the course of thought in detail. Enough to
point out that from his time, with varying intensity,
each side of this great antinomy came to the front.
It was this double consciousness in its most intense
form that was found in the pure, strong vision of
Jesus, the profoundest and most practical of all the
mystics. The truth which fuses these two sides of the
human consciousness together into a great moral and
spiritual force was not only implicit but even explicit
in his teaching. Jesus was no speculator. But the
intuitive mystical element in the Jewish nature had
come to a climax in him. He saw and felt intensely
this union of the Divine and human natures. It was
this that he lived to teach and died to attest. “ I
and my Father are one.’M “ That ye (His disciples)
may be one, even as we are one.” And if this is the
truth for which the religion of Jesus stands, and of
which it was the first complete assertion, what a light
it throws on the character and person of Jesus!
�HEGEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
55
How is it conceivable or consistent with any just
notions we can form of a Divine economy, that an
emanation of deity of a kind previously unheard of
should have to appear among men, in order to teach
us authoritatively a truth which lay in the direct line
of human thought and investigation 1 Such an idea,
instead of emphasising, tends rather to nullify the
principle of the Divine self-manifestation.
Paul could boldly speak of men as “ the temple of
God,” and to very poor specimens of mankind did he
address these pregnant words. Even uneducated
Peter could describe the object of the Christian life in
such mystical words as these: “ That ye might be
partakers of the Divine nature.”
But the Church for ages almost smothered this
essential truth under a mass of dogmas and symbols
and organisation such as the world has hardly seen
matched elsewhere.
The Reformation (to take a long leap forward) was
essentially, so far as it went, a reassertion of this
inherent dignity and glory of the human spirit.
Descartes' “ I think, therefore I am,” and Schopen
hauer's “ I will, and that is the essential element not
only of my being, but of all spiritual existence,” were
fresh reassertions of the inalienable force of the human
spirit, and did much to hasten the inevitable conclusion.
Spinoza's whole work was an unmatched expression
of this great reassertion, but the pantheistic monism
in which it culminated was, in his day, too absolute a
diet for daily food. Kant's doctrine of the generative
power of the human spirit as the creator and fashioner
of all that can be called true knowledge was the nearest
approach that had been made since the days of Plato
to the solution of the riddle of philosophy. A dis
cerning writer (Schwegler) says of Kant:—
As regards the thing-in-itself that lies behind the appearance of
�56
HEGEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
sense, Kant, in the first edition of his work, expressed himself as if
it were possible that it and the Ego might be one and the same
thinking substance. This thought, which Kant only threw out as a
conjecture, has been the source of the whole subsequent evolution of
philosophy.
But it is when we come to Hegel, and study his
capacious grasp of the whole problem, that we find
the master-mind able to gather up the separate
threads of previous philosophic thought and bind them
together by a piercing insight and bold generalisation
that is nothing else than a reassertion of this intuitive
conjecture of Kant, which we take to be the greatest
generalisation of modern times.
Now, we do not pretend to break down Hegel for
popular consumption. The 1,200 somewhat verbose
pages1 in which The Secret of Hegel has been
disclosed to English readers are enough to deter any
ordinary man from the attempt. But, after all, the
secret, as it is called, is there. And, despite the
caution as to the impracticability of attempting to
convey a general idea of a modern philosophic system
for the benefit of “ well-informed people,” we venture
to see in this Secret of Hegel, the most commanding
analysis of that very consciousness and self-conscious
ness yet made by any philosopher, and the most
daring transference of the results of that analysis to
the curtain of the Infinite, to the very mind of God.
As the author of The Secret of Hegel says, “ that
process of self-consciousness strikes the keynote of the
whole method and matter of Hegel ” (p. 78).
1 Dr. Stirling’s style, in its alliterative, accumulative, and
accentuated ponderosity, is most irritating. It is not confined to The
Secret of Hegel. Here is a passage taken at random from his
Gifford Lectures, p. 279 : “ It is really very odd, but Hume is never
for a brief instant aware that in that he has answered his own
cardinal, crucial, and climacteric question. The immediate nexus,
the express bond, the very tie which he challenged you and me and the
whole world to produce, he actually at that very moment produces
himself, holds up in his hand even, openly shows, expressly names,
and emphatically insists upon. ’ ’
�HEGEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
57
Kant had sounded the same depths before Hegel.
Kant, indeed, had discerned and laid bare to ordinary
thinking men the leading land-marks, the constitutive
elements of human thought. He called these the
“ Categories of Thought.” These categories (which
we need not here refer to in detail) Hegel grasped,
unified, and expanded, and declared them to be
essential elements of that Pure Reason in man which
is absolutely kin and identical with the Universal
Reason which is God.
Hegel, in fact, showed that what the Mystics knew
to be the only satisfaction of their spiritual nature was
also the only possible answer and satisfaction to the
very laws of thought.
A later expounder of Hegel (Professor Wallace,
Prolegomena to the Logic of Hegel) says, emphasising
the very point we here insist on:—
The Hegelian was the first attempt to display the organisation of
Thought pure and entire, as a whole and in its details. The organism
of thought as the living reality and gist of the external world and the
world within us is called the “ Idea ” (p. 174).
The Idea is the reality and ideality of the world, the totality con
sidered as a process beyond time. God reveals his absolute nature in
the several relatives of the process. He is cognisable in those points
where that process comes to self-perception or self-apprehension. They
are the several forms under which the Absolute is cognisable to man.
In logical language, these forms of the Absolute are the Categories of
Thought.
And he proceeds to comment thus on a well-known
and vital philosophical controversy :—
Spencer and Mansel, Hamilton and Mill, are nearly all at one in
banishing God and religion to a world beyond the present sublunary
sphere, to an inscrutable region beyond the scope of scientific inquiry.
He is the Unknown Power, felt by what some of these writers call
Intuition, and others call Experience. They do not, however, allow to
knowledge any capacity for apprehending in detail the truths which
belong to the Kingdom of God.
The whole teaching of Hegel is the overthrow of the limits thus set
to religious thought. To him, all thought and all actuality, when it is
grasped by knowledge, is from man’s side, an exaltation of the mind
towards God; while, when regarded from the Divine standpoint, it is
the manifestation of His own nature in its infinite variety (p. 27).
In short, we may say that God is cognisable by man
�58
HEGEL’S CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
just because the very spiritual substance of man is a
breath and true part of the Divine Spirit; and the
highest forms in which the human mind can think,
and according to which it is ultimately compelled to
think, are just those features of the Divine mind
which are irrevocably stamped on the human spirit.
This embracing thought of Hegel, then, the unity
of the thinking being and the object thought, of the
subject and the object, of the Divine nature and our
human nature, we take not only on its merits, but
because we find it, as we have shown, to be the
essential identical conclusion reached by quite inde
pendent thinkers.
In respect of their personal attitudes towards
religion, no one would dream of linking together such
men as Haeckel and Spencer with Hegel. Our sole
object here is to show that on quite independent but
analogous lines all three have reached what is essen
tially the same conclusion. All three contribute their
own characteristic corroboration to the teaching of the
religious instinct. They confirm us in the possession
of a solid rational foundation for that which the
human heart demands, and the higher reason has
always supplied.
�Chapter V.
THE MYSTICS’ CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
—THE CONTRIBUTION OE SPIRITUAL
INSIGHT
“Avicenna, the Philosopher,
‘ All that he sees I know. ’
Abu Said, the Mystic,
‘ All that he knows I see.’ ”
Mysticism is often regarded as a transient and unim
portant excrescence on the religious history of man.
On the contrary, it is neither transient nor unim
portant. It is found in active force and in developed
form among some of the earliest peoples of whom we
have any record. East and West, we find it in all
climes and among all races.
The peculiar feature of the mystics is that in their
most characteristic moments and states they seem to
ignore and overleap merely intellectual barriers, and
fly straight to the apprehension of the very truth
which we find so laboriously wrought out by more
cautious and sceptical minds. The mystics, wherever
we find them, profess to have reached the joyous con
sciousness of a union with the Divine Spirit beyond
any power of description which they themselves could
command, or which others, however desirous to do
so, could adequately understand. How is this to be
explained ? How should one man feel himself com
pelled by the hard necessity of his ratiocinative
faculties to plod step by step, and with long oscillations,
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THE MYSTICS’ CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
towards a point which another man seems able to
reach with almost lightning speed, and to leave little
or no tatiocinative track to show his path ? Is there
any/svidential value in the experience of such men
towards understanding the great conclusion which
they, in common with very different minds, arrive at ?
What, in short, is the rationale of mysticism ?
Those who have studied the writings and the lives
of the mystics have not hesitated to declare them to
be the most profoundly spiritual of the race.
One of the most philosophical minds of our day
(the Master of Balliol) has defined mysticism as
“Religion in its most concentrated and exclusive
form, that in which all other relations are swallowed
up in the relation of the soul to God.” Another
Gifford lecturer (Professor Wm. James, of Harvard)
says to the same effect that “ all personal religious
experience has its root and centre in mystical states
of consciousness.” And mysticism is distinguished
from all other phases of mental action in this—that it
cannot be called the direct result of long intellectual
processes. Intellectual differences have formed the
perpetual element of division among ordinary religious
people, and are much modified after every minor or
major “reformation” that takes place. The essential
ideas, and, generally speaking, even the language, of the
mystic recur age after age with remarkable uniformity.
The explanation lies on the surface—the thought of the
mystic is nearer the centre, if we may so say, than
that of any other student of divine things. And if
mysticism be thus more deeply rooted than ordinary
forms of faith, any fluctuation in the form of expres
sion is so lit up by the vivid inner faith as to be seen
as but the play of the intellect round that which is
beyond its grasp. The true mystic thus finds himself
as much at home in the spiritual apophthegms of
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61
ancient India or Persia as in those of modern Europe.
The mysticism of the ancient Brahmanic faith is
well known; and we refer to it here only to point out
a characteristic feature of mysticism wherever we find
it. One able writer says :—
Mysticism as a genuine, progressive world-illuminating power began
with the Greeks. The Indians, no doubt, asserted the I and the not I
to be one. But they made nothing of this great truth, save to seek,
each man for himself, absorption into the Absolute. The Absolute
was real; the Phenomenal was illusion. The Greeks were more
honest thinkers. 'In short, the Indians were merely mystics. The
Greeks were mystics plus philosophers.
There is undoubtedly truth in this statement. The
mystical consciousness, unless it can be intellectualised—expressed, that is to say, in more or less
definite and illuminating language—will never be of
much spiritual value to other minds—though there is
a most true sense in which the mystic consciousness is
“ineffable”; its spiritual contents cannot be effectively
conveyed from one to another, just as the sun’s rays
may be reflected from one object to another, but the
full strength of his influence must be received directly
by each object for itself. But the form which this
mysticism assumed in the ancient Indian mind was
not the result of a mere unassisted imaginative tour de
force. It had been preceded, we may be sure, by
thought and experience. And though the actual
entry into 4jhe mystic consciousness would no doubt
be what is called an intuitive act, which at one
bound rose above the level of the intellect, brooding
meditation is the soil from which it grows. For the
very perception of the phenomenal as Maya or Illusion
was almost certainly the outcome of long meditation
on the fleeting things of time and sense. And though
they could not succeed in thinking this phenomenal
into God, or conceiving it in terms of God, these
mystical minds felt that there was no abiding city;
that, on the contrary, their own spirits were greater
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THE MYSTICS’ CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
than all these visible things; that this spirit of theirs
must, in some deep sense, be an index to the meaning
of the world; and they clasped to their hearts the
belief that God was not only spirit, like themselves,
but the only Spirit, the only Reality in the universe,
and their own spirits but breaths and sparks of that
Eternal Spirit with whom it was their highest spiritual
satisfaction to feel themselves united. We may call
this philosophy or not, as we choose. It was the profoundest philosophy the world had at that time heard
of. And even European philosophers whose names
no thinker can afford to despise have called these
“ the loftiest heights of philosophy.” The correct
definition of mysticism, however, is a minor question.
The real point is that the mystic—that is, the charac
teristically religious spirit—long since instinctively
grasped the truth which we desire to emphasise : the
union of the Divine with the human.
The Platonic doctrine that the human soul is a portion
of the Divine nature is as simple a digest of the mystic
principle as any. And even Plato was long antici
pated by the old Brahmanic philosophy. “ The
kernel of the Vedantic philosophy—the great sentence,
it is called—is ‘ Tat tv am asi ’—‘ That thou art.’
Thou, 0 neophyte, art thyself the Brahman whom thou
seekest to know. Thou thyself art a part of the All.”
And see how naturally this same thought finds
itself reproduced in our latest modern philosophy.
Hegel says, recognising the affinity to his own
deepest thought, of the great Persian mystic lately
introduced to English readers by Dr. Hastie :—
In the excellent Jelaleddin Rumi in particular we find the unity of
the soul with the One set forth, and that unity described as Love.
And this spiritual unity is an exaltation above the finite and common,
a transfiguration of the natural and spiritual in which the externalism
and transitoriness of nature is surmounted. In this poetry, which
soars above all that is external and sensuous,, who would recognise
the prosaic ideas current about so-called Pantheism ?
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63
It is easy to see how such a faith might lead its
possessors into many extravagancies. Modern illus
trations will occur to every reader. Take Bohme, the
German mystic. Bohme in early life felt so acutely
the working and suggestions of his own spirit that he
instinctively regarded the thoughts which thus came
to him as Divine revelations. And he was nearer the
truth in this than colder natures could imagine. His
consciousness of the Divine was not at fault; it was
no hallucination. But his efforts at exposition were
often confused, and even unintelligible. Not only so ;
his mind was so hampered and bound by an almost
slavish adherence to the dogmas of his day that his
writings. often suggest to the mind of the reader
the wild flutterings of an eagle in the cage of a
sparrow.
There are, in fact, two classes of mystics. One, the
more familiar, consists of such as Bohme, Blake, and
even Swedenborg, whose forte, and at the same time
weakness, was that they felt themselves overwhelmed
by the Infinite—their spirits swayed helplessly beyond
the control of the intellect, in a kind of hypnotic sleep
of the spirit. Their mystical experience intoxicated
them—made them all one as if they were insane.
They often failed to grasp the mystic lesson that their
reason is but universal reason. Hence it was not to
the normal workings of their spirit that they attended.
Voices, visions, ecstatic visitations—these only were
to them messages from God.
In the case of other mystic souls the mighty thought
of their oneness with the All steadied rather than
staggered their intellects. Tyndall, in a letter, recalls
Tennyson saying of the mystical condition, with the
passionate confidence of one who has experienced it,
“ By God Almighty! there is no delusion in the
matter! It is no nebulous ecstasy, but a state of
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THE MYSTICS’ CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
transcendent wonder, associated with absolute clear
ness of mind ” (Memoirs of TennysonfrNoX. ii., p. 473).
The thought of their oneness "with the All freed
them from “ the heresy of separateness,” and
enabled them to say, “If we are one with the All,
the thought that is in us is not our thought, but
simply Thought. It follows that, if we cautiously yet
boldly record the utterances of our own spirit, we shall
be recording the everlasting oracles themselves.”
Thus Plato, Wordsworth, Emerson, and a host of
others. Plotinus, who has been called “ the only
analytical mystic,” only twice or thrice in his life
claimed to have had direct vision of the perfect and
absolute One. His intellect was too active and critical
to admit of its habitual surrender to the mystic
passion.
Inspiration has been called merely “ an intensified
state of consciousness and he is but a poor specimen
of our common human nature in whom the Divine
does not find some more or less conscious flashpoint.
The commonest experience of this, and fortunately
the most valuable for the conduct of life, is that of
our moral convictions. The man who has learned the
force of the categorical imperative, as Kant called it,
or the imperious dictate of a reasonably enlightened
conscience, has learned the presence of the Divine in
his inner nature, even if the thought of it strikes
him as a kind of presumptuous familiarity. “ Stern
daughter of the voice of God ” is not all a metaphor.
We touch the Divine, or, rather, the Divine touches us,
at many points. Who has not felt it ? Who has not
experienced something of that overshadowing of his
spirit that comes through what we appropriately call
Communion—that conscious approach to the Divine
which slowly, but at last instantaneously, passes into
unconscious submersion of the spirit ?
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65
“Clear thought dies out in love’s absorbed delight.”
“ With thy sweet soul this soul of mine
Hath mixed as water doth with wine.
Who can the wine and water part,
Or me and thee when we combine ?
Thou art become my greater self ;
Small bounds no more can me confine.
Thou hast my being taken on ;
And shall not I now take on thine?”
—Jelaleddin, X.
When that stage of spiritual intensity is reached, the
only language possible is that of symbol. And the
symbols, being but the counters of the intellect, are
but feeble illustrations of that which is the ineffable
and incommunicable. They have their value up to
a certain point. Beyond that, their light is lost in a
brightness that is past their ken.
And yet mysticism is not unrelated to ordered
thought. There is no reason to suppose that it is in
any way incompatible with the largest attainments of
scientific and philosophic thought. On the contrary,
it has nothing to fear from the encroachment of the
scientific spirit. Latest science and latest philosophy
alike point unmistakeably to the truth which is the
core of mysticism. In the words of a careful French
writer,1 “ It is my opinion that mysticism, pure of all
alloy, will expand as much as science, and will expand
with it.” The progress of scientific and philosophic
thought, therefore, only confirms the mystic faith.
Mysticism, in its exercise of what we call intuition,
or deep spiritual passion, has thus all along dis
counted the slow attainment of more prosaic powers.
Spencer’s own conclusion is that mysticism underlies
all knowledge. To-day it is the slow-footed scientific
spirit that is at last coming into line with the swift,
unquestioning faith of the mystic. All shades of the
1 E. Recejae, Essay on the Basis of the Mystic Knowledge, trans
lated by S. C. Upton (Kegan Paul & Co., 1899).
F
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THE MYSTICS’ CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
orthodox faith, if they could recognise their true
interest, would thank God, not merely for the strong,
persistent faith of the mystic, which has borne per
petual witness to that for which all religion stands,
but for the latest outcome of modern thought, which,
so far from weakening that faith, is rendering its
essence more impregnable than ever.
See, for example, how even the Agnostic may find
himself fundamentally at one with the mystic. To
Dionysius, the mystic, Negation and Affirmation were
the two appropriate methods for knowledge of the
Infinite. Vaughan says of him—and the words cannot
fail to recall to memory the ever-recurring language of
our modern Agnostics—“ To assert anything concern
ing a God who is above all affirmation is to speak in
a figure—to veil him. The more you deny concerning
him, the more of such veils do you remove. By Nega
tion we approach most nearly to a true apprehension of
what he is.” Thus does the mystic avail himself of
the Agnostic’s most cherished phrases as the fittest
help in the expression of his own deepest faith. God
is regarded as “ the Nameless,” “ the inscrutable
Anonymous.” With all deference to Spencer’s
favourite phrase, “ the Unknowable,” this of the
Nameless and the inscrutable Anonymous is distinctly
superior. It covers the whole difference between the
Agnostic and the mystic. Of the existence of the
eternal reality both are passionately convinced. Both
are prepared to defend it against all shades of mate
rialists. The Agnostic never gets or hopes to get any
nearer to an apprehension of the Infinite Reality. All
his phraseology is the phraseology of despair. When
he has once satisfied himself of its reality, he im
mediately turns his back and retires from its presence
with a wail of hopeless denials. He thus feels himself
for ever debarred from attempting to commune with
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67
the Eternal. The mystic, on the contrary, even with
a similar and reverent refrain of denials, feels himself
drawn ever the nearer to the one object of his faith.
“ I am what is and is not; I am the Soul in All. ”—Jelaleddin, XVI.
Dionysius, with the mystic’s ready gift for similes,
aptly compares his negative method of speaking con
cerning the Supreme, to the operation of the sculptor
who strikes off fragment after fragment of the marble,
and progresses by diminishing. With such an issue as
this before us we must beware of becoming entangled
in the limitations and inadequacies of mere words.
To the true mystic language is but noise. As one of
them said ages ago :—
So long as the bee is outside the petals of the flower it buzzes and
emits sounds ; but when it is inside the flower the sweetness thereof
has silenced and overpowered the bee. Forgetful of sounds and of
itself, it drinks the nectar in quiet. Men of learning, you too are
making a noise in the world; but know the moment you get the
slightest enjoyment of the sweetness of the love of God you will be
like the bee in the flower, inebriated with the nectar of Divine love.
(“Ramakrishna,” Nineteenth Century, August, 1896.)
^hus do the mysticism of thousands of years ago and
the latest generalisation of modern philosophy meet
and join hands in one and the same truth. And as
Professor Wm. James suggests (p. 389):—
What reader of Hegel can doubt that that sense of a perfected Being,
with all its otherness soaked up into itself, which dominates his whole
philosophy, must have come from the prominence in his conscious
ness of mystical moods in most persons kept subliminal ?
Our union with the Divine, then, the truth which
was clasped to their hearts by the mystics with the
first appearance of developed thought, has been con
tributed to directly or indirectly by every nation under
the sun; has at last been slowly, and one might say
almost unwillingly, confessed by the purely scientific
men who were not searching for it; has been acknow
ledged by discerning Christian theologians as the
fundamental principle of their faith; has been finally
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THE MYSTICS’ CONTRIBUTION TO RELIGION
grasped and stated in its most comprehensive form by
the legitimate heirs of all the slow deposits of human
thought, and stands forth challenging the verdict, not
only of philosophers, but of every human being who
chooses to think seriously on the subject, and is
destined, we believe, to provide ultimately a great
eirenicon for all the creeds and cults of the human race.
�Chapter VI.
WANTED—A NEW BUTLER
“ There is in progress a movement vastly more important than
that which is the special concern of the higher criticism, and that is
the total reconstruction of theological theory, in fearless logical
accord with the truth of incarnation.”—“ The Christ of To-day”
It would be interesting to trace the disintegrating
and at the same time illuminating effect which the
general naturalistic view expressed in the preceding
pages has on Church dogma. That must be left for
some future occasion. Meantime, it is distinctly
suggestive to note the confusion and perplexity which
the want of such a view creates in the minds of the
more thoughtful adherents of the Church. The best
minds, of course, feel this most. But it is not often
that we find it so vividly illustrated, and even
admitted, as in a recent work by a representative
theologian.
Dr. Fairbairn, of Mansfield College, has lately
brought his proved ability and insight to bear on a
Philosophy of the Christian Religion. It is one of
many like attempts; and we call attention to this one
here because it is an elaborate effort to apply anew,
in the full light of modern science and criticism, the
famous Analogy of Butler. So faithful is the attempt
at reproduction that the good Bishop’s failures, too,
have been carefully repeated, on a scale proportionate
to the larger material now available for the treatment
of the argument. For, as is well known, Butler
attempted too much. In principle, his argument was
69
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WANTED—A NEW BUTLER
irrefragable. It was a memorable tu quoque to the
Deists of his time. But he accepted to the full the
whole dogmatic framework of the Church, and
deemed it to be his duty to show that even dogmas
that have been quite discarded since were equally in
line with his great analogy. Needless to say, that
was an impossible and futile task.
The Bishop’s natural cast of mind and his reveren
tial study of “ the constitution and course of nature ”
assure us that, in other circumstances and with larger
light, he would have been the first man to hail the
slow, orderly, self-manifestation of God as the one key
to Nature and Religion alike. Unfortunately, the
nearest approach he could make to this larger concep
tion was to “prove,” as he endeavoured to do, that
that special dispensation of Providence, the Christian
Religion, being “ a scheme or system of things carried
on by the mediation of a Divine person, the Messiah,
in order to the recovery of the world,” is analogous
to what is experienced in “ the constitution and course
of Nature.” “ The whole analogy of Nature,” he
says, p. 151, chap. v.,“ removes all imagined presump
tion against the general notion of a Mediator between
God and man. For we find all living creatures are
brought into the world, and their life in infancy is pre
served, by the instrumentality of others; and every
satisfaction of it, in some way or other, is bestowed by
the like means ” !
That is to say, the fact that we are brought into
the world by means of the instrumentality and
mediation of our parents is the good Bishop’s proof,
by analogy, that the theological mediatorship ascribed
to Christ, in the Church’s dogmatic system, is a truth
consonant with all Nature.
The Bishop dug from a rich quarry, and his ground
plan was admirable ! But his architecture is
�WANTED—A NEW BUTLER
71
antiquated, and many of his rooms are long since
deserted.
Dr. Fairbairn adjusts his effort to the new situation,
and fortunately puts the crux of the matter plainly
before his readers. “ The problem of the person of
Christ,” he says, “ is exactly the point in the Christian
religion where the intellect feels overweighted by
mysteries it cannot resolve.” Another question
arises—Is that mystery “ a thing of nature, or is it
a made or manufactured article, a myth which the
logical intellect has woven out of the material offered
by a simple and beautiful story”? The theological
mystery of the person of Christ is undoubtedly “ a
made or manufactured article.” We accept Dr.
Fairbairn’s description of the process of its pro
duction :—
The imaginations [of the early disciples and evangelists], touched
by the enthusiasm of an all-believing love, became creative, and they
saw Jesus as if he had been the Messiah they had hoped he was....
and it needed only the fearless logic of a metaphysical, unscientific
age to identify him with Deity, and resolve his humanity by the
incarnation of the Son of God.
But that process of their imagination, and that logic
of a metaphysical unscientific age, were really uncon
scious vindications of that larger truth, that universal
“ mystery ” in which there is nothing that is “ficti
tious or artificial,” but which is, on the contrary,the
full expression of that unity of the Divine and the
human for which Jesus lived and died.
Under the unconscious shelter of this deeper truth,
the conflicting theological contentions of the Gnostics,
the Arians, and the Athanasians find their explana
tion and their historical justification. Without the
hard-fought decision of the early Councils, this larger
truth would have been lost for ages. Without this
larger truth, waiting its full realisation, the deification
would have remained in the region of pure dogma,
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and lost its fertilising power altogether. At the
present moment this is more apparent than ever
before in the history of Christian theology. Scaf
folding after scaffolding is being taken down, and the
“ building not made with hands, eternal in the
heavens,” and in the heart of man, is being laid bare
to our view, and all the struggles of past ages justified
and made intelligible.
Dr. Fairbairn himself admits that it is not the
Gospel records that supply him with the chief mystery
of the person of Christ:—
It is not Jesus of Nazareth who has so powerfully entered into
history. It is the deified Christ, who has been believed, loved, and
obeyed as the Saviour of the world. The act of apotheosis created the
Christian religion (p. 15).
The question as to the person of Christ is a problem directly raised
by the place he holds and the functions he has fulfilled in the life of
man collectively and individually.
And so boldly does Dr. Fairbairn sum up his solution
of the problem that he says :—
The conception of Christ stands related to history, as the idea of
God is related to nature—i.e., each is in its own sphere the factor of
order and the constitutive condition of a rational system (p. 18).
This is the point where a sober philosophy parts
company with Dr. Fairbairn. For, needless to say,
this is a tremendous contention to maintain. Here
is how he attempts to base his analogy:—
What do the theories of energy and evolution mean but the con
tinuance of the creative process ? But if new forms in biology have
emerged, if from however mean an origin, in a mode however low,
mind once began to be, why may not new and higher types appear in
the modes and forms of being known to history as politics, ethics,
religion ? In other words, may not the very power which determined
the appearance of the form, and the whole course of evolution from
it, determine also the appearance of creative persons in history, and all
the events which may follow from their appearance ? Might we not
describe the failure of the fit or needed man to appear at some supreme
moment as a failure which affects the whole creation ? And would
not the work which he did for God be the measure of the degree of
the Divine presence or quantity of the Divine energy immanent
within him ? It seems fair, then, to conclude that, so far from the idea
of a supernatural person being incompatible with the modern idea of
nature, it is logically involved in it!
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73
Will any tyro in logic pretend that this attempted
analogy from new forms in biology can by any strain
of legitimate reasoning suggest a “ Divine Man,” a
“ stupendous miracle,” as he elsewhere calls Christ ?
The attempt made in this passage is quite unworthy
of Dr. Fairbairn, and absolutely inconsistent with the
profession of his preface. He shuffles and alters the
cards in such a way that, beginning with the innocent
phrase, “ new and higher types,” he passes on to
“ creative persons
then deliberately steps from the
plural into the singular number, “ the fit or needed
man,” which is still, however, conceivable as one of’
an orderly series; and at last boldly “ concludes ” for
“ a supernatural person,” as being “ logically
involved ” in the idea he started with. This is first
to parade a philosophical attitude, and then repudiate
it inch by inch.
Supernatural man—that is to say, man conceived
in terms of the invisible and transcendental—Dr.
Fairbairn apparently cannot bring himself to treat
seriously as an element in philosophy. And yet he
speaks of “the incarnate reason we call man”
(p. 291), and in many passages uses language which
shows how willingly, if he dared, he would utilise this
larger conception if only he could reconcile with it the
idea of “ the ” supernatural person, the “ stupendous
miracle.” Even his friendly reviewer, Dr. Orr, feels
compelled to point out this inconsistency. Referring
to Dr. Fairbairn’s contention for the perfect super
natural personality of Christ (p. 92), Dr. Orr says:—
This is finely put, and undeniably has truth in it. But language
must not conceal from us the fact that this mode of interpreting the
supernatural, however noble, leaves us still a long way from the kind
of supernatural implied in the incarnation, as Dr. Fairbairn would
have us understand it, or in miracles like those of the evangelical
history, as Dr. Fairbairn in a later chapter (pp. 331-5) defends them.
What we have reached so far is the supernatural as a spiritual
principle in nature, but not a supernatural which transcends
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nature, save in the sense in which every man as personal and
ethical is supernatural. The formula applicable to the former—viz.,
that the supernatural is but the natural viewed under a changed
aspect (pp. 56, 307, etc.)—can certainly not be stretched without
amphiboly to cover the supernatural of the Gospel and the Creeds.
Dr. Fairbairn’s idealistic friends will go with him his whole length in
the one contention. They would probably not go with him a single
step in the other.1
Dr. Fairbairn’s comparison of Christ and Buddha
is remarkably well drawn out. We cannot deal with
it here in detail. Sufficient to say, nothing could be
more strained and inconsistent than the quite opposite
conclusions he draws from two cases admittedly so
similar. Here again, Dr. Orr (though, like all his
confreres, without the full courage of his conviction)
says:—
Here we may begin to feel that we are getting on very slippery
ground indeed. There must be interpretation and apotheosis by
the community, but in the case of Buddha, at any rate, that apotheosis
is purely imaginative—fictional. Is it to be presumed that it is the
same with Christ ? Dr. Fairbairn would repel that inference with
his whole soul, but in some of his parallels he comes perilously near
suggesting it.2
And again, referring to Dr. Fairbairn’s appeal to
history as the ultimate verification of the claims of
Christ:—
Might not the same argument, mutatis mutandis, be urged as estab
lishing the truth of the conception of the idealised Buddha ?
For our own part, we accept Dr. Fairbairn’s bracket
ing of creation and incarnation. We are even pre
pared to press the analogy. For, if truly applied, it
is illuminating in the highest degree. But every
analogy that can be consistently drawn from the idea of
creation points not to a single historical event like the
life of Christ, as Dr. Fairbairn contends, but to a fact
as fundamental and universal as creation itself—the
incarnation of God in humanity.
If creation, as the rationale of the material universe,
1 Contemporary Review, September, 1902.
2 Ibid.
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75
be incarnation, as Dr. Fairbairn says—that is to
say, an embodiment of the Divine so far as it goes
—so, the analogy teaches us, incarnation, as the
rationale of the moral and spiritual world, is the
embodiment of the Divine in a sense and to a
degree of which the material universe is only a
pictorial suggestion.
If the promise and potency of all organic life is
enshrined in the germ which science has disclosed as
its secret, so, if the analogy has any force at all, in
that same germ there lies the promise and potency of
all the moral and spiritual life of man.
What the precise method of the Divine inhabitation
may be neither science nor psychology will probably
ever fathom. But in both respects the germ is
possessed by the Divine energy, and all the wondrous
life of man—body, soul, and spirit—lay latent in its
insignificant folds.
It is painfully evident that Dr. Fairbairn feels the
inadequacy of his own attempt to apply the Bishop’s
method to the problem which faces us to-day. It is
this that explains his aspiration after something more
effective than Butler’s Analogy.
11 The time is coming,” he says,“ and we shall hope
the man is coming with it, which shall give us a new
analogy, speaking a more generous and hopeful lan
guage, breathing a nobler spirit, and aspiring to a larger
day than Butler’s.” And the striking thing is that, feel
ing this inadequacy so acutely, he was unable to grasp
the larger analogy when it was put vividly before him.
Dr. Fairbairn came into personal contact in India with
men to whom the larger conception of incarnation is
part of their spiritual being, and it is deeply inte
resting to see how Dr. Fairbairn’s mind was affected
by this contact. He admits frankly that he was both
‘ ‘ illuminated and perplexed ” by it. “It was not that his
�76
WANTED—A NEW BUTLER
previous knowledge of their religion was found to be in
correct or false, but that it was mistaken in its emphasis.”
This is a confession that does Dr. Fairbairn credit,
and it expresses very correctly the exact position of his
mind. He saw the larger truth, and was “ illumi
nated.” He failed to see—or, rather, as we believe, he
could not afford to admit—the radical importance, to a
true philosophy of the Christian religion, of the great
predominant doctrine of India, “ the community of
Gods and men,” as Dr. Fairbairn calls it, or the in
carnation of God in humanity, to give it its proper
name. This is what “ perplexed ” him. “ The Jew,”
he tells us, “ could not conceive how his God could
become incarnate in any man. The Hindu cannot
conceive how any man could be the sole and exclusive
incarnation of God. He thinks of God as incarnate
in every man and in all forms of life. In so thinking
he makes incarnation in the Christian sense impos
sible ; and, by deifying everything, he undeifies all.”
Evidently, according to Dr. Fairbairn, we may have
too much of the Divine! But “ what God hath
cleansed, that call not thou common ”! So what God
has glorified by his presence, that call not thou
common or undeified, else you fly in the face of that
very Scripture whose letter you so magnify.
This truth requires no twisted or strained analogies
to support it. Its perfect analogy with all Nature is
complete. Dr. Fairbairn constantly flutters around it,
but can never fling himself on it, or tear himself
away from his great presupposition. He can say in
one passage that “ the reason that is in man is one
with the universal reason.” But for the practical
purpose of his philosophy that is a forbidden fruit to
him. He is afraid to pluck it, but cannot keep his
eyes off it. Or, to change the metaphor, he is like the
timid bather who cannot trust himself beyond the
�WANTED—A NEW BUTLER
77
solid footing to which he has been accustomed, having
no faith that the sea, the apparently yielding sea, can
ever support him.
♦
The incarnation of God in all men, the manifestation of the Creator
in the whole race he had created, might be an arguable position, but
not its rigorous and exclusive individuation or restriction to a single
person, out of all the infinite multitude of millions who have lived, are
living, or are to live. In some such manner the understanding, by
means of its keen, dexterous logic, might argue that “the ” incarnation
was a mere fictitious and artificial mystery.
, We feel, after reading such a passage, that the
writer is really envying the “ arguable position ” and
the “ keen dexterous logic ” to which he somewhat
cynically refers. His dogmatic presupposition blinds
him to the fact that this larger doctrine of incarnation
is implicit, and in some places quite explicit, in his
own faith, as that faith was taught by the Founder
himself.
To surrender what he has no better name for than
“ the metaphysical conception of Christ,” and to hail
in its place this great spiritual dynamic fact, would
not only have fed his own spirit, but satisfied his
intellect and proclaimed the essential truth of all
religion.
Dr. Fairbairn, when stating “ the problem,” in his
opening chapter, speaks of the “mass of intricate
complexities and incredibilities ” which surround the
orthodox view of the person of Christ. And after
letting “ the dexterous logician ” speak for himself, he
says:—
The dexterous logician is not the only strong intellect which has
tried to handle the doctrine. The contradictions which he translates
into rational incredibilities must either have escaped the analysis of
men like Augustine or Aquinas, or have been by their thought
transcended and reconciled in some higher synthesis. It is a whole
some thing to remember that the men who elaborated our theologies
were at least as rational as their critics, and that we owe it to
historical truth to look at their beliefs with their eyes (p. 13).
We accept the spirit of Dr. Fairbairn’s reference to
these ancient authorities. There is a higher synthesis.
'
*
�78
WANTED—A NEW BUTLER
It by no means follows that they had seized it. There
is not necessarily any presumption in maintaining
that these “ rational incredibilities,” of which Dr.
Fairbairn speaks, have gradually forced modern
thought towards a synthesis that, pin its simplicity,
universality, and spiritual power, gives them all their
due place, and preserves, for the higher life of man,
all the truth which they contained. Illusion and
tentative dogma have formed a large element in the
moral and spiritual progress of man, Christian and
pagan alike! We can only reconcile the confused
attitude of Dr. Fairbairn in this whole book by
suggesting that, to use a modern phrase, his subs
liminal consciousness is loaded with the true higher
synthesis which we here emphasise, but that his
logical faculties are enlisted in the defence of the
orthodox conceptions. He frequently writes as if
under the influence of the former, but perpetually
falls into the meshes of the latter.
We commend to Dr. Fairbairn and his whole school
the following from the Master of Balliol’s latest
exposition. We know of no philosophical pronounce
ment, in recent times, that means so much for the
future of Christian thought, and that says what it
means in plainer and less pugnacious language:—
From the beginning Christianity involved a new conception of the
relation of God to man. But this conception Was at first an unde
veloped germ—a germ of which the whole history of thought from that
time has been a development. It was the idea of God in man, and
man, by a supreme act of self-surrender, finding the perfect realisation
of himself as the son and servant of Go<t- It was this as embodied in
an individual, to whom others might attach themselves, and by this
attachment participate in the same life....... The issue of the contro
versy (of the early centuries) at the moment was the assertion of the
unity of Divinity and humanity in Christ, but this issue was deprived
of a great part of its meaning, in so far as it was confined to Christ
alone, and in so far as the unity was regarded, not as a unity realised
in the process of the Christian life, but a unity that existed indepen
dently of any process whatever. The imperfection of this result was
explained by the necessity that the principle of unity of the human
and the Divine should be asserted, ere it could be worked out to any
�WANTED—A NEW BUTLER
79
further consequences. Christ was the one crucial instance, which, if
it could be maintained as real, must inevitably determine the whole
* issue. And if one man, living such a life of self-sacrifice for mankind,
was in perfect unity with God, so that his consciousness of himself
could be taken as the Divine self-consciousness, then must not the
same be true of all who followed in the same road
In that case,
the highest goodness was shown to be only the realisation of an ideal
which every human soul, as such, bears with it.
There is the true philosophic ring. There is the
true rationalising of the Christian religion, showing it
to be, when rightly understood, in perfect harmony
with the whole “ constitution and course of Nature.”1
If Dr. Fairbairn could have assimilated an inclusive
principle, such as we have endeavoured to set forth,
instead of the absolutely exclusive doctrine which
forms the assumption of his book, he would not have
been merely “ perplexed ” by what he saw and heard
in India—he would have had his whole philosophy
widened and rationalised, and would have been able
to proclaim a far greater Analogy than Butler’s, in a
♦ universal truth which, once it is really seen, finds a
response in the human spirit everywhere. He would
have proved himself a pioneer in a movement which,
sooner or later, must secure the spiritual sympathies,
as *®ell as the philosophic acceptance, of Western
« Europe. Dr. Fairbairn, in this great undertaking,
has *lost his chance, and completely fails in the
* * philosophical ” task to which he set himself. Will
any candid reader maintain that such argument as Dr.
^Faii^irn’s book contains induces him to believe that
human history, ancient and modern, “ has no meaning
apart from Christa in the sense in which Nature is
unintePljgible without God ” ? That is the demand
which Dr. Fairbairn makes on our reason.
We can only conclude by saying that, while he has
adde$ yet another to the innumerable apologies for
(rlasgow Gifford Lectures.
*
*
�WANTE0—A NEW B%TLEE .
the Christian dogmatic system, he has made more >
patent than ever the impossibility of framing a con
sistent “ philosophy ” of that dogmatic system as it at
present stands. The larger Analogy he prays for is
ready to our hand * and Dr. Fairbairn might have
been the modern Butler.
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PRINTED BY WATTS AND CO., I7, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C
�By the same Author.
■ “A RELIGION THAT WILL WEAR."
SECOND EDITION.
Some Personal Opinions.
Professor MAX MULLER.
“A book with most of which I fully agree, and from which I have
learned a great deal. ”
STOPFORD BROOKE,
“I think it will do a great deal of good among laymen, more proI bably than any authorised preacher is likely to do. Things are faced
not in the conventional manner, and without the catchwords of the
mere theologian. I am glad to see the book, and wish it God-speed.”
i
PROTAP CHUNDER MOZOOMDAR, Leader
of
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“I must beg your forgiveness for writing to such length. Believe
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PRINCIPAL STORY.
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Mk
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“The high-water mark of lay thought in theology.”
Professor MENZIES, St. Andrews.
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Presbyterian laity.”
PRINCIPAL HODGSON, Edinburgh.
“A remarkably interesting and significant little book,”
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“I am sure that it will do much good. The spirit of the book is.
excellent. It is written with great intelligence, and every subject is
treated with marked moderation. There is not a canting statement
in it, from beginning to end.”
Dr. STRONG, Melbourne.
“ ‘ A Layman ’ shows an intimate knowledge of theology, such as
many clergymen do not possess. It is an honest attempt to get down
to the bed-rock of religion, and to show that religion and Christ abide
in the deepest and truest elements of human life, though theology
may change and critics re-write the Bible.”
ROBERT BIRD, Author of Jesus the Carpenter, Joseph the
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„ It is a valuable contribution to practical Christianity for thinking
men, and should place some wavering feet on solid ground. I am
delighted that a layman life myself should have read so widely and
reflected so deeply about things over which the fogs of theology have hung
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London: JAMES CLARKE & CO.
�By the same Author.
“A RELIGION THAT WILL WEAR."
SECOND EDITION.
A Few Press Notices.
GLASGOW HERALD.
“ The writer reflects the attitude of many thoughtful and religious
minds towards the Churches and the Christian Faith.”
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“ It is a clearly-stated and interesting discourse, which meets the
objections raised by philosophy and science to revealed religion,
and offers an acutely reasoned and well-informed, if perhaps not
definitely conclusive, intellectual justification of the message of Jesus."
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the essential and the dispensable which is a chief qualification for
work of this kind. ”
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“ The book is an eirenicon, addressed to unbelievers. It should be
read by believers also.”
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“Thoroughly modern in spirit, and thoroughly religious also;
wholly free from all bonds to theological formulas, it presents the
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London: JAMES CLARKE & CO.
�
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Haeckel's contribution to religion
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Philosophy
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PDF Text
Text
How and Why lam a Unitarian.
A LECTURE
BY
J. FREDERICK SMITH,
Minister of
the
1 1
u
Elder Yard Chapel,
Chesterfield,
(Late of the Baptist Chapel, George-Street, Hull,')
Delivered
in the
Bowlalley-Lane Chapel, Hull,
On Sunday Evening, April 12th, 1874.
.....
'.
------- J--------
,
I
HULL:
Sold by J. S. Harrison, Bookseller, 48, Eowgate ;
And at the Chapel Vestry.
CHESTERFIELD :
Sold by J. Toplis, “ Courier” Office, High-Street.
1874
Jj’rice Sixpence.
I
�J
�How and Why I am a Unitarian.
A question very analogous to that we have to consider
to-night is, How and Why am I a Christian ? The two
questions are alike in several respects. It is exceedingly
rare that any number of thoughtful persons agree in their
definition of what Christianity is. The name Christian is
an old historic name of very wide and very various signifi
cance. It can be borne by religious people of very dis
similar, or even of opposite,' theological and moral ten
dencies.
It follows from the compass of the name
Christian, that men call themselves Christians for reasons
as various as the senses in which they appropriate the
name. Those amongst them who are not charitably dis
posed, deny to the larger number of their would-be brothers
the right to use the distinction. The charitable con
fess amongst themselves that no definition of Christianity, t
and no classification of the only valid reasons for professing
•it ought to be attempted. Our reasons for being Christians
are very personal as well as our definition of what con
stitutes a Christian. It is not surprising, therefore, to find
that not a few minds prefer greatly to answer the question,
How and Why am I a Christian ? not directly and ex
plicitly, but indirectly and implicitly. They prefer not to
define Christianity or to formulate the reasons of their ad
�4
herence to it: a reply to the question more congenial to
their ideas and feelings would be found by an examination
of some of the living elements of Christianity and of their
own spiritual necessities. They would thus avoid much un
profitable and repulsive historical and dogmatic discussion,
while at the same time they would probably come much
nearer the real heart and true import of the question.
The question proposed by my lecture, How and Why
I am a Unitarian ? appears to me to be in precisely the
same case. We most of us know many senses in which we
are not Unitarians. Some people are Unitarians because
the Bible they think teaches Unitarianism : but certainly I
should be a Unitarian if the Bible had been an earlier
edition of Calvin’s Institutes. Some people are Unitarians
because they hold that the doctrine of the Divine Unity is
the doctrine of the standing or falling church ; yet I am of
those who were I a Manichean or Zoroastrian on this head,
should still class myself with the bearers of the Unitarian
name. Like the word Christian, it is a historic name with
no precise dogmatic import, but on the contrary of a wide
popular meaning, including amongst its bearers men of very
unlike, often of opposite, feelings and views on very im
portant topics. I will ask you, therefore, to permit me to
deal indirectly and implicitly with the question before us
rather than by the method of strict definition and formal
proof. This method will, I believe, enable us to come upon
what are to many amongst us the really valid reasons for
belonging to churches which are commonly described as
Unitarian.
The substance of the answer to the question before us
which I have to return to-night is this : As a religious man
I stand in great need of certain assistance from religious
association ; this assistance is refused by the churches which
are founded upon authority, but is at least to some extent
�5
supplied by the Unitarian or Free Churches which acknow
ledge no higher authority than the individual reason and
conscience.
A man’s religion is that which he most sacredly loves
and seeks: his profoundest desires, his best and most in
vincible tendencies, the deepest springs of his best feelings,
constitute his religion. Now, some amongst us cannot
overcome, and dare not now attempt to overcome, the deep
desire to come into the right relation and attitude towards
all that is not ourselves—God, Man, Nature ; to use and
cultivate fully all that is ourselves—the powers' of our
nature ; and to fulfil the duties that arise from our consti
tution and our relation to things beyond ourselves. The
religious association that will help us to attain this attitude
towards what is without and to use and perfect what is
within, is an association that feeds and sustains our religious
life : it will be our church, even if it renders but imperfect
help.' On the other hand, the association that throws itself
in the way of our deep longing in these respects comes into
collision with our religion, retards and hinders what we count
the highest and holiest attainment.
Let me explain a little more fully the nature of this
deep religious necessity.
Our acquaintance with Nature is at present com
paratively slight; but it is sufficient to call forth admira
tion, wonder, and gladness, mingled with fear and reserve.
Our attitude towards her must be one of reverent enquiry ;
at present we cannot look upon all her ways with satis
faction. At times we could almost worship her, but not
infrequently we are tempted to curse her. Now and here
she is a loving mother to her children ; but then and there
she is a cruel step-mother. We know her at present as a
being half-divine and half-demonic. Our attitude towards
her is a mixture of confidence and dread, while we wait to
�6
know more. The church that condemns this attitude by
authority, in some form or other, not showing us why we
ought to abandon it, cannot help us. We know that we
must respect Nature and study her assiduously ; and we ask
for aid to maintain, in the face of strong temptation to the
contrary, this attitude of respect and enquiry, until fuller
knowledge may exhaust the revelation and sanction a
new at-titude.
Our knowledge of 'Man shares the imperfection of our
knowledge of Nature. Great questions upon which ancient
churches had formal and final dogmas have of late been re
opened, and many of them answered anew, and in the very
teeth of the received authoritative answers. I refer to such
enquiries as those into the origin of man, the unity of man
kind, the mental, moral, and religious endowments of the
various races of mankind, the history of religious and of
moral ideas. The attitude we feel bound to take up in re
ference to Man with such questions as these still open, is
one of profound interest mingled with reserve and eager
enquiry. Not only shall we feel unable to attach any value
to an authoritative dictum as to man’s history and nature,
but we shall feel compelled to reject any one-sided theory
which will not consider all the facts known, and any final
dogma which will not acknowledge that we are at present
but just commencing an acquaintance with the facts. How
could a church assist us in one of the profoundest instincts
of our hearts—to study mankind, if she opposed that study,
either by laying down a theory which rendered it un
necessary, or by condemning some of the established con
clusions of science?
Just as our present knowledge of Nature and of Man
is deficient, so our faith in God waits for completion and
greater strength. At present our faith is sufficient to produce
adoration and trust, but it stands in great need of accessions
,
�7
both to its fulness and vigour. Our theology is our most
precious treasure, but its jewels are yet uncut and its gold
is u,ncoined. We feel rich in possession of it, and would
die rather than resign it, yet we cannot define it. ' Our
attitude towards God is that of profound reverence and
trust, which does not preclude but rather commands earnest
enquiry. How could that church assist us religiously that
requires the acceptance of final views of the nature and
character of God ?
Let us now turn for a moment to those duties that
arise from the possession of personal endowments and the
relation we sustain to God and Nature and each other.
Xhey give rise to great religious necessities which the true
church ought to satisfy to some degree.
As men we are endowed with powers of thought and
feeling, and the means of using them for ourselves and
others have been put within our reach. These are all
talents that must be employed and not left to lie idle.
If we take the intellect, we may observe that one of
the deepest rooted and most ineradicable sins of our nature
is love of ease, which shows itself especially in our dislike
of hard and continuous thinking. Another sin is often
associated with this of intellectual idleness: it is the sin of
indulging ourselves in pleasant theories and beliefs: a fatal
facility in acquiring and tenacity in holding notions that
make u's happy, with the corresponding slowness to receive
any idea that is unpleasant. These two sins together are
the evil genius of the intellect: they are the fruitful source
of moral and mental ruin in innumerable cases. And the
man who is at all alive to the strength of the temptation
that will assail him from this quarter earnestly seeks help
from those who are stronger and more faithful to the God
who gave them reason than he himself is. He seeks a
church that will drive him to think when thought is
�8
wearisome and when it leads to painful results. His
church must be no bulwark of authority for the faint
hearted who are afraid of thought, no retreat for the weary
who are tired of thought, and least of all a. castle of in
dolence for the idle who will not think.
The culture of our emotions is not of less importance
than the culture of our intellects. Our emotions branch
off into several directions. They are directed towards our
fellow creatures who can appreciate and return them,
towards objects of beauty and grandeur, or towards what
is right and noble in conduct. Now, whether they take the
form of affection, or conscience, or taste, they are in all
cases great endowments capable of wide and fruitful cul
ture. All three forms are essential parts of our nature,
neither of them can remain in neglect without serious in
jury to our character and manhood. Whenever one of them
has been allowed to usurp the place of the rest, individuals,
and society have greatly suffered. Conscience must not
frown down the love of beauty; the love of beauty must
not proceed to sacrifice the sanctity and chastity of affec
tion ; nor may affection disregard the rights of conscience
and pleasures of taste. They are all instincts and powers
which the reverent man will fear to slight; they all deliver
a revelation of higher things when their language is under
stood ; their development is the growth of the individual
and the wealth of society. But it is hard to keep the
balance between such closely allied powers quite true ; and
here, as everywhere, the root-evil of idleness bears poisonous
fruit. Who will help us to train and cultivate our emotions
with wisdom and due care ? The church that will recognise
some of them only, that will condemn others, and destroy
the harmony between them by over-estimating more, is not
the church we need. Within ourselves there is enough of this
unwisdom : we seek those who will help us to get rid of it.
�9
'
These powers of intellect and feeling have been put
v into the hands of creatures who can use them for their own
and other’s good. We have endowments, and we must
apply them. This application of them is attended with
great difficulty. It is a difficult matter to know what is
good for ourselves and others ; and when we know, it is
difficult to do. All about us we see men pursuing wrong
courses of action. Much of the benevolent conduct of men
* is weak, twisted, whimsical; it lacks rationality and thorough
usefulness. Still more is our conduct when directed to our
own interests devoid of reasonableness and adaptation : we
are ignorant of what we really want; we are led by impulse
or by custom : our manners and habits, our pursuits add
occupations, our acquaintance and friends, are largely deter
mined by accident and whim. We call aloud to the wise
and strong for help to assist us in attaining right, rational,
and noble conduct. Our church must be composed of souls
that have at least some help to render in this our need.
We now turn from a brief review of some of the
necessities which a church must satisfy to some extent if it
can be a church to us, to enquire which of the churches
around us meets our wants. Now, there is one vital dis
tinction which will divide the whole of the churches around
us into two separate classes, and leave us free to disregard
i the well nigh innumerable minor distinctions amongst them.
This distinction is that of authority or private judgment ;
and it gives us two groups of churches ; on the one hand,
the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Protestant Churches,
and, on the other, the Undogmatic Free Churches. Roman
Catholic and Orthodox Protestants are alike in this, that
they fall back as their last resource upon some authority
outside the individual reason and conscience, either upon a
church or a book. The Undogrqatic Free Churches, whether
called Unitarian,, Free Christian, Theistic, or by no name at
�IO
all, agree in this, that higher than any authority without is
the living, personal judge within. Neglecting the less
fundamental differences that distinguish them, this common
characteristic of Rome and the Reformed Churches justifies
us in classifying them all together so far as regards the
requirements we put upon our church.
All these churches of authority at some stage or other
obstruct enquiry and growth by the introduction of some
authoritative and final doctrine or model : here it may be
a creed, there a book ; here a canonised saint, there a re
ligious founder; but the difference of form makes no
essential difference in the reality: an authoritative dogma
limits enquiry, and an authoritative life limits personal and
social development. The holiest necessity of our nature is
to enquire in all directions until our intellect is satisfied ;
to cultivate and train all our faculties and emotions without
restraint until they find their true rest in perfection and full
activity ; and to pursue any course of conduct whatsoever
that our reason and conscience may command. But these
churches meet us at some critical point of our intellectual
enquiries with dogmas and theories which have ultimately
no other claim to be received than the supposed infallibility
of their propouriders. So far from assisting us to maintain
perfect loyalty to reason and intelligence, and aiding us to
overcome thebesetting sins of idleness and selfish wilfulness
in thinking, they either forbid the exercise of the intellect
upon all subjects, or they concede its unavoidable demands
suspiciously and grudgingly. Not less do they impose
restraints upon the full and free development of human
nature. Their ideal of humanity was conceived in an un
cultivated and decrepid age : it lacks essential elements of
a full, rounded manhood ; many excresences and deformities
cling to it. Their ideal of society is equally imperfect, their
kingdom of heaven becoming every age less adapted for re-
�II
velation upon the earth. Through all history the social
and political instincts of the best citizen have met with ob
structiveness rather than assistance from these churches.
They have assiduously cultivated some of the virtues of
the good citizen, such as submission to authority, content
ment under suffering, but upon other and still more essential
virtues, such as independence, resistance to injustice, love
of enquiry, they have put their bann. And some of the
vices that have weakened society, such as improvidence,
uncharitableness, untruthfulness, have been sometimes in
directly fostered at others. openly sanctioned as divine.
This authoritative and final model of manhood and society
is commonly imposed by these churches either as the in
fallible teaching or the perfect model of life granted to men
at the commencement of our era.
Having an ideal of man and society that descends
from the remote past when both men and society were in
important respects unlike what they now are,, it can hardly
be expected of these churches that they should be able
either to wisely direct or morally strengthen the conduct of
the individual-^vho is seeking counsel and support. They
do not really know what in our day is the one thing need
ful ; nor if they knew would their theory of human nature
permit them to supply the real strength and motive that
are required. The lives that have been formed, and the
conduct that has been directed by them, have not been of
' the type that we can to-day pronounce exemplary. The
lives of priests and ecclesiastics may be taken as indicative
of the real nature and tendency of ecclesiastical character
and aims. These lives are devoted enough, but the devo
tion is to wrong objects, and is not distinguished for its
sanity and fair, strong manliness. The course of conduct
and prevailing characteristics of the chosen saints of all
these churches have been deformed more or less by inhuman
�12
other-worldliness, and want of clear intellectual sanity and
vigour. The lives of St. Augustine, St. Francis of Assisi,
Luther, Calvin, John Wesley, cannot be considered as model
and complete lives by those who know how great Heathen
have lived and what Shakespeare and Goethe have taught.
They are the lives of saints protesting against nature rather
than conforming to her highest requirements. The work
they accomplished needed to be done, but their fitness to
do it rendered them unfit to become models of human
character. Their time was out of joint, and they were
born to set it right: but their ability to do this made them
more unfit than a Hamlet to represent human nature
generally. Without doubt in a sick and despairing age,
their course of conduct and character had great charms for
the hopeless; yet we have more and stronger faith than to
believe that the wants of a diseased period of human life
are the normal wants of mankind, or that the regimen of
sick men should be adopted as the law of their lives by
those who are whole. Memento mori is for some few a
needful sermon, but the greater and more general need of
men is to hear the admonition, Memento vivere !
An enquirer for a church who brings with him such
demands as we have been considering, will not, therefore,
find his church in this first class of authoritative com
munities. He will find that they have determined for him
another attitude towards nature, man, and God, than that
which he holds to be the only true and reverent one ; that
they have laid their bann upon conduct and pursuits which
are to him essential parts of his religion ; that they present i
commands for his obedience and examples for his imitation
which he must deem to lack authority, and to be either
useless or injurious. Turning his face from Catholicism
and Orthodox Protestantism, he will come to the few Free
Undogmatic Churches that are around him, with the hope
�13
of finding there help amidst his struggles after a higher life.
Not that amongst the millions who belong nominally to
these churches of authority, there are not thousands who
are seeking just what he seeks : this he is happy to believe,
and thankful to know personally some of them. It is the
legitimate and prevailing tendency and influence of the
churches only which he must pronounce opposed tawhat
he thinks is best and holiest.
The Undogmatic Free Churches to which we now turn,
have this characteristic in common, that they acknowledge
no external authority as entitled to command the opinions
or the conduct of others. They propose to no one any
final and unalterable views of nature, man, and God; they
set up no absolute 'ideal of manhood, which all men every
where, and in all ages, are tp acknowledge as divine. They
do not map out with unalterable lines the course of any
man’s pilgrimage to heaven.
They know nothing of
eternal plans and schemes of salvation. They rather hold
that the beginning of salvation and holiness is in the
individual’s 'practical recognition of the responsibility that
is laid upon him to think for himself, to shape his own con
duct, and to cultivate any power God has given him. On
this point they all speak with fervour and give no uncertain
sound ; but on the great mass of philosophical and theolo
gical dogmas their opinion is divided and uncertain. They
urge upon men by precept and personal influence that their
holiest duty is to think, and to think earnestly and man
fully ; to make the best use they can of any faculty they
possess, training it to its highest perfection ; and to live
a life as far removed from an ignoble and selfish worldliness
as from the pursuit of irrational and useless projects.
On minor points these churches differ greatly amongst
themselves. They have no common name. They are
called Unitarian, Free'Christian, Theistic; and some of
�14
them have no name at all. In most cases the name is not
a dogmatic description, but merely a .convenient and
customary appellation.. This, I take it, is the case with
the name Unitarian. Our chapels are called Unitarian
Chapels, and our ministers Unitarian Ministers, not be
cause we care particularly whether Trinitarian arithmetic is
correct or incorrect. We found our separation from ortho
dox Christianity upon a principle and not upon a dogma,
that principle being independence of external authority.
Again, these churches have no organisation which
unites them into one ecclesiastical body. They are the
most purely congregational of all congregational churches.
There is not even a common association that unites them
all. This leaves each separate congregation absolutely free
to pursue its own line of thought, and to develope its own
type of character, and follow its own tendencies to action.
They differ in still more important respects. The
position which they assign to the Bible amongst books, and
to Jesus Christ amongst men, are very various. While
they agree in ascribing superiority to the Bible and to Jesus
only to the extent to which their reason is convinced, the
measure of this superiority is of a very varying scale.
Some would rank the Bible above all literatures, while
others put but a low value upon some of its books, and
would not place any of them highest in human literature.
So, too, with respect to Jesus. His character and work are
very variously estimated. To not a few He is a son of
God as no other man has been, while there are others
who consider Him as but one amongst other greatest
religious leaders.
'
Not less undogmatic are these churches with respect
to theology proper, or the doctrine of God. They have no
formulated statement of their faith on this great article.
Each enquirer is left free to form his own ideas of God.
�i5
If his tendencies are towards a pure theism, he will find
fellow believers ; if he shrinks from ascribing human attri
butes to the Infinite, he will find that he is by no means
alone. And whether his religious associates agree with
him in his theology or not, they will urge him to be true to
his own light and proclivities.
Based upon this great principle of free unfettered en
quiry, these churches also leave their members free to cul
tivate their own powers as they deem wise, and to put forth
their energies in whatever direction and to whatever pur
pose they think useful.
The influences of these free
societies may feed the springs of character and activity,
but they do not force the streams to flow in any prescribed
channels. Special ecclesiastical work is not cut out for their
members as the only or chief work of God. They do not
recognise the distinction between the church and the con
gregation, and they dare not call any human avocation or
pursuit unholy and profane. They wish to enable men to
do with all the might of religious fervour whatsoever their
hands find to do. All days are holy days, all work is
worship, all earnest effort is prayer and praise, every
service of our kind is a consecrated ministry, every legiti
mate act of nature is an act of grace. Thus members of
these congregations are left as free'to act for themselves as
to think for themselves; they may form their own ideal of
manhood as well as their own theology; they may choose
any spot on God’s earth as their field of labour, and cul
tivate it with what means and in what manner they think
best. Their religious associates do not command them
what to do, but simply to do what they do well.
Based upon this great principle of individual freedom
and responsibility, and possessing this practical breadth
and divergency of ideas and aims, these churches appear
to me to present religious association in a form which may
�be made really and truly helpful. A small number of souls
possessed with the deep religious desire to stand right with
God, nature, their fellow creatures, and themselves, will not
be hindered by the constitution of such free associations ;
and the one religious bond that binds them together supplies
the positive force which will make them mutually helpful.
The mere fact of association upon such a basis gives im
mense strength to each member of it. The moment I know
that those with whom I meet are possessed with the same
sacred open-minded desire as myself to stand right with
themselves and God, my own desire has acquired a vast
accession of strength and support. The connexion with a
society of men who are seeking the good and the true sus
tains us amidst the temptations of life. And these societies
not only admit but seek out earnest and fearless preachers
of whatever truth has been laid upon their hearts as genuine
and of worth. If a man has anything to say, and can say
it plainly, he will be not only patiently but gladly heard.
Thus the simple but powerful elements of all* helpful
association are. to be found in these churches : they have
the sympathy of the like-minded and the animating and
enlightening word of the speaker. These elements were
the only essential conditions of that little church in
Galilee, of another later at Mecca, and of one earlier than
either on the banks of the Ganges. While the churches of
Buddha, Jesus, and Mohammed, were simple associations of
like-minded men with a speaker at their head, they were
living sources of strength and inspiration to their members ;
when they had hardened into ecclesiastical organisations,
they became the source of bondage and weakness. Their
simplicity was their strength. So is it with these Free
Congregations. They have no organisation beyond the
simplest arrangement for securing a chapel and the few
services connected with it. The whole influence for good.
�17
of the association is to come from the simple source of
personal communion and alliance ‘in devotional acts and
holy desires, and the exhortation of a brother man.
It seems to me that these societies contain constitu
tionally neither too much nor too little to render the assis
tance which we have seen to be requisite. Of course I know
well that many of them fall miserably short of what they
ought to be. Some of them are untrue to the name they bear
and the very principles upon which they are founded. But
the fault lies in the particular exceptions themselves, not in
the principles upon which they were established ; and the
generality of them are, I believe, in fact, as well as in name,
vehicles of vast moral and religious assistance to those who
are connected with them. And, what is of great importance,
these churches are so constituted, that they are capable of
adaptation to new needs and of indefinite improvement.
They can be made whatever the members who compose
them desire to make them. Everything about them is flexi
ble and expansive. Their past history has been one of steady
but continuous change and progress. They have gone on
to find out gradually the depth and compass of their great
fundamental principle of personal freedom and responsi
bility ; they have gone on gradually to widen their con
ceptions of man’s true attitude towards the great facts and
mysteries around him ; they have gone on gradually to
learn that in conduct sanctity is allied to sanity, that human
righteousness is a sweet and noble reasonableness, that one
mission of. the Messiah was to cast out the legions of *
irrational and whimsical demons that twisted the minds
and perplexed the imaginations of religious people.
Here or nowhere, it appears to me, we have the •
lost church restored. In the middle ages men fabled
that God’s church had been lost-—sunk into the depths
of the sea, vanished from the worldly eye within the gloom
�i8
of impenetrable forests. The spiritual ear could indeed be
surprised by the long lost sounds of holy hymns and chants
coming up from mid ocean or stealing from the depths of
holy woods ; but to the outward worldly eye, the sacred
edifice was lost. Personally, I must confess, that that fable
has long been truth to me. The outward church of God
has been lost. But for the inward ear of the spiritual man
there is still audible here and there, far away from ecclesias
tical splendour and carnality, the sweet, tones of bell and
organ and choir, telling us that still the house of God is
with us, that wherever two or three are gathered together
in His name, He is in the midst of them to bless them.
Only He cannot be with any of us unless we are true to
ourselves and the light He has given us!
KIRK, PRINTER, CHAPEL-LANE, HULL.
���
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How and why I am a Unitarian: a lecture
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” A.< EXTRA SERIES.
“Bold and Bright
NEW
CATECHISM
M. M. MANGASARIAN
Lecturer of Independent Religious Society of Chicago
WATTS & CO.,
17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.
[issued for the
rationalist press association, limited]
No. 5 of this Series is CHARLES T. GORHAM’S “ETHICS OF THE
GREAT RELIGIONS”
�THE
RATIONALIST PRESS ASSOCIATION
(Limited).
[Founded 1899.]
Chairman—GEORGE JACOB HOLYOAKE.
Honorary Associates:
Leonard Huxley
Prof. W. C. van Manen
Eden Phillpotts
J. M. Robertson
W. R. Washington Sullivan
Prof. Ed. A. Westermarck
Thomas Whittaker
M. Berthelot
Paul Carus, Ph.D.
Edward Clodd
Stanton Coit, Ph.D.
W. C. Coupland, D.Sc., M.A.
F. J. Furnivall, M.A., Ph.D., D.Litt.
F. J. Gould
Prof. Ernst Haeckel
't
Bankers :
The London City and Midland Bank, Ltd., Blackfriars Branch, London, S.E.
Auditors:
Messrs. Woodburn Kirby, Page, & Co., Chartered Accountants, I, Laurence Pountney Hill,
London, E.C.
•
Secretary and Registered Offices:
Charles E. Hooper, 5 and 6, Johnson’s Court, Fleet Street, London, E.C.
A
All who approve of the publication, in a cheap and popular form, of works
such as the present Reprint can help to produce them, and can join in a systematic
propaganda for encouraging free inquiry and sober reflection, and repudiating
irrational authority.
These are the objects of the R. P. A. (The Rationalist Press
Association, Ltd.).
The Members of this Association have banded themselves
together, not with any view to commercial gain, but solely to promote sound
reasoning and the growth of reasoned truth, as essential to the welfare and
progress of humanity.
Should these aims commend themselves to your judgment
you should apply at once for full particulars to
,
The Secretary,
R. P. A., Ltd.,
5 and 6, Johnson’s Court, Fleet Street,
London, E.C.
�N46 6
1 NEW tAWCHISM
�1
We baptise the twentieth century in the name of Peace, Liberty, and Progress!
We christen her—the People’s Century. We ask of the new century a Religion
without superstition; Politics without war; Science and the arts without
materialism; and wealth without misery or wrong 1
j
]
�A NEW CATECHISM
M. M. MANGASARIAN,
Lecturer of Independent Religious Society of Chicago
“ Our growing thought makes growing revelation.”—Geobqe Eliot.
“ Believe it, my good friends, to love truth for truth’s sake is the principal part
of human perfection in this world and the seed-plot of all other virtues.”—Tighk-r-
[iSSUED FOB THE RATIONALIST PRESS ASSOCIATION, LIMITED]
WATTS & CO.,
17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.
1904
��Ml' '
INTRODUCTION
BY GEORGE JACOB HOLYOAKE
The author of this book, M. M. Mangasarian—an Armenian
by descent—has the distinction of being the Lecturer of the
Independent Religious Society of Chicago. He is said to
enchant by his addresses a weekly concourse of some two
thousand persons—the largest congregation, having regard to
quality, known in any country. We have larger religious
congregations in England, but they are swelled by the children
of Dogma. Mr. Mangasarian’s audiences are composed of the
children of Reason, of spiritual and ethical inquirers—a much
rarer race. The Open Court Publishing Company, of the lively
and tumultuous city of Chicago, has issued several editions
of this book for the convenience of American readers. The
Rationalist Press Association has, I think, usefully resolved to
give to the readers of Great Britain an equal opportunity of
possessing this new and original Catechism.
The most difficult form of literary composition, which has the
quality of interesting the reader, is undoubtedly a Catechism.
The author must be an expert diver in the deep sea of polemical
thought to recover essential facts, hidden in those depths. A
Catechism is a short and easy method of obtaining definite know
ledge. There are only two persons on the stage—the Questioner
and the Answerer. A good Questioner is a distinct creation.
He must know what information to ask for. If he be irrelevant,
he is useless; if he be vague, he is impracticable. The Answerer
must be master of the subject investigated, and definite in ex
pression. “ The New Catechism ” has these qualities. It is the
boldest, the brightest, the most varied and informing of any
' M
�6
INTRODUCTION
work of the kind extant. The principal fields of human
knowledge, which the Churches have fenced round with super
natural terrors, the Catechism breaks into, cherishing what is
fair and showing what has been deformed. The notes, of
which there are many, referring both to ancient and contem
porary sources, are as striking as the text. The book is a
cyclopaedia of theology and reason in a nutshell.
The Questioning Spirit, whose curiosity has for its wholesome
object the verification of truth, is the most effectual instrument
of knowledge available to mankind. A well-directed question is
like a pickaxe—it liberates the gold from the superincumbent
quartz. Whole systems of error sometimes fall to the ground
from the force of unanswerable questions. All error has contra
diction in it, which is revealed by a relevant inquiry, when an
artillery of counter assertions might not disclose it. Arguments
may be evaded, but a fair and pertinent question creates no
animosity, and must be answered, since silence is a confession
of error or. of ignorance.
The author of this Catechism shows good judgment in devising
questions. Answers without parade or pretension come quickly
and decisively, often including unforeseen information, which has
the attraction of surprise. The answers do not drag along like
a heavily-laden team, but flash like a message of wireless
telegraphy, unhampered, unhindered, over the ocean of new
thought. As suits the celerity of the age, these answers are
expressed with brevity. Prodigality in words impoverishes the
giver and depraves the taste of the receiver. Mr. Mangasarian,
like Phocion, conquers with few men and convinces with few
words. There is no better definition, says Landor, of a great
captain or a great teacher.
Eastern Lodge, Brighton.
October 20th, 1902.
�AUTHOR’S PREFACE
The old Catechisms which were imposed upon us in our youth
—when our intelligence could not defend itself against them—
no longer command our respect.
They have become mildewed with neglect. The times in
which they were conceived and composed are dead—quite dead I
A New Catechism to express the thoughts of men and
women and children living in these new times is needed.
This is a modest effort in that direction.
�CONTENTS
CHAPTER
PAGE
I. Reason
Revelation
and
».
<.
II. The Christian Revelation
III. The Canon
IV. God
of the
•
Bible
25
V. The Earth
31
VI. Man
35
.
40
VIII. The Teachings
IX. The Church
of
Jesus
44
.
50
X. The Liberal Church .
55
XI. The Creeds
59
XII. The Clergy
XIII. Prayer
15
19
.
VII. Jesus
9
and
1
>
«
1
«
1
Salvation
XIV. Death .
XV. Immortality
XVI. The Chief End of Man
64
67
•
71
73
77
�A NEW CATECHISM
CHAPTER I.
REASON AND REVELATION
What is religion ?
Faith in the truth.1
Define truth.
It is the most perfect knowledge attainable concerning
any given question.2
Q. What is meant by “ faith in the truth ”?
A. Confidence that such knowledge may be depended upon
for the highest ends of life.
Q. How can one demonstrate his faith in the truth ?
A. By lifting his conduct to the height of his clearest vision
or knowledge.
Q. How may truth, or the “ most perfect knowledge,” be
acquired ?
A. Through experience and study.
Q. Is there no other way ?
A. There is not.
Q. Have , you given me the generally accepted definition
of religion ?
A. No. According to popular opinion religion is what a
man believes concerning supernatural beings and what
he does to obtain their favour.
Q. What is the supernatural ?
A. Whatever is at present inexplicable by the known laws of
nature.
1. Q.
A.
2. Q.
A.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
1 Truth is defined by Thomas Aquinas as “adaequatio intellectus et rei."
Kirchhoff defines knowledge as a “ description of facts. ” (See Carus’s Primer of
Philosophy, pp. 37 and 46.)
2 Knowledge reveals things as they are; hence, truth, which is the highest
knowledge, is the reflection of reality. “ Wisdom,” says Schopenhauer, “ is not
merely theoretical, but also practical perfection; it is the ultimate true cognition
of all things in mass and in detail, which has so penetrated man’s being that it
appears as the guide of all his actions” (Zimmern’s Life of Schopenhauer).
9
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A NEW CATECHISM
9. Q. What is the proper attitude of mind towards all such
questions ?
A. We should not quarrel about them, but permit them to
be discussed freely.
10. Q. Does not “ revelation ” or the “ word of God ” teach us
many things which we could not otherwise know ?
A. As there are many “ revelations,” we should first decide
which one we have reference to.
11. Q. Name some of them.
A. The Zoroastrian; Brahman ; Buddhist; Jewish; Chris
tian ; Mohammedan ; Mormon-------12. Q. Do all these “ revelations ” or bibles claim a divine origin?
A. They do.
13. Q. Do they respect one another ?
A. On the contrary, each condemns the other as unreliable
or incomplete.
14. Q. How ?
A. Buddha is reported to have said : “ There is no one else
like unto me on earth or in heaven. I alone am the
perfect Buddha.”1
15. Q. Give another example.
A. Jesus has been quoted as saying : “I am the door of the
sheep—all that came before me are thieves and robbers.
.......... No one cometh unto the father but by me.”2
16. Q. What would be considered a stronger proof than these ?
A. The fact that the disciples of each are trying to convert
those of the others.3
17. Q. What does it mean to “ convert ”?
A. To make others think and believe precisely as we do.
18. Q. What is the motive ?
A. Among others, this, that unless people believe as we do
they shall be damned forever.
19. Q. Which of these different Revelations is the true one ?
A. Not one of them is either wholly true or wholly false.
1 Oldenberg, Buddha.
2 Gospel of John. It is possible that neither Jesus nor Buddha ever expressed
these narrow sentiments.
8 “This true Catholic faith out of which no one can be saved” (from the
creed of Pope Pius IV.). “ I detest every.......sect opposed to the holy Catholic and
Apostolic Roman Church ” (words used for the reception of Protestants into the
Catholic Church—Catholic Belief, p. 254). This same spirit prevails in the standard
Protestant creeds. (See chapter on Prayer and Salvation.)
�REASON AND REVELATION
11
20. Q. How are we to know what is true and what is false in
them ?
A. By using our best judgment.
21. Q. Would not that imply that reason was a higher
authority than Revelation ?
A. Unquestionably.
22. Q. If we possess the highest authority within ourselves, do
we still need a Revelation ?
A. We do not; for a Revelation must approve itself to our
reason before it can be accepted.
23. Q. If you believed a certain book to contain the “ word of
God,” would you not obey it implicitly whether your
reason approved of it or not ?
A. No.
24. Q. And why ?
A. If I obeyed it blindly, my obedience would have no
merit; if under compulsion, it would not be voluntary
obedience. But if I obey it intelligently and with the
approval of my reason, then it would be my reason and
not the book that I would be obeying.
25. Q. Give an illustration.
A. If any of the “ bibles ” of the world were to teach, for
instance, that the earth was flat, we could not believe
them, because our own experience and study teach us
the very opposite.
26. Q. If, however, “ revelation ” should command you to do
what your reason condemned as wrong, would you not
obey the “ word of God ” rather than your reason ?
A. If I do what my best judgment forbids, I cannot be a
moral being.
27. Q. Is it not possible to regard as true what reason recognises
to be wrong ?
A. It is impossible. Reason is absolute sovereign. No
power can compel her to assume as true what she has
declared to be untrue.
28. Q. But do any of these “ bibles ” really teach things con
trary to reason ?
A. They certainly do.
29. Q. What, for instance ?
A. The creation story.
30. Q. Give another example.
A. The deluge.
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A NEW CATECHISM
Give one more example.
The fall of man.
What do we know to-day as to these questions ?
We know for sure that there never was any “ fall of
man,” or “ universal deluge,” or “ creation,” such as
these ancient bibles announce.
Q. What other mistakes do these bibles make ?
A. They make many other mistakes in history and science ;
they contradict themselves in many places, and in more
than one instance they teach what we know to be
wicked.1
Q. How do you account for these mistakes in the bibles ?
A. It is human to err.
Q. Are they all the work of man ?
A. They are nothing more than the record of the wisdom
and folly, the virtues and vices, of man.
Q. What are we to do under these circumstances ?
A. Follow the best light we have.
Q. What is that ?
A. Our reason.
Q. But may not our reason lead us into error ?
A. Yes.
Q. Why follow it then ?
A. Because we have nothing better, and it is our duty to
follow the best light we possess.2
Q. Why do people attach so great an importance to Revela
tion ?
A. For fear that without a Revelation there would be no
morality.
Q. Is there any reason for such a fear ?
A. No. In the name of Revelation, or the “ Word of God,”
many of the worst crimes have been perpetrated,3 while
31. Q.
A.
32. Q.
A.
33.
34.
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.
41.
1 “ They contradict each other’s chronology, genealogy, geography; and whole
substance of both natural and supernatural events; they stand at variance with
authentic secular history ” (James Martineau, Essays, Reviews, etc.).
2 “ Lost at nightfall in a forest, I have but a feeble light to guide me. A stranger
happens along: ‘ Blow out your candle,’ he says, ‘ and you will see your way the
better.’ That stranger is a theologian ” (Diderot). “All religions have demanded
the sacrifice of reason. The religion of the future will make that terrible sacrifice
unnecessary” (consult the author’s pamphlet on Religion of the Future, p. 6).
3 Theodore de Beza, the successor of John Calvin, as leader of the Reformed
Church, of Geneva, publicly praised Poltrote, the assassin of Francis, a Catholic
Prince, and promised him a luminous crown in heaven. John Calvin himself, in
the name of the “ Word of God,” condemned Servetug to the flames. The assassin
�REASON AND REVELATION
42.
43.
44
45.
46.
47.
48.
49.
13
on the other hand not a few of the world’s noblest men
knew nothing of a Revelation.1
Q. Has there always been a Revelation in the world ?
A. No; it is believed that it was only given some five
thousand years ago.
Q. Was there no morality in the world before that date ?
A. There was, undoubtedly; for men, societies, and nations
existed long before then.
Q. Was a Revelation given to each and every nation on
earth ?
A. No; the general belief is that the Jews were the only
people who were favoured with a Revelation.
Q. Were the Jews then the only moral people of the world ?
A. By no means ; the Greeks, who had no Revelation, were
the most advanced people of antiquity.
Q. What does that signify ?
A. That morality is independent of a Revelation.
Q. Is it well to teach that morality is impossible without a
Revelation ?
A. It is not; because, in the first place, it would not be
true; . and because, in the second place, people, in losing
faith in Revelation, would also lose faith in the right.
Q. How may faith in the right become permanent ?
A. By loving and doing the right for its own sake.
Q. What are the other motives to right conduct ?
A. The strongest are those which arise from a craving for
self-esteem, the altruistic impulse,2 and the sense of
duty.
of Henry the Third, of France, received almost divine honours at the hands of the
Catholics. His name was introduced into the litanies of the Church, his portrait
exhibited on the holy altar, and his dastardly deed likened to the holy mysteries of
religion. The mother of Clement, the assassin, came to Paris to demand a reward
for the crime of her son, and the priests took up a collection for her and carried her
in a procession as the blessed woman who had given birth to the murderer of a king
who favoured the heretics (comp. Esprit de la Ligue, Estoile, vol. iii., p. 94; also
Jules Simon, La Liberte de Conscience, pp. 86, 87). Many similar examples could1
easily be given to show that a revelation has, instead of curbing the passions,
frequently made them more violent. All the bloodshed recorded in the Old Testa
ment was committed with a “ And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, etc.”
1 Socrates, Phocion, Epaminondas, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, and many others
of pagan times. Of Chilon, one of the seven sages of Greece, it is recorded that at
his deathbed he summoned his friends, to whom he declared that in a long life he
could recall but a single act that saddened his dying hour. It was that, in an
unguarded hour, he had permitted friendship to obscure his sense of justice.
2 To respect ourselves we must respect humanity, of which we are a part, and
when we confer'feilue upon ourselves we confer value also upon our race.
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A NEW CATECHISM
50. Q. What is meant by “ the sense of duty ”?
A. The feeling that we ought to do those things which
increase life and make it beautiful, and to refrain from
those things which bring shame and misery and wrong
in their train.
51. Q. Is it always pleasant to do our duty?
A. The old religions teach that duty is “ a cross,” and that
to be good is to sacrifice ourselves.
52. Q. What is the consequence of such teaching ?
A. It makes people afraid of the good life, and associates it
in their mind with gloom and depression.
53. Q. What else?
A. It makes people suppose that only the wicked can be
happy in this world.
54. Q. What is the right conception of duty ?
A. That it is not “ a cross,” or a self-sacrifice, but harmony,
beauty, and joy. We sacrifice ourselves, and make life
“ a cross,” when we disobey the laws1 of the body and
the mind.
J
1 For a definition of law consult concluding chapter.
�CHAPTER II.
THE CHRISTIAN REVELATION
1. Q. Which of the “ Revelations ” you have mentioned has
exerted the greatest influence in the world?
A. Without doubt, the Christian.
2. Q. How?
A. It has helped to shape the history of the first-class
nations of the world.
3. Q. Has this influence been good or bad?
A. It has been both good and bad.
4. Q. Where is the Christian Revelation to be found?
A. In a book called the “ Holy Bible,” and consisting of
the Old and New Testaments.
5. Q. Give me the most accurate information concerning the
“ Holy Bible.”
A. It is a collection of sixty-six books, written by different
authors at different periods in different languages and in
different countries of the world.
6. Q. How is it, then, that we have them all in one volume?
A. They were collected gradually into one volume by
religious synods and councils.
7. Q. Which are the oldest books in the Bible?
A. Those contained in the Old Testament—about thirtynine in number.
8. Q. What do these books write about?
A. The rise and progress of the Jews, their laws and
manners, their wars and persecutions.
9. Q. Is it any different from the history of any other primitive
people ?
A. Not materially.
10. Q. Does it give us any intellectual or moral truths at first
hand ?
A. No. Truth or knowledge is a conquest, not a Revela
tion.
15
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A NEW CATECHISM
33. Q. If the original manuscripts are lost, how do you account
for the words, “ Translated out of the original Greek,”
on the title-page of the New Testament?
A. The revisers have finally dropped the word original from
the title-page, not thinking it honest to keep it there
any longer.
�CHAPTER III.
THE CANON OF THE BIBLE
1. Q. What is meant by the “ canon ” of the Bible?
A. “ Canon ” is a Greek word meaning “ rule,” and is used
to qualify the collection or catalogue of books which
ecclesiastical councils have declared to be of divine'
authority in matters of faith and practice.
2. Q. Has the “ canon ” of the Bible remained the same fromthe beginning ?
A. No. The early Christians, being mostly Jews, regarded
only the Old Testament as the authoritative word of
God.1
8. Q. What do the apostolic fathers2 say on this subject?
A. We infer from their writings that they did not regard'
the New Testament as of equal authority with the Old.
4. Q. When did the New Testament come to be placed on a
level with the Old Testament ?
A. The schism between the Jewish and Gentile Christians
gave rise to the idea of a Catholic Church3 possessing
authority to decide all matters pertaining to doctrine and
practice. To realise this idea it was necessary to have a
generally accepted “word of God.” The demand in
time created the supply, and a “ canon ” of the New
Testament was the result.
5. Q. How early is the first reference to such a “ canon ” ?
A. The latter half of the second century.4
1 After the Old Testament, tradition was the chief source of knowledge in the
early Church.
2 Hermas, Barnabas, Papias, Polycarp, Ignatius, Justin, and Clement have
scarcely any express citation from the New Testament. They apply the word
“Scriptures” only to the Old Testament (see Davidson, Introduction, etc.).
Hegesippus, writing in the year 180 a.d., appeals only to the “ Old Testament and
the Lord ” as the source of all authority.
8 “ The formation of a Catholic Church and of a canon was simultaneous ”
(Davidson).
4 Fisher, Christian Doctrine, p. 72.
19
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A NEW CATECHISM
6. Q. What were the books contained in the earliest “ canons ”?
A. The Christian fathers Justin, Tertullian, Irenseus,
Origen,1 and many others, give each a different list.
7. Q. What was the canon of Muratori ?
A. It appeared about the year 170 a.d., and did not contain
Paul’s Epistle to the Hebrews, nor those of Peter,
1 John, and James.
8. Q. What was the canon of the Emperor Constantine ?
A. It was produced in the year 352 a.d., and contained the
present number of books except the Book of Revelation.
9. Q. What was the Syrian “ canon ” ?
A. It lacked the Second Epistle of Peter, Third of John,
the Epistle of Jude, and the Book of Revelation.
10. Q. What other books in the Bible have been questioned ?
A. The Epistles of Paul, the Epistle of James, the Book
of the Acts of the Apostles ; and Job,2 Esther, and others,
in the Old Testament.
11. Q. What was Luther’s Bible ?
A. Luther did not regard the Book of Revelation and the
Epistle of James as a part of God’s word.
12. Q. What is the position of the modern creeds on the question
of the “ canon ” ?
A. Article VI. of the 39 Articles of the Church of England
reads : “In the name of Holy Scriptures we do under
stand those canonical books of the Old and New Testa
ments of whose authority was never any doubt in the
Church.”3 But this is both obscure and misleading, as
there is scarcely a book in the New Testament the
authenticity of which has not been questioned in the
Church.
13. Q. Does the Catholic Bible agree in all respects with the
Protestant ?
A. No, the Catholic Bible contains seventy-two “ inspired ”
books.
14. Q. How is that ?
A. The Catholics accept as inspired many of those which
the Protestants reject as apocryphal.
1 Origen speaks of three classes of Scriptures : the authentic, the unauthentic,
and middle class. In the middle class he included James, Jude, 2nd Peter, and
3rd John, which are in our Bible.
2 Luther rejected the Book of Job as being no more than “ a sheer argumentum
fab'tila.”
8 The position of the other Christian denominations is very much the same.
�THE CANON OF THE BIBLE
21
15. Q. How does the Catholic Church treat those who deny
inspiration to these apocryphal books ?
A. The Council of Trent1 decreed a curse against them.
16. Q. When was the Catholic Bible translated?
A. It is claimed to have been translated by St. Jerome in
the fourth century.
17. Q. What was this translation called ?
A. The Latin Vulgate.2
18. Q. Has the Catholic Bible been revised at all ?
A. Yes, by the Popes Sixtus V. and Clement VIII.
19. Q. When was the present Protestant translation of the Bible
made ?
A. In 1611, under King James of England.
20. Q. Has it been revised since ?
A. Yes, in 1884 a new translation was produced.
21. Q. Does it differ at all from the King James version ?
A. It certainly does.
22. Q. Are the variations important ?
A. Some are very important.
23. Q. What are they ?
A. The verse in 1 John v. 7 : “For there are three that
bear record in heaven—the Father, the Son, and the
Holy Ghost; and these three are one.” This verse,
which has been quoted in defence of the doctrine of the
Trinity, does not appear in the new version.
24. Q. What else ?
A. The notes which have been inserted in the margin of the
new version throw doubt upon many passages hitherto
accepted as of unquestionable authority.
25. Q. Give an example.
A. In the last chapter of the Gospel according to Mark a
note in the margin reads: “The two oldest Greek
manuscripts and some other authorities omit from
verse 9 to the end.”3 Another note reads: “ Some
other authorities have a different ending to the Gospel.”
26. Q. Are these missing verses important ?
A. Yes. They relate to the resurrection and ascension of
Jesus, and, above all, to the doctrine of eternal damnation.
1 One of the infallible councils (see Introduction to Catholic Bible, Douay
vers ion).
3 An English version of this was made in 1609.
8 Missing eleven verses.
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A NEW CATECHISM
27. Q. What may also be inferred from the marginal words,
“ some other authorities have a different ending to the
Gospel ” ?
A. That the translators had many manuscripts from which
to select “ the word of God.”1
28. Q. Are these the only translations that have been made ?
A. No. Many scholars have made independent transla
tions, believing the authorised versions to be inaccurate.
29. Q. Do Catholics and Protestants regard the Bible in the
same light ?
A. They do not.
30. Q. Explain the difference.
A. The Catholics bold that it is the Church that gives to the
“ word of God ” its authority.2
31. Q. What is their argument ?
A. They quote St. Augustine, who confessed that “ there
were more things in the Bible he did not understand
than things he did understand.” If so great a doctor of
the Church could not understand the “ word of God ”
without an infallible interpreter, say the Catholics, much
less can ordinary mortals.3
■ 32. Q. Do Catholics permit private interpretation of the Bible?
A. They do not.
“33. Q. Do they permit the people to read the Bible ?
A. Only with approval of their Bishop.4
34. Q. What is the Protestant doctrine of the Bible?
A. That it is the infallible “ word of God,” which each must
read and interpret for himself.
35. Q. How can fallible man interpret the Bible infallibly ?
A. It is claimed that the Holy Spirit reveals the true meaning of the Scriptures to all.
1 The American committee, failing to have their recommendations accepted by
the English, had the same published as an Appendix to the Revision........Speaking
of the authorship of one of the books, Justin Martyr loosely remarks, “A man
among us named John wrote it.” And Luke prefaces his Gospel with the significant
words : “ Forasmuch as many have taken in hand to set forth, etc., it seemed good
to me to write also ” (Luke i. 1-3). Is this the infallible language of inspiration ?
2 “ We Catholics... .not only would not, but simply could not, believe the Bible
to be the inspired word of God unless we had the authority of the Church for it ”
(Rev. John Scully).
3 Catholic Belief, by the Rev. Louis S. Lambert, chap. viii.
4 “ To guard against error, it was judged necessary to forbid the reading of
Scriptures in the vulgar languages without the permission of spiritual guides”
(Catholic Bible, Pref.).
�THE CANON OF THE BIBLE
23
36. Q. Does the Holy Spirit reveal the same meaning to all
readers?
A. Evidently not, for there are many contrary interpreta
tions.
37. Q. Are all the Protestants agreed on the question of
baptism ?x
A. They are not.
38. Q. Or on the question of Predestination ?
A. They are not.
39. Q. Or on eternal punishment ?
A. They are not.
40. Q. On the doctrine of Atonement ?
A. They are not.
41. Q. On the Divinity of Jesus ?
A. They are not; though they claim to have infallible Reve
lation on all these disputed matters.
42. Q. Had there been no infallible Revelation on these questions,
would the Churches have been more at variance concerning
them?
A. It is not likely.
43. Q. What would help to reconcile the disagreeing sects?
A. A new Revelation to make plain the meaning of the old.
44. Q. What is the principal objection against an inspired
book ?
A. It limits the possession of truth to one people or race, and
makes it a thing of the long past.
45. Q. What else?
A. It makes all further research and investigation unneces
sary ; it gives to a sect or a Church power to suppress
new truth, and to persecute all who help to broaden the
horizon of the mind.
46. Q. What is the testimony of history in this respect ?
A. (1) It is said that Omar ordered the Alexandrian Library
to be reduced to ashes, because the Koran contained all
that was worth knowing. (2) In the same spirit, the
Catholic Church, believing the Bible sufficient for all
human needs, made war upon Greek and Roman culture
until not a trace of it was left in Europe for nearly one
thousand years. (3) In modern times all scientists and
1 “In what way the washing of new-born babies” ensures their salvation is still
a subject of discussion in the Churches (see James Martineau’s works).
�24
47.
48.
49.
50.
A NEW CATECHISM
discoverers have been branded as infidels, if not perse
cuted to death, for announcing conclusions different from
those of the “ word of God.”
Q. What is the inference from these examples ?
A. That an infallible book stands in the way of the progress
of mankind.
Q. How is the Bible regarded to-day in Europe and
America ?
A. Largely as the literature of primitive and uninformed
peoples.
Q. Is it still worshipped anywhere as an infallible
authority ?
A. Only among the least educated people.1
2
Q. What is the right use of the Bible ?
A. To accept whatever is helpful in it, and to reject the rest.3
1 Martin Luther denounced the astronomers in these words: “ People gave ear to
an upstart astrologer who strove to show that the earth revolves, not the heavens
or the firmament.... The fool wishes to reverse the entire science of astronomy.
But sacred history tells us that Joshua commanded the sun to stand still, not the
earth.”
When printing was invented it was hated by the Church as the black art,
and a Governor of Virginia said: “ I thank God that in those days there was not a
printing press nor a school in all Virginia to breed heresy.”
2 “ It may be said in benevolent apology for the teaching of Spurgeon [Moody,
Dowie, and Talmage] that it has its taint of vulgarity; but vulgar people exist
and must have their religion ” (James Martineau). But let it not be forgotten that
men and women of culture, science, and refinement exist too, who have an equal
right to a religion of their own (see James Martineau’s Speeches, etc., p. 433).
3 When the Church was all-powerful no one was permitted to reject any portion
of the Bible. The eighteenth and nineteenth verses of the last chapter of ‘ ‘ Revela
tion,” threatening with awful plagues all who shall add or take away from the
written Word, were quoted as sanctioning the persecution against scientists and
philosophers. The writer of a heretical book had to sign the following document
to escape burning at the stake: “The author has laudably made his submission
and reprobated his book ” (Auctor laudabiliter se subjecit et opus reprovavit).
�CHAPTER IV.
GOD
1. Q. Tell me something of the popular ideas about God ?
A. The majority of people think of God as the Person who
has created the heavens and the earth and all that they
contain.
2. Q. What else ?
A. That he knows everything, sees everything, possesses
everything, and is everywhere.
3. Q. What do they believe about his character ?
A. That he is just and holy.
4. Q. What else ?
A. That he is a God of love.
5. Q. Have they always thought of him as a God of love?
A. No. God grows better as man improves in intelligence
and character.
6. Q. Explain your meaning.
A. The god of the savage was a savage and a bandit; the
god of Job, the Arab chief, was an Oriental despot; the
god of the Jews was a man of war and revenge; and
the god of many Christians is a being who punishes
the errors of this brief life with unending torments.1
7. Q. What other ideas are there of God ?
A. That he is deeply interested in what we think, say,
and do.
8. Q. And why?
A. To reward us for the things that give him pleasure,
and to punish us for the things which offend him.
9. Q. What name is God known by ?
A. By different names in different countries. The Greeks
1 Though belief in eternal torments is still professed by church-goers, it is difficult
to find any one in our day who acts as if he really believed in so horrible a doctrine.
Abraham Lincoln said that, if this doctrine were true, no one.should take the time
to attend to anything else in life, but remain praying on his knees from the cradle to
the tomb.
25
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A NEW CATECHISM
call him Zeus; the Romans, Jove; the Persians, Ormuzd;
the Hindoos, Brahm ; the Jews and Christians, Jehovah
or Elohim ; the Mohammedans, Allah.
10. Q. What other names have men given to God ?
A. “ The Supreme Being,” “ The Infinite,” “ The First
Cause,” “The Over Soul,” “TheEternal Energy,” “The
Universe,” “ Nature,” “ Mind,” “ Order,” etc.
11. Q. But when people say “ God ” do they not all mean the
same thing ?
A. Not exactly, for some mean a person ; others, an idea, a
law ; or the unknown or unknowable power which finds
expression in the phenomenal world; to others, again,
God is “ The Whole,” or the Point of Confluence of the
forces of matter and mind.1
12. Q. Have people always believed in a god ?
A. In some form or other the majority of people have always
believed in a god or gods.
13. Q. Have there been more than one god ?
A. According to popular belief, yes.
14. Q. What are people believing in more than one god called ?
A. Polytheists; while those believing in one god are called
Monotheists.
15. Q. Name a few of the polytheist people in the world.
A. The Egyptians, Hindoos, Greeks, and Romans.
16. Q. Who were the Monotheists ?
A. The Jews, Christians,2 and Mohammedans.
17. Q. Have these latter always believed in one god ?
A. No. Polytheism was the earliest belief of all nations.3
18. Q. What were the gods of the polytheists ?
A. The sun, moon, invisible spirits, shadows, giants, fairy
men and women, animals, trees, mountains, rocks, rivers
—almost everything.
19. Q. How do you know that these objects were regarded as
gods?
A. Because they prayed to them, built churches or temples
for them, made images and idols to represent them, and
sacrificed to them.
1 See chapter on Prayer for discussion on the personality of God.
2 Would the belief of the Christians in the Trinity exclude them from this list ?
8 The claim that to the Jews the Unity of God was divinely revealed is not
supported by the facts. It is clearly shown by the Old Testament accounts that the
Jews believed in other gods, and that their god was jealous of them.
�GOD
27
20. Q. Did they consider all these gods of equal importance ?
A. No, the intelligent few looked upon the many gods as
the servants or symbols of the one god who was above all.
21. Q. And the ignorant ?
A. They believed some to be stronger, more friendly, more
beautiful, and wiser than others.
22. Q. How did the belief in gods originate?
A. That question has given rise to many theories.
23. Q. Mention a few of them.
A. There is first the theory that ignorance led the earliest
people, who were much like children, to fear what they
did not understand, and to ascribe what they feared to
the agency of invisible beings, patterned after themselves
only on a very much larger scale. Second: The theory
that the feeling of human helplessness or dependence
is responsible for the belief in beings more powerful
than ourselves. Third : According to another theory,
man, who is a sociable being by nature, feels the
necessity of entering into fellowship with the invisible
forces about him, for which purpose he personifies them.
Fourth: The theory that death is the chief cause of
the belief in gods.
24. Q. In what way ?
A. It is said that, if we could live on this earth for ever, we
would get along without imagining the existence of
supernatural beings. It is the knowledge that we will
die which makes us think of another life, and of beings
who control life and death. The animals have no
gods, because they have no knowledge of their
mortality.
25. Q. Is the number of gods increasing ?
A. It is decreasing.
26. Q. Why?
A. As people advance in knowledge and power, they feel more
and more able to take care of themselves.
27. Q. Have the educated people fewer gods than the ignorant?
A. Yes. The belief in many gods prevails only in the least
civilised countries.
28. Q. How about the belief in one god ?
A. It is still very largely held.
29. Q. Are there any people who do not believe in a god?
A. There are.
�28
A NEW CATECHISM
30. Q. Why do they not ?
A. Because they say a being such as he is conceived to
be by the popular mind is beyond the sphere of our
knowledge.
31. Q. Cannot the existence of a god be demonstrated?
A. Some think it can, and others, again, that it cannot.1
32. Q. State a few of the principal arguments for the existence
of a god.
A. The first is the argument based on the law of causality.
33. Q. What is that ?
A. Every effect or existence must have a cause. The
universe is an existence, therefore the universe has a
cause, which is—God.
34. Q. Is not that a strong argument ?
A. It is very strong, but not conclusive.
35. Q. Why not ?
A. If every existence must have a cause, God, who is an
existence, must have a cause too.
36. Q. But could not God have his existence from all eternity ?
A. If he could exist at all without a cause, then the argu
ment that there is no existence without a cause falls to
the ground.
37. Q. What else ?
A. If God could exist from the beginning without a cause, so
could the universe.
38. Q. What would follow if we admitted that God, too, had a
cause ?
A. Then we would wish to know what was the cause of that
cause, and so on, building an eternal chain without
beginning or end.2
39. Q. What is the next argument ?
A. The argument from perfection.
40. Q. Explain that.
A. It is said that, though we ourselves are imperfect beings,
we still carry in our minds, as in a mirror, the idea or
reflection of a perfect being.
41. Q. What is the inference ?
A. That this reflection in the mirror of the mind of a perfect
1 Consult Kant’s Critique, Caro’s L'Idee de Dieu dans la Critique Contemporaine,
Guyau’s L’lrreligion de L’Avenir (translated).
2 Read chapter on Kant in History of Philosophy, by George Henry Lewes.
�GOD
42. Q.
A.
43. Q.
A.
44. Q.
A.
45. Q.
A.
46. Q.
A.
47. Q.
A.
48. Q.
A.
49. Q.
A.
50. Q.
A.
29
being proves the existence of such a being, which is—
God.1
Explain further.
If we have in our minds the image of a perfect being,
this being must also possess existence, for if he lacked
that he would not be perfect.
What would follow ?
It would follow that our idea of God proves that God
exists, for, if such a being did not exist, we could not
have thought of him as existing.
What is the value of this argument ?
It is not considered so strong as the first.
Why?
Perfection is a quality, existence is a condition, and the
argument confounds the one with the other. We may
have in our minds, for instance, the image or dream of
a perfect city hidden away in the bosom of the ocean or
floating on the clouds, without there being any such
city in existence to correspond to the picture in our
mind.
Give me another illustration.
For many centuries people entertained the idea that the
world was flat, yet that idea in their mind could not have
been the reflection of the earth, for such an earth never
existed.
Do these perfectly good or perfectly bad beings exist only
in our minds ?
Yes.
What is the next argument ?
It is called the argument from design.2
What is that ?
Just as a watch, the works of which are so constructed
as to strike the hour, proves beyond a doubt a watch
maker, the world, by its more wonderful mechanism,
proves a world-maker.
What is the value of this argument ?
There is no similarity between a watch and a world. It
is not so easy to agree on what the world was made for
as it is to tell what a watch was made for.
1 This was Descartes’s celebrated argument, which, with slight modification, was
presented also by Malebranche, Leibnitz, Reid, and many others.
2 Paley and Bishop Butler were the great advocates of this argument.
�A NEW CATECHISM
51. Q. Are not the marks of design in nature as unmistakable
as those in the watch ?
A. If they were, there would be no mysteries. We would
then know everything.
52. Q. Do you mean to say we do not understand the world as
fully as we do a watch ?
A. Yes, and that we cannot, therefore, explain it as satis
factorily as we can a watch.
53. Q. What else may be said against this argument?
A. A watch could prove only a watch-maker, not also one
who created the materials out of which the watch was
made.
54. Q. What then ?
A. Even admitting a world-maker, we would still have to
prove a world-creator.
55. Q. In view of these difficulties, what is the right attitude of
mind towards this question?
A. One of earnest investigation. We should neither be
dogmatic nor flippant, but continue to seek for light.
56. Q. In what sense may the word “ god ” be properly used ?
A. As representing the highest ideals of the race. What
ever we believe in with all our heart, and seek to possess
with all our might, is our God.
57. Q. Would it not follow from that that some people’s gods
are better and nobler than others ?
A. Undoubtedly ; each man is the measure of his own Ideal
or God.
58. Q. Explain further.
A. As we see only as much and as far as the structure of
our eyes will permit, so we can only think and desire
according to the compass of our mind.
59. Q. Who, then, made God ?
A. Each man makes his own God.1
1 It is proper also to speak of God as representing the constitution of the
universe ; yet even then he, or she, or it, would be to us no more, and no less, than
a picture in our mind. A subjective God is all we can have any relations with.
�CHAPTER V.
THE EARTH
1. Q. How old is the earth ?
A. The years of the earth run into the millions.
2. Q. Has it always been inhabited ?
A. For a long time the earth was too hot to permit of life.1
8. Q. What is the origin of the world ?
A. Scientists tell us the world was once a sailing cloud of
fire, the molecules or particles of which were prevented
from coming together by the excessive heat.
4. Q. What happened then ?
A. In the course of long ages the heat declined, giving the
atoms a chance to come together.
5. Q. What was the result of this concentration of atoms ?
A. The sun was formed—a vast ball of fire, which, as it
rotated and revolved, cast off pieces which became
worlds. The earth is one of them.
6. Q. How did life begin on the earth ?2
A. As the earth, which is like a bubble in a Niagara of
worlds, became cooler, it shrank and contracted and
divided into land and water.
7. Q. And then ?
A. With this process of cooling, the thick, smoky atmo
sphere which had enveloped it before disappeared,
letting the sun’s rays penetrate to the earth.
8. Q. What happened then ?
A. “ The earth became with young.”3
9. Q. In what form did life first appear ?
A. In the form of specks, which floated on the surface of
waters and repeated themselves.
1 Virchow on the Teachings of Science (Clifford); Martyrdom of Man (Win
wood Reade).
2 Tyndall's Belfast Lectures, 1874; Revue d'Anthropologie: Philosophie
Zoologique (Lamarck); The Origin of Species (Charles Darwin, 1859); The Physical
Basis of Life (Huxley).
8 Winwood Reade.
�32
A NEW CATECHISM
What are these specks called ?
In scientific language they are called embryonic plants.
What was the next form of life ?
Then appeared other specks which lived on the first.
These were more complex in organism, and are called
embryonic animals.
Q. Were these animated specks the ancestors of man ?
A. The history of our race begins with them.
Q. Are you sure you have given me the true story of the
earth ?
A. No. This is only an hypothesis or a guess.
Q. Has it any value whatever ?
A. It has great value, because it is not a random guess, but
the result of the patient labours of the greatest scientists
of the world.
Q. What is this hypothesis called ?
A. The theory of evolution.
Q. Are there any other theories on the subject ?
A. There is also the theory of creation.
Q. Which is the oldest ?
A. The creation story.
Q. What is that ?
A. According to this theory, the heavens and the earth and
all that they contain were created in the space of six
days by the “ word of God.”
Q. Was anybody present when God created the heavens and
the earth ?
A. There could not have been.
Q. On whose authority, then, is the statement based?
A. On the authority of men who were not eye-witnesses.
Q. Why is their word accepted ?
A. It is claimed that God told them how he made the
world.
Q. How do we know that ?
A. The men themselves say so.
Q. Are we expected to accept their word fipon their own
authority ?
A. It is the only proof they offer.
Q. The theory of creation, then, is a guess too ?
A. It is.
10. Q.
A.
11. Q.
A.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
�THE EABTH
83
25. Q. Of the two which should we prefer ?
A. The one which commends itself to the most enlightened
minds and best explains the known facts.
26. Q. In accepting either theory do we thereby bind ourselves
to it for ever ?
A. No ! We reserve to ourselves the liberty of exchanging
it for a better one whenever we can do so.
27. Q. Who is the author of the theory of Evolution ?
A. Charles Darwin is the man with whose name, more than
with that of any other, the doctrine of Evolution is
associated.
28. Q. Who is the author of the story of creation ?
A. Moses is perhaps the most frequently quoted authority
on the subject.
29. Q. Compare the two men.
A. Darwin was a student and a scientist who spent all his
life interrogating nature; Moses was not a scientist, he
made no independent investigations, but accepted the
views about the origin of the earth which were current
in that remote age.
80. Q. How do people distinguish between the ideas of Darwin
and those of Moses ?
A. The ideas of Darwin are called Science; those of Moses
Theology.1
81. Q. What is the standing of Moses with modern scientists?
A. As a scientist he has no standing at all.
32. Q. Is it proper to point out the mistakes of a man considered
infallible?
A. If he makes mistakes, yes.
33. Q. Has any violence ever been used to advance Darwin’s
views ?
A. No.
34. Q. To advance those of Moses?
A^gYes—men have been put to death by fire and the
sword.
35. Q. Whose views prevail to-day ?
A. Darwin’s^
1 Even Moses, in trying to explain the world, was obeying a scientific impulse—
the story of the creation was the best solution he could invent. But the science of
Moses has become the theology of the Churches.
D
�34
A NEW CATECHISM
86. Q. What does that signify ?
A. That error cannot be maintained by force, and that no
miracle in the calendars or bibles of the world can
compare with the triumph of truth.1
1 Mohammedanism is to-day the religion of nearly two hundred millions of people ;
but let us think of the bloodshed and of the long ages of persecution and the large
sums of money which were required to perpetuate Islam. The same may be said of
Christianity; it has cost two thousand years of war, persecution, inquisition, and
oceans of human lives and of money. But let us turn our eyes upon this other
picture: A short time ago some scientists, foremost among whom was Charles
Darwin, announced a new doctrine—the doctrine of Evolution, which was as new, as
radical, as revolutionary, as either Mohammedanism or Christianity, and yet it has
overcome the most determined and fanatical opposition, and is, at the present day,
accepted and taught in all the world. Yet to achieve this stupendous triumph it
has required only about a half-century of time, and absolutely without the remotest
suggestion of persecution—without so much as singeing the hair of a single human
being. Could anything be a greater compliment to the puissance of truth ? In the
course of a few years science has established a grander empire than the Bibles of the
world, in spite of the bloody seas they have sailed through for the past thousands of
years.
�CHAPTER VI.
MAN
What is man 21
A rational animal.
How old is man ?
Hundreds of thousands of years old.
Who are his ancestors ?
The mammalia.2
How do you know ?
In the composition, structure, and function of his organsman is exactly like an animal.
Q. Specify a few of the points of resemblance between man
and the animals.
A. Man has not a muscle or a bone or an organ which is
not paralleled in the animals.
Q. What else ?
A. They are both composed of the same materials, possess
the same physical parts, and are subject to the same
laws of life and death.
Q. Does man differ at all from the animals ?
A. Intellectually and morally, man is superior to all the
animal^F
Q. In what other way do they differ ?
A. The animal seeks only the gratification of his appetites;
man, the realisation of his ideals.
Q. What else ?
A* Man lives and labours for the future, for posterity—for
his fellows not yet born ; the animals exhibit no sense of
the beyond.
1. Q.
A.
2. Q.
A.
3. Q.
A.
4. Q.
A.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
1 Consult IVatwaZ History of Man (Pichard), Man’s Place in Nature (Professor
Huxley), Descent of Man (Charles Darwin), Unite de L’Espece Humaine (de
Quatrefages, Paris, 1861), Early History of Man (Tylor), Antiquity of Man
(Lubbock).
a The highest class of vertebrata—all the animals which nurse their own young
only.
35
�86
A NEW CATECHISM
10. Q. In what relation does man stand to the animal ?
A. He is descended or ascended from the animal.1
11. Q. What is the strongest proof that man has ascended from
the animal ?
A. The fact that the human embryo before birth passes
through stages of development, when he has gills like a
fish, a tail, great toes, a body covered with hair, and a
brain like that of a monkey.
12. Q. What is the meaning of this ?
A. That man in his long existence has climbed through all
these forms of life to his present state.
13. Q. Do you mean to say that there was a time when man was
an animal like some of those known to us to-day ?
A. For many, many years he was like the monkey, the
gorilla, the chimpanzee, or the orang-outang.
14. Q. How long ago was that ?
A. It is difficult to say, but probably hundreds of thousands
of years ago.
15. Q. Man was not specially created, then ?
A. No. He grew slowly upwards—from lower forms of life.
16. Q. Have there ever been any eye-witnesses of an animal
evolving into a man ?
A. No. Nature works in secret. The lower animals have
passed into man by soft, slow, imperceptible gradations
—as one view dissolves into another.
17. Q. Is this growth or development confined to his body ?
A. His mind or reason is just as much an evolution as his
body.
18. Q. Why do not all animals develop into men ?
A. For the same reason that all savages have not developed
into civilised peoples.
19. Q. What is that ?
Unfavourable conditions.
20. Q. Explain this.
A. Progress results from necessity. Both animals and
savages remain stationary as long as they can preserve
themselves in comfort. They invent and develop new
resources only when compelled or threatened by danger
and death.
1 “The abyss which, through the ignorance of man, was placed between him and
the brute world does not exist ” (Dr. G. L. Duprat, Professor in University, Lyons,
France).
�MAN
37
21. Q. Explain further.
A. Men and animals are the expression of the conditions
under which they live. When these change, men and
animals change with them.
22. Q. What one thing ha,s contributed to the development of
man more than anything else ?
A. The struggle for existence.
23. Q. Are there any other opinions on the genesis of man ?
A. Yes. A great many people still believe that he was
created by God, all at once and perfect, some six thousand
years ago/
24. Q. What is meant by “ created perfect ” ?
A. Made in the likeness of God.
25. Q. Is it claimed that man was once as perfect as God ?
A. I do not think so.
26. Q. Then he was imperfect, compared with God ?
A. Yes.
27. Q. Why do they say, then, that man was created perfect?
A. I believe they mean he was as perfect as a man could ever
hope to be.
28. Q. Why is he not perfect now ?
A. It is said that he fell from perfection by an act of dis
obedience against his creator.
29. Q. How could a perfect man commit a crime ?
A. It is said that the creator for his own glory permitted the
crime.
30. Q. Then he obeyed God instead of disobeying him ?
A. Yes, if he was helping to carry out the eternal purpose
of God.
31. Q. What were the consequences of man’s fall ?
A. Sin, suffering, and death, for all mankind.
32. Q. Was there no evil in the world before the fall of man ?
A. There was, according to science; and also according to
the Bible, for it says Satan tempted Adam.1
2
1 The American Association for the Advancement of Science, by almost unani
mous vote, “ declared Adam and Eve to be myths” (comp. Report of Asso., 1901,
Aug. 29th). Notwithstanding the unanimity of men of science on this point, the world
over, the clergy still continue the tra-la-la of empty phrases about the first man, etc.
But can the clergy afford to ignore the doings and sayings of the men of science ?
2 As both Satan and hell existed before Adam, man cannot be held responsible
for the introduction of evil into the universe.
�38
33. Q.
A.
34. Q.
A.
35. Q.
A.
36. Q.
A.
37. Q.
A.
38. Q.
A.
39. Q.
A.
40. Q.
A.
41. Q.
A.
42. Q.
A.
■43. Q.
A.
44. Q.
A.
45. Q.
A.
46. Q.
A.
47. Q.
A.
A NEW CATECHISM
What is the popular belief about Satan ?
That he is the great enemy of God and man.
What else ?
That he is as powerful for evil as God is for good.
How old is the devil ?
Almost as old as God—in the popular mind.
How may the belief in a devil be explained ?
Mankind, in its childhood, in attempting to account for
the existence of light and darkness, life and death, love
and hate, accepted the simplest solution—that of sup
posing two different beings, the one good and the other
bad—ruling the world.
Is he also as wise as God ?
No, but he is believed to be very cunning.
What is said to be the object of his existence?
To tempt and ruin men, and to spoil the work of God.
Who is responsible for his existence ?
The common belief is that he was, like the first man, a
perfect being—an archangel, who, desiring to be a god
himself, was put out of heaven.
Why does not god destroy the devil ?
For the same reason that is said to have influenced him
in permitting the fall of man.
What is that ?
His own glory.
Will there always be a devil and a hell ?
According to many people, yes.
Why do people believe in such stories about the
devil, etc. ?
Because their fathers and mothers believed in them.
What do you think of such beliefs ?
The opinions and beliefs of people concerning sub
jects they have not diligently studied are of little
value.
What are the effects of a belief in the devil ?
It makes men superstitious, melancholy, cowardly, and
cruel.
How may the belief in a devil be outgrown ?
Through enlightenment.
What is the most fearful thing in the world?
Fear.
�MAN
89
48. Q. Why?
A. Because, by paralysing both mind and body, fear deprives
us of the ability to defend ourselves; and when we cannot
defend ourselves we become the sport of political and
religious scarecrows.
�CHAPTER VII.
JESUS
1. Q.
A.
2. Q.
A.
3. Q.
A.
4. Q.
A.
5. Q.
A.
6. Q.
A.
7. Q.
A.
8. Q.
A.
9. Q.
A.
10. Q.
A.
11. Q.
A.
What is the prevailing belief about Jesus?
That he was a god and the son of a god.
What else ?
That he was also a man like ourselves.
Was he both god and man ?
•
That is the popular belief.
What are the evidences of his divinity ?
It is said that he was conceived of the Holy Ghost; that
he was without sin; that he worked miracles, and that he
proclaimed himself the equal of God.
What is the value of these cl aim r ?
They cannot be accepted as evidence.
Why not ?
In regard to the Immaculate Conception we may say that
of Jesus, as a “miracle,” we can have no opinion what
ever.
But could people be prevented from believing in bip
miraculous birth ?
No ; because people generally believe without any regard
to the evidence.
What is such belief called ?
Credulity.
How do the educated people differ from the vulgar in thia
respect ?
The educated proportion their beliefs to the evidence.
What about the miracles of Jesus ?
As we have not ourselves seen any of his miracles, they
cannot have the same weight with us as with those who
were supposedly eye-witnesses.
Continue the argument.
And as but few of those who saw the miracles considered
them conclusive—for many hesitated and asked for more
40
�JESUS
41
signs—we, who. have not seen them at all, would be
justified in treating the miraculous element in the life of
Jesus as we treat the same in those of Buddha, Moses,
and Mohammed.
12. Q. Explain further.
A. Without entering into the discussion of ini rn,el eg in
general, it could be said that, inasmuch as they are
an appeal to the senses of those who may have been
present, it has to be shown, in the first place, that their
senses did not deceive them, and, in the second place,
that their testimony is infallible, before we can accept
them as evidence.
13. Q. We have, then, only the word of man that Jesus worked
miracles ?
A. That is all.
14. Q. If a man, claiming to be a god, should raise the dead in
our presence, would not that prove his claim ?
A. It certainly would not.
15. Q. Why?
A. Because, even if he should create also a new world in our
presence, he would only be doing a few things which we
could not do ourselves. Because a man can raise the
dead, etc., it does not follow that he can do everything.1
16. Q. What would he have to do to prove he was a god ?
A. Everything !. But in the nature of things no man can
give proof that he can do everything.
17. Q. And therefore ?
A. No man can prove himself a god.
18. Q. What is the strongest argument against miracles as an
evidence of divinity?
A. The fact that miracles were also performed by the devil
and hi§ agents.2
19. Q. Did Jesus admit the power of others besides himself to
work miracles ?
A.Yes, when he said : “If I cast out devils by Beelzebub,
by whom do your sons cast them out ?”
1 See Chap. I., “Reason and Revelation.” A safe rule in these matters is always to
prefer the least wonderful to the most wonderful: it is more probable that the men
who reported the miracles of Jesus were mistaken, as those who reported the miracles
of Mohammed are supposed to be, than that the dead, for instance, rose from the
grave.
8 Supernatural powers are attributed to the devil and his angels in all the religious
scriptures of the world ; the magicians of Egypt competed with Moses, and Simon
Magus with the Apostles in performing miracles.
�42
A NEW CATECHISM
20. Q. Hag there ever been a religion that has not claimed
power to work miracles ?
A. We do not know of any.
21. Q. What about the claim that Jesus was without sin ?
A. “ And the child grew and waxed strong in spirit,” says
the evangelist. If Jesus grew better as he grew older,
he could not have been perfect from his birth.1
22. Q. Tell me now about the man Jesus—when was he born,
and where ?
A. He was born in Palestine about two thousand years ago.
23. Q. Do the writers of the time speak about Jesus and his
works ?
A. There is positively no important mention of Jesus in any
writing outside of the New Testament.2
24. Q. What is the meaning of that ?
A. That either he was not considered a sufficiently important
personage to write about, or that he was not known to
these writers at all.
25. Q. What is the story about him in the New Testament?
A. That he did many good and wonderful deeds; that he
was arrested and tried for calling himself “ King of the
Jews ” and “ Son of God
that he was condemned and
crucified, and that he rose again from the dead.
26. Q. What else ?
A. That he showed himself after his Resurrection to his
disciples, and ascended on the clouds to heaven.
27. Q. How long did Jesus live on earth ?
A. From thirty-three to fifty years, according to tradition
and the gospels.3
28. Q. Was his public career long ?
A. No. His public life covered probably a little over a
year, though the Apostle John seems to make it three
and a half.
29. Q. Did Jesus have a family?
A. He was not married.
30. Q. Did he have brothers and sisters ?
A. Yes, he was one of a large family of children.
1 See Chap. VIII., “Teachings of Jesus.”
2 Seneca, Ovid, Epictetus, Josephus, Philo, Pliny, Tacitus, Juvenal, and Quintilian
lived about the time of Jesus and his Apostles.
8 There was a tradition in the early Church that Jesus lived to be nearly fifty
years old.
�JESUS
43
31. Q. Did all the members of his family believe in him ?
A. Not all of them.
32. Q. Have there been others before or since Jesus who claimed
to be divine, and to have worked miracles ?
A. There have been many.1
33. Q. Have these, too, their followers ?
A. Yes, and their temples and altars, to this day.
34. Q. Were they all impostors ?
A. Not at all. Most of them believed they were divinely
chosen to teach or to rule the people.
35. Q. Does their sincerity make true all they taught ?
A. No. Sincerity cannot change the chaff into wheat.
36. Q. What is the proper attitude towards these ancient
teachers ?
A. One of gratitude for their services, and of honest
criticism of their errors.
Hundreds of years before Jesus was born, Gautama, the Rdteha. was
worshipped as the Sinless One. He was supposed to be born without a father,
and to have worked miracles. The same was said of Serafis, Appollonias, and
many others. The Chinese believe that Laotze, the founder of one of the religions
of that empire, was born at the age of eighty-four, with grey hair; his gestation was
prolonged that he might have wisdom from his birth.
�CHAPTER VIII.
THE TEACHINGS OF JESUS
What were the ideas of Jesus ?
Mostly those of the people of his time and country.
Of what nationality was Jesus ?
He was a Jew.
What was the political condition of the Jews at that
time ?
A. They were a subject race, having been conquered by the
Romans.
Q. Was that the first time the Jews had lost their freedom ?
A. No. It may be said that they had spent the greater part
of their existence in slavery and oppression, first - in
Egypt, then in Assyria, and finally under the Persians
and Romans.
Q. What was their intellectual standing ?
A. Owing to the long period of political oppression under
which the Jews lived, the arts, industries, sciences,
literature, and philosophy were necessarily neglected.
Q. What were the Jews distinguished for ?
A. For their religion.
Q. What was the great hope held out by this religion ?
A. The hope of a Messiah—a Christ1 who would deliver the
Jews from foreign bondage.
Q. What did Jesus teach in regard to this national hope ?
A$J He offered himself as the Messiah of the Jews.
Q. Did he deliver the Jews from their foreign yoke ?
A. No. The Jews are still without a state or kingdom of
their own, and continue to be oppressed in many lands.
Q. Do they still look forward to “ a Christ” ?
A. Most of them do, but the educated among them have
abandoned the hope of a Messiah, and have wisely
adopted the countries in which they live as their own.
1. Q.
A.
2. Q.
A.
3. Q.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
The word Christ is derived from “ Kristus,” a Greek word, meaning anointed.
44
�THE TEACHINGS OF JESUS
45
11. Q. What other political ideas did Jesus have ?
A. He believed that all the kingdoms of the earth belonged
to the devil, but that some day he would himself be
recognised as the king of kings.1
12. Q. What was his attitude towards Caesar ?
A. He recognised his authority, and commanded others to do
the same.
13. Q. Did Jesus denounce war ?
A. No; at least not directly.
14. Q. Or slavery ?
A. He kept silent on that question.
15. Q. Did slavery exist in his day?
A. Slavery of the worst kind existed almost everywhere at
the time.
16. Q. What did he say in regard to peace and goodwill ?
A. That he did not come “ to bring peace, but a sword.”
17. Q. What else ?
A. To his disciples he said: “ My peace I give unto you.”
. 18. Q. Have all who called themselves Christians lived in peace
with one another ?
A. No. They have repeatedly waged war against one
another, and have persecuted one another.
19. Q. Which have been the worst persecutors in the world ?
A. Without doubt, those who have called themselves
Christians.
20. Q. Could the teachings of Jesus be held responsible for it ?
A. Only a part of it.
21. Q. For example ?
A. When he said that they who did not believe on him were
the children of the devil and would be damned.2
22. Q. Did Jesus wish to compel people to believe on him ?
A. No; but if they did not, they would be punished severely.
1 See Temptation of Jesus in the Wilderness.
2 The following are a few of the sayings of Jesus on this subject:—“But those,
mine enemies which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay
them before me” (Luke xix. 27). “And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear
your words.... it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in
the day of judgment than for them ” (Matt. x. 14). “And he that believeth not
shall be damned ” (Mark xvi. 10). “ Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire ”
(Matt. xxv. 41). “ He that will not hear the church, let him be to thee as a heathen ”
(Matt, xviii. 17). Read also what Jesus is reported to have said about throwing into
the fire the “ branch” that abideth not in him ; about those who refuse to confess
him before men; also, his words, “ Many are called, but few are chosen,” etc.
�46
A NEW CATECHISM
23. Q. What did his followers do ?
A. To save people from this awful punishment, they perse
cuted or compelled them to become Christians.
24. Q. Define persecution.
A. It is an attempt to maintain an opinion by violence.
25. Q. Explain further.
A. It is a conspiracy to conquer the reason without en
lightening it.1
26. Q. Has persecution ever helped the truth ?
A. Never. It has only caused much suffering, and tempted
people to commit perjury from fear.
27. Q. What is the lesson we should learn of this ?
A. That freedom and fraternity are better than hate and
persecution.2
28. Q. Did Jesus believe in liberty of conscience ?
A. No religious teacher claiming divine authority ever has.
29. Q. What other subjects did Jesus talk about ?
A. About love, faith, charity, brotherhood, goodness, justice,
and forgiveness.
80. Q. How are his teachings on these subjects regarded ?
A. Very highly.
31. Q. What were some of the most beautiful sayings of Jesus?
A. His parable of the Good Samaritan; the Prodigal Child ;
the shepherd’s care for the lost sheep; the wise and
foolish virgins ; the sower who went out to sow his seed;
the widow and her mite; and his gracious invitation to
the weary and heavy laden to come unto him for rest.
32. Qu What is the value of these sayings of Jesus?
A. They are as sweet as any human words can be.
33. Q. Did Jesus ever say or do anything which it would be
wrong for us to imitate ?
A. Yes. In moments of anger and impatience he “ cursed ”
and called his enemies evil names.3 He used physical
force4 against the money changers; disregarded the
« «The mouth from which such heresies proceed should be stopped with blows from
a Bludgeon, and not with arguments.”—From a letter to Pope Innocent II. by St.
Bernard (comp. Abelard, by de Reimusat and Jules Simon). See also chapter on
“ Creeds.”
2 See conclusion of chapter on “ The Earth.”
8 Luther defended his vehemence often by quoting the example of Jesus: “ What
think ye of Christ.... when he calls the Jews an adulterous and perverse generation,
a progeny of vipers, hypocrites, and the children of the devil ? What think ye of
Paul, who calls his enemies of the gospel dogs and seducers ?” (Luther’s Table Talk).
* See the story of his using a whip against the money changers.
�THE TEACHINGS OF JESUS
84. Q.
A.
35. Q.
A.
86. Q.
A.
87. Q.
A.
38. Q.
A.
39. Q.
A.
40. Q.
A.
47
laws of health and cleanliness; destroyed the property
of his neighbours—
Give me particulars.
In those days, in the Orient, people ate with their hands,
as no knives or forks were used, and when Jesus was
asked why his disciples did not wash their hands before
eating he defended the unclean habit by saying that
nothing which went in from the outside could hurt
anybody.1 This is also the doctrine of the Dervishes,
who never wash.
Is it true that nothing going in from the outside can
hurt us ?
No. Disease germs, foul gases, poisonous foods or drugs,
intoxicating liquors, etc., frequently hurt both mind and
body.
When did Jesus destroy property belonging to his
neighbours ?
When he caused to be drowned a herd of two thousand
swine, without first securing from their owner the right
to do so.23
Would anyone be permitted to do to-day what Jesus did
on that occasion ?
Our laws punish such acts.
But if Jesus was God, could he not do as he pleased ?
If that be the defence, then it were foolish for us to have
any opinion whatever of him. If Jesus could do as he
pleased without regard to right or wrong, as we under
stand them, then we would have no standard by which
to judge, even that he was good. We cannot respect or
love anybody who is merely an enigma.
Would it be fair to infer from the above instances that
Jesus was severe and unjust ?
No. There are many passages which describe him as
the gentlest, kindest, and friendliest of men—one who
“ went about doing good.”
Is not that a contradiction ?
Not unless we regard him as a God, for there is in all
men a better and a lower nature. The best of men are
not always at their best; neither was Jesus.
1 No doubt the monks and anchorites of the Middle Ages who cultivated “ dirt ”
as a virtue remembered this reputed saying of Jesus.
3 Matt. viii. 28-34.
�18
A NEW CATECHISM
41. Q. Is it well to disclose both sides of a man’s character ?
A. It is necessary to do so. We cannot understand human
nature unless we understand also the contradictions of
human nature.
42. Q. What did Jesus teach about marriage?
A. He preferred celibacy,1 and commended the example of
those who became eunuchs23 the kingdom of heaven’s
for
sake.3
43. Q. What did Jesus teach about the future, or the “kingdom
of heaven ”?
A. He taught that the other world was more important
than this, and, instead of endeavouring to right wrong
conditions here and now, he counselled non-resistance
to evil.4
44. Q. What did he say to those who wept and suffered, and
were persecuted and robbed of their liberties and
rights ?
A. To rejoice and be exceeding glad, for they would have
their reward in the other world.5
45. Q. What effect would such teaching have ?
A. While it might help some people to bear the ills of life,
it would unnerve the many for all efforts to right their
present wrongs.
46. Q. What other effect would it have ?
A. It would encourage the rich and the powerful to answer
the cry for justice of the oppressed by suggesting to
them that they ought to be satisfied with the reward
promised them in the next world.
1 How the Church has interpreted Jesus’s teaching on this subject may be seen
from the following: “ If any one shall say that the married state is to be preferred to
the state of virginity or celibacy, let him be accursed........” (Canon of the Council
of Trent).
2 In one of the Apocryphal Gospels a woman asks Jesus how long this sinful
world will last. To which Jesus answers : as long as you women marry and bear
children.
3 It is curious how the Catholics, who believe in celibacy of the priesthood,
make St. Peter—a married man—their favourite Apostle, while the Protestants,
who believe in marriage, show a decided preference for St. Paul, the celibate.
4 “Him that taketh away thy cloak, forbid not to take thy coat also. Give to
every man that asketh of thee, and from him that taketh away thy goods, ask them
not again ” (Luke vi. 29, 30). “ Resist not evil; unto him that smiteth thee on the
one cheek offer also the other ” (Luke vi. 29).
5 Matt. v. 12 ; also: “Blessed be ye poor, and ye that weep now, and mourn, for
great is your reward in heaven ” (Matt. v. 3, 4, and Luke vi. 20-23). “ But woe
unto you that are rich, for ye have received your reward ” (Luke vi. 24, 25).
�THE TEACHINGS OF JESUS
49
47. Q. Would the poor have any right to complain of their con
dition now if they are to be rewarded for it in the
future ?
A. No; for they could be assured that justice would be done
to them in the next world, and that, since their op
pressors would be punished there, they should be left
unmolested here.1
48. Q. Is it right to be contented with poverty and oppression ?
A. It would be treason against our fellows to encourage
these evils by submitting to them.
49. Q. Is it blessed to be poor, weak, and wretched ?
A. It is miserable.
50. Q. What should we do, then ?
A. Do everything to better our condition, now and here.
51. Q. Sum up the views of Jesus on the question of justice.
A. Those who have their reward now, like Dives, for
instance, will open their eyes in hell; while those who,
like Lazarus, suffer here, will go to Abraham’s bosom.2
52. Q. Did not Jesus denounce the evil doers ?
A. Yes, he spoke in tones of righteous indignation against
all who, knowing the good, preferred the evil.
53. Q. On the whole, then, has the influence of Jesus been good
or bad ?
A. His words of love and goodness have made the centuries
fragrant, but his theological doctrines have caused much
hatred and bloodshed.
1 Comp, parable of the wheat and the tares growing together until the day of the
harvest.
2 Luke xvi. 19.
E
�CHAPTER IX.
THE CHURCH
1. Q. Define the word “ Church.”
A. It is derived from the Greek “ kuriakon,” which means
[the house] of the Lord.
2. Q. Define the idea.
A. At first the Church was a republic of fellow-believers—
an organisation in the Spirit; then arose gradually a
distinction between clergymen and laymen. Teaching
in the Church was monopolised by the priest and the
bishop, who also claimed the power to save and to damn
the soul for ever. From a republic the Church became
a corporation.
8. Q. Which are the oldest Churches ?
A. The Catholic, Greek, Armenian, and Nestorian ; and the
modern Churches are the Lutheran, Episcopalian,
Presbyterian, Baptist, Methodist, etc.
4. Q. What other Churches are there ?
A. The Liberal—namely, Unitarian, Universalist, and Un
sectarian.
5. Q. Do they fellowship with one another ?
A. More now than formerly. The progress of the sciences
has stopped all sectarian persecutions which once dis
honoured humanity.
6. Q. Do they ever co-operate in the field of charity and
reform ?
A. More in this country than in any other, which is a very
hopeful sign, for it shows that the spirit of toleration is
spreading.
7. Q. What has contributed to this broadening process ?
A. Education and commerce ; also the labours and examples
of brave men and women.
8. Q. Which is the most formidable Christian Church to-day ?
A. The Catholic.
fiO
�THE CHURCH
61
9. Q. How did the Catholic Church arise?
A. It was organised about the time the Roman Empire
became converted to Christianity. The Emperor Con
stantine1 was the first imperial head and protector of the
Catholic Church.
10. Q. What kind of a man was he ?
A. He was both cruel and weak. Among many other crimes
he murdered his wife and son; notwithstanding, he pre
sided in his imperial robes at the important councils of
the Church.23
11. Q. What effect did his imperial patronage have upon the
early Church ?
A. It made the Church covetous of wealth and influence, and
the clergy ambitious, intriguing, partisan, and intolerant.
12. Q. What else ?
A. It makes the prelates, pontiffs, and popes claim authority
over all things, both temporal and spiritual.
13. Q. Did the Catholic Church prosper ?
A. It became in time more powerful than the Roman Empire.
14. Q. What use did the Church make of this vast power ?
A. It added to its pecuniary and political resources, domi
nated the consciences of people, put to death all the
heretics, and announced that no one could have God for
a father unless he accepted also the Church for a mother.9
15. Q. What is the verdict of history on the persecutions of the
Catholic Church ?
A. That it has caused more unnecessary suffering in the
world than any other institution.4*
16. Q. Is the Catholic Church sorry to-day for her past ?
A. The Catholic Church believes it can never do wrong,
therefore it has no regrets.^
1 Comp. Jules Simon’s La Liberte de Conscience, pp. 32-35.
2 Constantine, in his silken robe embroidered with threads of gold, presided at
the Council of Nice, called to take action against the Aryan heresy. At the Council
of Chalcedon the priests presented the following address to the emperor : “ You have
established the Faith, exterminated the heretics. That the king of heaven may
preserve the king of the earth is the prayer of the Church and the clergy,” etc.
3 Consult Winwood Reade’s Martyrdom of Man.
4 See Lecky’s History of European Morals.
6 Consult Jules Simon on the Massacre of St. Bartholomew, Liberte de Conscience,
pp. 43-84. In his Histoire de France Henry Martin quotes those terrible
words of the Catholic priest in reply to the complaint of the soldiers that they could
not tell the Catholics from the heretics : “ Kill, kill all,” answered the priest, “ God
will know his own ” (Tuez, tuez, Dieu reconnaitra les siens). The joy of Catholic
�52
17. Q.
A.
18. Q.
A.
19. Q.
A.
20. Q.
A.
21. Qr
A.
22. Q.
A.
23. Q.
A.
A NEW CATECHISM
Why does she not persecute to-day?
The State will not permit it.
Has the influence of the Catholic Church been only bad?
No, she has also served humanity in many ways—by
protecting the poor, by encouraging art, and by bringing
about a European coalition against Asiatic invaders.
How did the Catholic Church lose its prestige ?
In the sixteenth century a German monk rebelled and
succeeded in splitting up the Church. This was Martin
Luther,1 the author of the religious movement known as
the Reformation.
Do all the Protestant Churches date from the Reforma
tion ?
Except the Church of England.
Who was the founder of that ?
Henry VIII., of England, who quarrelled with the Pope.
What was the occasion of the quarrel ?
The king wished to put away his wife for another woman,
but the Pope would not give his consent.2
What did the king do then ?
He founded a new Church, of which he became the abso
lute master, and which let him do as he pleased.3
Europe over the massacre of St. Bartholomew was so great that the French Parlia
ment ordered an annual procession in Paris to commemorate the event. Fortu
nately, the decree was never carried out. In Rome, however, Gregory XTTT.
organised a procession which went about the streets chanting and praising God for
the massacre of the heretics. This same Pope also ordered a fresco representing the
scenes of murder on the night of St. Bartholomew, which may be seen to this day in
the Sistine Ch? pel. In a sermon preached before this Pope only a few days after
the massacre, Muret, the priest, said: “ 0 memorable night! Most glorious of all
the festivals of the Church. In that night even the stars shone more brilliantly,”
etc. The address concludes by calling Charles IX., Catherine his queen, and
the Pope the most blessed in all the world, for being instrumental in bringing about
the massacre of the Huguenots (Les Predicateurs de la Ligue Labitte !).
1 On his death-bed Martin Luther was able to say that he had conquered three
Popes, one king, and one emperor.
2 There were other points of dispute, but the desire of the king to put away
Queen Katherine for a younger woman precipitated the breach between England and
Rome. For a long time after, the Church of England remained, except in name,
Roman Catholic in belief and practice. Consult Mosheim’s Ecclesiastical History. It
is said that Charles V., being related to the English Queen, used his influence to
prevent the Pope from granting a divorce. Henry married six times, sent three of
his wives to the block, and also beheaded Sir Thomas Moore for refusing to acknow
ledge him as the supreme head of the Church. Leo X. had called Henry VIH. “The
Defender of the Faith,” for having written against Luther.
3 Henry VIII. altered the coronation oath to read: ‘ ‘ The King shall then swear
that he shall maintain and keep the lawful rights and liberties of old time granted
by the righteous Christian Kings of England to the Holy Church of England, not
�TEE CHURCH
24. Q.
A.
25. Q.
A.
26. Q.
A.
27. Q.
A.
28. Q.
A.
29. Q.
A.
30. Q.
A.
S3
What is the name of the Church of America ?
America has no State or National Church.
Are all Churches tolerated here ?
Yes, and all religions ; but while the State in America
makes no appropriation for the Church, in exempting
Church property from taxation it indirectly compels the
people to support the Churches.
Is the Church to-day on an equal footing with the State
in any country ?
No. The Church, which once ruled both kings and
peoples, is now the servant of the State everywhere.
What does that imply ?
That a Church which obeys the secular power, instead of
commanding it, cannot be a divine institution.1
Is there any recognition of Christianity in the American
Constitution ?
No. The word “ God ” or “ Christian ” is not men
tioned in the American Constitution.2
Have the Protestants ever persecuted in the name of
religion ?
Almost as much as the Catholics, but the Protestants are
ashamed of their past persecutions.3
Were the persecutors, whether Catholic or Protestant,
always bad men ?
No. It was frequently their sincerity which led them to
persecute. Believing sincerely that heresy would cause
damnation of souls, they used both fire and sword to
exterminate it.4
prejudicial to his jurisdiction and dignity royal." Here we have the first clear pronunciamento of the supremacy of the Secular over the Spiritual state. The West
minster divines, who formulated one of the most autocratic creeds, presented the
same to Parliament as “ their humble advice.”
1 Formerly the Church met this objection with the plea that the King was the
“anointed terrestrial Governor under Christ, and that obedience to him was
obedience to God.” But the force of this argument has passed away with the
“divine right ” of kings. The modern State exercises its authority as coming from
Man—not as coming from God.
2 George Washington, in his message to the Senate, in 1776, stated that the
American Government was “in no sense founded on the Christian religion.”
8 Schaff, Greeds of Christendom.
4 It has also been suggested that the heretic was burned at the stake because it
was easier to silence him by fire than by arguments. The Church in those days
claimed the right to kill all whom it could not convert. Consult Story of the
Crusades, the Inquisition, etc.
•
�54
A NEW CATECHISM
31. Q. Why is not heresy denounced to-day as vehemently as
before ?
A. Because we have learned that honest doubt is more
religious than blind belief.1
82. Q. Can a man who does not know how to doubt know how to
believe ?
A. Not intelligently.
33. Q. What do we call the faith that is unintelligent?
A. Superstition.
84. Q. Analyse and define superstition.
A. To attribute to an object virtues or powers which it does
not possess is a superstition.
35. Q. Give an example.
A. To carry on one’s person a chain, an image, or a crucifix,
believing it to possess beneficent powers or virtues,
would be a superstition.
.'.36. Q. What is an object called when invested with imaginary
virtues ?
A. A fetish.
1 “There lives more faith in honest doubt,
Believe me, than in half the creeds ”
(Tennyson, In Memoriam, xcvi.).
�CHAPTER X.
THE LIBERAL CHURCH
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t>
<p
P
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1. Q. How do the Liberal Churches differ from the orthodox ?
A. The Unitarian and other Liberal Churches submit, in a
measure, the doctrines of religion to the test of reason.
2. Q. Do not the orthodox do the same ?
A. Not to the same extent, for they believe that revelation is
a higher authority than reason.
3. Q. What are the beliefs of the Liberal Churches ?
A. It is very difficult to tell, for the Liberal Churches follow
neither revelation nor reason exclusively, but try to do a
little of both.
Cannot revelation be reconciled with reason ?
When revelation agrees with reason, there is only reason.
It is when it disagrees with reason that there is, or is
thought to be, also a revelation.
Illustrate your meaning.
When revelation teaches that man is mortal, it is only
repeating what we know ; but when it teaches that man
was created perfect, it teaches what is contrary to our
reason or experience, and so becomes or assumes the
character of a revelation.
What are some of the orthodox doctrines which Liberal
Churches reject?
The atonement; eternal punishment; plenary inspira
tion of the Bible ; a personal devil; total depravity, etc.
Mention a few of the orthodox doctrines which the
Liberal Churches accept ?
A personal God; the sinlessness of Jesus; immortality
of the soul; the duty of prayer; the superiority of the
Bible to any other literature, and the rites of baptism and
communion. Some Liberal Churches are more rational
istic than others.
How do the Liberal Churches prove their position ?
Generally from the Bible.
55
�56
A NEW CATECHISM
9. Q. How do the orthodox prove theirs ?
A. Exclusively from the Bible.
10. Q. What is the main emphasis of the Liberal Churches ?
A. They make little of theology, and a great deal of
character.
11. Q. Are the Liberal Churches growing ?
A. Not numerically, but their influence has been large in the
religious world. They have compelled the orthodox to
abandon many crude and foolish beliefs and practices,
and have helped to withdraw the attention of people
from theology to science, philosophy, and ethics. The
Liberal Churches have rendered Religion the inestimable
service of recalling her from barren dialectics to concrete
realities.
12. Q. What other religious movements are there in this
country ?
A. Spiritualism, Theosophy, Christian Science, etc.
13. Q. What do Spiritualists teach ?
A. That we can communicate with the spirits of the dead.
14. Q. How do they attempt to prove the claim ?
A. By quotations from the Bible, and the testimony of men
and women now living.
15. Q. Who are these ?
A. Generally mediums, who make their living by giving
seances or sittings.
16. Q. What is the reputation of these mediums ?
A. It is not of the very best.
17. Q. What is Theosophy ?
A. The doctrine that there are “wise men,” or “adepts,” or
“ masters,*’ who have become divinities, and who direct
human affairs and reveal the future to the living.
18. Q. What are the other doctrines of Theosophy ?
A. The doctrine of Karma or Justice, and of Reincarnation.1
19. Q. What is the value of Theosophy as a religion ?
A. It is a mere speculation.
20. Q. What is Christian Science?
A. The belief that a certain New England woman has recently
received a special revelation from God.
1 “We reap in this life as we have sown in some previous existence ” is the funda
mental idea in Buddhism, and in all the religious philosophies of the Orient.
�THE LIBERAL CHURCH
57
21. Q. State the nature of the revelation.
A. Nothing exists but God; God is health and purity;
therefore disease and sin are illusions.
22. Q. Is that logical ?
A. No ; because, if God is all, whose illusions then are sick
ness and sin ?
23. Q. Is disease an illusion of the “ mortal mind ”?1
A. Disease is the effect of a cause or causes, such as
drunkenness, debauchery, dirt, etc. If these causes are
illusions, then are their effects illusions too.
24. Q. Can the evil effect of drunkenness, or dirt, be treated
away without first removing their causes ?
A. It is not possible.
25. Q. What else do Christian Scientists claim ?
A. They claim to treat successfully, for a sum of money,
all manner of diseases except those pertaining to
surgery.2
26. Q. What do Christian Scientists do with money ?
A. They use it for the necessary wants of the body.
27. Q. Do the Christian Scientists believe in the body ?
A. No.
28. Q. What would be an impartial judgment of Christian
Science ?
A. Like all human systems, it contains both truth and error.
29. Q. Have we any religious movements in this country from
which the supernatural element is altogether absent ?
A. There are the Ethical, Positivist, and other rationalistic
organisations, which make science the highest authority
in matters of faith and conducts
80. Q. What is the nature of their teaching ?
A. It is purely practical. To make the highest use of this
life without any reference to a life before, or a life after;
without any reference, either, to gods, demons, heaven,
or hell.
31. Q. Do they deny God and the future ?
A. No; because they know that they do not know enough,
as yet, on these questions to speak definitely and
positively about them.
1 The Christian Scientists, by calling evil “mortal mind,” have only changed
the name without doing away with the thing.
2 See Mrs. Eddy’s defence for going to a dentist (“ Miscellaneous
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A NEW CATECHISM
82. Q. Is that a proper attitude of the mind ?
A. Yes, and it is also the most hopeful, for until we
know our ignorance we will not seek for knowledge.1
83. Q. Is knowledge of your ignorance the beginning of wisdom ?
A. Yes, and the promise of coming enlightenment.2
1 “ Nothing keeps a man from knowledge and wisdom like thinking he has both ”
(Sir Wm. Temple).
2 As this Catechis m is written from the standpoint of the non-supernatural, it
will be unnecessary to give in this place a fuller exposition of the philosophy of these
Independent Societies.
�CHAPTER XI.
THE CREEDS
1. Q. What is a creed ?
A. A rule of faith, or an authoritative expression of the
doctrines of a Church.1
2. Q. What is the origin of the word ?
A. It is taken from the first word in the Apostles’ Creed
(credo—I believe).
3. Q. What is the origin of the idea ?
A. The differences and disagreements among believers are
responsible for the creeds of Christendom.2
4. Q. How early did dissensions arise in the Church ?
A. The first dissension was between the Apostles Peter and
Paul; the former representing the Jewish, and the latter
the Gentile, party in the Church.
5. Q. Was the dissension serious ?
A. The Apostle Paul considered it so; for he charged
Peter with dissimulation, hypocrisy, and unrighteous
conduct.34
6. Q. What was the primary object of a creed ?
A. To enforce uniformity of belief, and to excommunicate
the heretics?
v. Q. What, then, did these creeds really try to do ?
A. To prevent anybody from thinking independently.
8. Q. Which is considered the oldest Christian creed ?
A. The Apostles’ Creed, which we know for certain was not
written by the Apostles.
1 Called also a “ symbol,” or “ confession ’’ of faith—Symbolicum Apostolicum.
2 It is claimed that Jesus called for a creed when he said : “ Every one who will
confess me before men, him will I also confess before my father who is in heaven ”
(Matt. x. 32, 33; Rom. x. 9, 10).
3 Read the Epistle of Paul to the Galatians; and also the first chapters of
Revelation and the Acts of the Apostles.
4 Heresy is from a Greek word, and means "toexamine,” ar " to select.”
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A NEW CATECHISM
9. Q. Why, then, is it so called?
A. For the same reason that the Gospels have been ascribed
to the Apostles—to give them a greater authority.
10. Q. Who, then, is the author of the Apostles’ Creed ?
A. The question of its authorship is involved in as great an
obscurity as that of the Gospels.’
11. Q. What are the fundamentals in this creed ?
A. Belief in the Trinity, the Immaculate Conception of
Jesus, and the resurrection of the flesh.
12. Q. What proofs are given to establish these claims ?
A. None whatever. They are assumed to be true.
18. Q. Do the Mohammedans and Buddhists offer proofs for the
doctrines of their creeds ?
A. No, they assume theirs too.
14. Q. How are we to know which assumption is the truth ?
A. The general custom has been to assume that the creed of
the country one is born in is the true one.
15. Q. Is this a good custom ?
A. It is a very bad custom, for it deprives us of the greatest
privilege of life—the pursuit of truth; it makes truth a
denominational or sectarian possession, the creature of
climate and geographical boundaries; and it makes us
believe that, while we ourselves are inspired and chosen
of God, all others are heathens.
16. Q. Tell me now of the Nicene Creed.
A. This was formulated by an assembly of 318 bishops in
the city of Nicsea, near Constantinople, in the year 325.
It excommunicated the Arians1 and fulminated a curse
against them for questioning the doctrine of the Trinity.
17. Q. What is the next important creed ?
A. The Athanasian, which is the most unpleasantly dogmatic
and intolerant of all ancient creeds, and which is unique
in its damnatory clauses. Yet it was held in high
esteem,2 and was sung as a hymn in all the Churches,
and is still in force in official Christendom.
18. Q. What is the creed of the Greek Church ?
A. The Greek or the Eastern Church holds that the Holy
Spirit proceeds from the Father only, and not also from
1 The followers of Arius, who had heretical views about the divinity of Christ.
2 See Schaff, Creeds of Christendom, vol. i., p, 41.
�THE CREEDS
61
the Son. For this heresy it was excommunicated by the
(jatholic Church, but the Greek Church in return ex
communicated the Catholic Church.
19. Q. What is the creed of the Church of England ?
A. It consists of Thirty-nine Articles adopted at various
times, and finally authoritatively promulgated in 1628 by
Charles I. as “ His Majesty’s Declaration.”
20. Q. What was its object?
A. “ For the abolishing of diversity of opinions,” and to
drive out of the country popish and Calvinistic doctrines.
21. Q. Was subscription to the Thirty-nine Articles compulsory
in England ?
A. Yes. Even the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge
required of every graduate to subscribe to the Thirtynine Articles before he could receive his diploma; a Bill
of Parliament compelled all teachers and preachers to
subscribe to them.
22. Q. Did this Bill accomplish its object ?
A. No.
23. Q. Can compulsion prevent people from thinking ?
A. It can only prevent them from teaching as they think.
24. Q. What are people who think one thing and teach another
called ?
A. Hypocrites.
25. Q. What follows ?
A. That compulsion only makes hypocrites.
26. Q. Which is the most important of modern creeds ?
A. The Westminster Creed, formulated by an assembly con
sisting of one hundred and fifty members elected and
convened by an Act of Parliament in 1643 during the
brief reign of Presbyterianism in England.
27. Q. What are the leading ideas of this creed ?
A. Predestination, salvation of elect infants1 only, the
damnation of all peoples and nations not Christian, and
the use of physical force against all heretics.
28. Q. How does it define the Doctrine of Damnation ?
• A. As a ‘‘judicial decree of God ” by which, “on account of
Adam’s fall”...... “God was pleased to ordain” others
“ to dishonour and wrath ”—to “ everlasting death ”......
1 “ Modern Calvinists admit the probability of salvation of all infants ” (Schafi,
vol. i., p. 795).
�62
A NEW CATECHISM
29. Q.
A.
30. Q.
A.
31. Q.
A.
82. Q.
A.
33. Q.
A.
“ and their number is so certain and definite that it
cannot be either increased or diminished.”1
How does it recommend physical force against heresy ?
It says : “ The civil magistrate hath authority, and it is
his duty to take order that the unity and peace be pre
served in the Church, that all heresies be suppressed, all
abuses in worship prevented ”;2 and Article IV., in Chapter
XX., reads : “ They (the heretics) may lawfully be called
to account, and proceeded against by the power of the
Civil Magistrate.” And verse 109 of the Catechism
states that the “ Ten Commandments forbid tolerating a
false religion.”3
Is an absolutely creedless Church possible ?
No. An organisation, whatever its end, must have a
platform, a declaration of principles, to serve as a bond
of union, which, in the larger sense, is a creed.
Why, then, are creeds denounced?
Not because they contain a statement of belief, but
because the statement is narrow, intolerant, and unpro
gressive.
Which is the best creed ?
The creed which is most in accord with the facts of
science, and which keeps abreast of the increasing
knowledge of man.
State the difference between a creed founded on authority
and one founded on science.
The one is finished, the other is still growing; the one is
an echo of the past, the other is an accent and a voice
of the present; the one is a statement, the other is a
movement; the one can be accepted only on conditions
impossible to the reason, the other welcomes all the
strain which the progress of knowledge can bring to bear
upon it.4
1 Original sin was considered so wicked that one of the clergymen declared : “ If
a man had never been born, he would yet have been damned for it.”
2 The American Churches have modified this clause.
8 “ It is not only lawful to punish to the death such as labour to subvert the true
religion, but the magistrates and people are bound to do so unless they will provoke
the wrath of God against themselves ” (John Knox, History of Mary I., Queen of
England; E. P. Dutton & Co.).
4 “ There is a fire-fly in the southern clime,
Which shineth only when upon the wing.
So is it with the mind: when once we rest,
We darken.”
—Bailey, in Festus.
�THE CREEDS
63
84. Q. Should we ever subscribe to a creed which forbids freedom
of thought and speech ?
A. No. The dignity of man is in his reason, the dignity of
reason is in freedom; to destroy freedom is to destroy
reason, and without reason we would cease to be
human.1
35. Q. Why is freedom of speech indispensable ?
A. Because without freedom we can never know whether the
priest or the teacher says what he wishes to say, or only
what he must say.
1 “Yet one thing there is that ye shall not slay,
Even thought.”
—Swinbubne.
�CHAPTER Xn.
THE CLERGY
1. Q.
A.
2. Q.
A.
3. Q.
A.
4. Q.
A.
5. Q.
A.
6. Q.
A.
7. Q.
A.
What is a clergyman ?
A man who has received “ holy orders.”
From whom has he received them ?
From the Church, and by the laying-on of hands.1
Why is he called a clergyman ?
The word is derived from “clerus” or “clericus,” which
in Greek, signifies a “ lot,” or anything by which a vote
is cast.
What does this signify ?
That the clergymen were elected by the casting of lots.2
What other explanation is there ?
It has also been supposed that the Greek word clericus
means “rank,” which term was applied to the Apostles
and the early teachers to indicate their authority.3
By what other names is a clergyman known ?
Priest, prelate, pontiff, bishop, pope, etc.
What do the clergy claim ?
That Jesus, the King, has committed “the keys of the
Kingdom of Heaven to officers of the Church,” by virtue
whereof “ they have power respectively to retain and
remit sins ”...... “to shut that kingdom,” and “ to open
it.”4
1 “ Receive the Holy Ghost by the imposition of our hands ” is the formula oi
ordination.
2 This was the opinion of St. Augustine and also of Jerome. St. Mattias was
elected by the Apostles to take the place of Judas by casting lots. The usual custom
was to write the names of the different candidates and put them in a box ; then,
having offered prayers, the box was shaken, and the first name that fell out was
considered “ chosen of the Lord. ”
3 Bauer, the German scholar, is the advocate of this theory.
4 See Westminster Creed. The following words of Jesus are quoted both by
Catholics and Protestants to establish this claim : “And I will give unto thee the
keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth, shall be
be bound in heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in
heaven ” (Matt. xvi. 19). Compare this with what is said in chapter on “ Prayer ”
about controlling God.
64
�THE CLERGY
8. Q.
A.
9. Q.
A.
10. Q.
A.
11. Q.
A.
12. Q.
A.
13. Q.
A.
14. Q.
A.
15. Q.
A.
16. Q.
65
Have the priests exercised great power in the world ?
Yes, and have enjoyed also exceptional privileges.
What were these privileges ?
Exemption from civil duties, taxes or contributions to
public works. In many countries a clergyman, what
ever his crime, could not be made to appear before a civil
magistrate.1
What use have the clergy made of these privileges ?
On the whole, they have abused them, for which cause
they have been deprived of nearly all of their old
privileges.
How can a man become a clergyman to-day?
By submitting to an examination to prove his adherence
to the creed of the Church to which he applies for
admission.
Are these examinations as strict as formerly ?
No, the candidates for holy orders may now exercise what
is called “ mental reservation.”
What is that ?
It is the liberty, while subscribing to the creed just as it
is, to read one’s own meaning into it—to accept it as true
theologically only, and not also philosophically. The
candidate may answer the question, “ Bo you believe ?”
by “I do,” while in his own mind he may add:
“ Not as it is commonly interpreted, but as I interpret
it. ”
Illustrate this by an example.
He may say, “ I believe in the ‘ word of God,’ ” but
mean by it not only the Christian Scriptures to which the
creeds limit inspiration, but all that he considers true
and pure wherever found. In the same way he may
believe in the divinity of Christ, meaning by it that all
good and noble men are divine.
Do the people always understand his meaning ?
If he wished to be understood, he would not resort to
“ mental reservation.”
Should a clergyman not in full accord with his Church
continue to remain in its fellowship ?
1 Comp. Benefit of Clergy in England. In Catholic countries, if anyone struck a
priest he was excommunicated for life, absolution being withheld from him until
the hour of death.
F
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A NEW CATECHISM
A. To a conscientious and fine-fibred soul, such a relation
would be intolerable.1
17. Q. But should not a clergyman wait until his people are
ready for the new ideas ?
A. Yes, if he means to follow his people, but not if he wishes
to be a teacher and a guide.
1 James Martineau quotes the praise of a Frenchman lavished on this class of
clergymen : “ Our clergy, to be sure, are all perjured ; but, then, how charmingly
liberal ” (Essays and Reviews, vol. ii., p. 187).
�CHAPTER XIII.
PRAYER AND SALVATION
1. Q. What is prayer ?
A. It is a supplication addressed to God, or a desire for com
munion with him.
2. Q. Do people ever pray also to the laws of nature ?
A. No.
3. Q. Or to great ideals or visions ?
A. No; prayer is always addressed to a person, because a
person alone can hear and answer prayer.
4. Q. Do all who pray believe in a personal God ?
A. They should; for if God be not a person, he would not
be different from the laws of nature or the ideals of the
mind.
5. Q. What is a person ?
A. One who knows that he is himself and no other.
6. Q. Can God be a person?
A. He cannot be a God and a person at the same time.
7. Q. Why?
A. To be a god is to be infinite; to be a person is to be
finite. The infinite cannot be conscious of itself, for
such consciousness would imply that it distinguished
itself from something else, and was not, therefore, the
“ All!” To be able to say, “ This is I,” the infinite
must also be able to say, “ That is not I,” which would
mean that the infinite was not infinite.
8. Q. Can there not be an infinite person ?
A. No, as there cannot be an infinite finite.
9. Q. How did the habit of prayer originate ?
A. It originated in the desire of people to appease the anger
and secure the favour of invisible beings.
10. Q. Give an example.
A. At the close of a long drought the Pope, Archbishop, or
minister composes a prayer for rain, which is addressed
to God, believing that he permitted the drought and can
be entreated to discontinue it.
67
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A NEW CATECHISM
11. Q. Are such prayers ever answered ?
A. Yes, because a drought cannot last for ever.
12. Q. Does it not happen frequently that while some are pray
ing for one thing others are as earnestly praying for just
the opposite ?
A. Yes, people are asking God to do in one place what others
somewhere else are just as earnestly entreating or advis
ing him not to do.
13. Q. What do such prayers imply ?
A. That God is an individual ready to adapt himself to the
convenience of everybody.
14. Q. Has God any control over the weather ?
A. No more than over the law of gravity.
15. Q. Do people ever pray to have the law of gravity suspended
for their sake ?
A. Not any more.
16. Q. Why?
A. They have learned that the law of gravitation is invio
lable.
17. Q. When will they stop praying about the weather?
A. When they learn that the laws governing it are equally
inviolable.
18. Q. Is it as useless to pray for wisdom, knowledge, and
goodness ?
A. Yes; for these virtues cannot be given to us—they are
acquired through long effort.
19. Q. But does not prayer help some people to acquire these
gifts ?
A. They think it does, just as an Asiatic thinks he owes all
his good fortune to the amulet on his person or the tattoo
on his arm; or the zealot that he owes his to the
Virgin Mary, or to the candles he burns on some saints
altar.
20. Q. What is meant by prayer as praise ?
A. God, it is said, demands that his creatures should address
him continually in terms of glorification and endear
ment; and, therefore, one object of prayer is to satisfy
this desire of God.
21. Q. Does such an idea do honour to any person ?
A. No. A really great and good being would grow weary
of the genuflections and laudations of interested
votaries.
�PRAYER AND SALVATION
69
22. Q. Where did such an idea come from ?
A. Brom the Orient, where the sultans can only be approached
with prostrations, presents, and salaams.
23. Q. What is the moral argument against prayer ?
A. It makes men look for help from without and by miracle,
and thus cripples and maims their manhood.
24. Q. What else ?
A. It is an attempt to corrupt God by offering him bribes.
When we ask God to do better for us than we deserve,
we ask him to do us a favour for which we offer sweet
words of praise, build churches, give money, go on a
pilgrimage, etc.
25. Q. Is prayer, then, a petition for a favour ?
A. Yes, because it is said that we have no rights, and that
God can, if he so wishes, refuse us everything.
26. Q. Is salvation a favour too ?
A. Yes,, as shown by the malefactor on the cross, who
received the gift of salvation a few moments before he
expired.
27. Q. What are the views of Paul on this question?
A. He says: “ That a man is justified by faith without the
works of the law, for to him that worketh not, but
believeth, his faith is counted for righteousness
the
inference being that we cannot, by anything we do,
merit salvation. And the Westminster Creed says:
“Much less can men not professing the Christian religion
be saved, be they never so diligent to frame their lives
according to the light of nature; and to assert and
maintain that they can is very pernicious, and is to be
detested.”1
1 Luther said: “Every doer of the law and every moral worker is accursed,
for he walketh in the presumption of his own righteousness. He that says the
gospel requires works for salvation, I say, flat and plain, he is a liar ” (Table Talk).
And. John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist Church, was as positive in his
opinion that salvation is not something which we may conquer for ourselves, for he
says: “We are well pleased that our parishioners grow more diligent and honest,
that they practise both justice and mercy; in a word, that they are moral men ; but
the truth is, the Methodists know and teach that all this is nothing before God ”
(John Wesley's Works, vol. iii., p. 99). “ Salvation is an act of mercy, and may be
granted even to one who has no merit ” (Catholic Belief, p. 363 ; Father Lambert).
The doctrine of salvation by grace alone is unmistakably taught in the following
texts from the New Testament : John vi. 44 ; Ephs. ii. 8. This is also the position
of St. Augustine in his work on “ Grace.” It is this doctrine which has placed so
high a value on the sacraments and offices of the Church, as well as the mediation
of the priest as a means of salvation.
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A NEW CATECHISM
28. Q. What is the effect of such teachings ?
A. They make morality, character, and justice secondary to
Church rites, prayers, and dogmas,1 and they imply also
that we may impose our will upon God.
29. Q. Explain that point.
A. The Atheist says he is without God; the Deist says,
There is a God, but he has no relations whatever with
us; the Theist says, God exists and rules over men, but
by prayers, and praise, penance and sacrifices, we can
influence his will. Consequently, all these views amount
to a practical denial of God.
30. Q. How ?
A. There is little difference between a God who does not
exist and one who exists only outside of human affairs,
or one who can be influenced by us.
81. Ql What is the least desirable form of prayer ?
A. Public prayer, because it is not silent, but loud; not
spontaneous, but formal; not personal, but professional;
not short,, but long; not free, but compulsory; and
because it is oftener addressed to the congregation than
to God. Jesus said distinctly that we should not pray in
public.
32. Q. What is true prayer ?
A. To learn diligently the laws of life, and to obey them.
33. Q. What should we teach people to do instead of praying ?
A. To think.2
1 The Catholic religion is an order to obtain heaven by begging, because it would
be too troublesome to earn it. The priests are the brokers for this transaction ”
(Zimmern’s Life of Schopenhauer, p. 124). This criticism applies with equal force to
the Protestant denominations.
2 The late Master of Balliol said that the longer he lived the less he prayed, but
the more he thought. Read also Emerson’s essay on “ Self-Reliance.” The lost*
according to Dante, are those who can no longer think. Kant says that “ He who
has made great moral progress ceases to pray, for honesty is one of his principal
maxims..’ . He said also that to pray before the people is “to appeal to their sensu
ality ”—it is to “ stoop down to them.”
�CHAPTER XIV.
DEATH
How long has there been death in the world ?
As long as there has been life.1
What is the relation of life to death ?
They are different manifestations of the same powerJ
What is that ?
Movement.
What happens to the body at death ?
It begins to return to life again. The particles of which
the body is composed dissolve, separate, and pass into
their original elements—water, lime, iron, phosphorus,
etc. Thus disengaged, they mix with the sun and the
air, and, having renewed their youth, return to combine
again in new bodies.
5. Q. Do they always meet in the same body ?
A. No. If they did, the dead would rise again.
6. Q. Is death a punishment ?
A. Not any more than life.
7. Q. Why do people fear death ?
A. They have been taught to look upon it as the curse of
God for the sins of man, and that it marks the beginning
of an irrevocable doom; but people are rapidly out
growing these fears.
8? Q- Is death desirable ?
A. Not until we know more about it.
9. Q. But is it always a misfortune ?
A. When it ends a useful career, separates lovers, and makes
orphans of children, it seems a calamity. But when it
brings deliverance to the weary, the aged, and the suffer
ing, it is a blessing.2
1. Q.
A.
2. Q.
A.
3. Q.
A.
4. Q.
A.
1 This is true in a general sense, and as applied to recognised forms erf life.
To speak exactly, something must have lived before anything could die; while some
of the very simplest organisms do not die, but multiply by dividing into halves, each
of which becomes a whole organism.
2 “ Among the many half-pagan legends that were connected with Ireland during
71
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A NEW CATECHISM
10. Q. Could there be any progress in the world without death ?
A. As the old leaves must fall from the branches wto make
room for the new and greener ones, so must we die to
make place for the better men and women of the future.
11. Q. How may we learn to overcome the fear of death ?
A. 1. By trying to accommodate ourselves to those laws of
nature which will not accommodate themselves to us.
2. By cultivating in us the same mind that was also in
the bravest and noblest of our race. 3. By remember
ing that we are here to learn how to live, and not
how to die.
12. Q. What is the philosophical conception of death ?
A. That it either secures happiness or ends suffering.
13. Q. How did Socrates view death?
A. That if it ended life, it was not a misfortune; but that if
it freed the soul from the body, it certainly was “ the
greatest of boons.”1
14. Q. Is it wrong to mourn for the dead ?
A. It is natural; for, while we must face our fate like men,
we must also feel it like men.
15. Q. How may we triumph over death ?
A. By loving and serving some noble cause, in which we may
continue to live long after we have passed away.
16. Q. Who have been the greatest benefactors of man ?
*
A. Those who have relieved his mind of one more fear, and
helped him a step further on the road to mental
emancipation.
the Middle Ages, one of the most beautiful is that of the islands of life and death.
In a certain lake in Munster, it is said, there were two islands; into the first death
could never enter, but age and sickness, and the weariness of life, were all known
there, and they did their work until the inhabitants, tired of their immortality,
learned to look upon the opposite island as upon a haven of repose ; they launched
their barks upon its gloomy waters ; they touched its shore, and they were at rest ”
(Lecky’s History of European Morals, vol. i., p. 214).
1 “ There is no subject on which the sage will think less than death ” (Spinoza,
Ethics, iv., 67). “Death does not concern us, for when we are, death is not, and
when death is, we are not” (Epicurus, Diog. Laert., x. 27). Noble minds are free
from “the superstitious fears that are the nightmare of the weak” (Lecky, History
of European Morals, vol. i., p. 213). To lose what we cannot miss is not an evil.
�CHAPTER XV.
IMMORTALITY
1. Q. What does immortality mean ?
A. Deathlessness, or life without end.
2. Q. Does it mean that men will never die ?
A. No ; but that they will live for ever after death.
8. Q. In the same form as now ?
A. That is a disputed question.
4. Q. Will the body, too, live again and for ever ?
A. It is generally claimed that the soul alone is immortal.
5. Q. What is the soul ?
A. According to popular views it is a spark, a flame, or an
essence temporarily lodged in the body, but which, at
death, returns to its author—God.
6. Q. Have all men a soul ?
A. It is so believed.
7. Q. Have the animals a soul too ?
A. Few people believe they have.
8. Q. Can the body live without the soul ?
A. No.
9. Q. Can the soul without the body ?
A. People think it can.
10. Q. Have they any knowledge of it ?
A. Not exactly.
11. Q- Has anything been ever seen without a body of some
kind ?
A. No; though some claim to have seen spirits.
12. Q. Can we see anything that has neither form, colour, nor
extension ?
A. It is not possible.
13. Q. Can we even think of a spirit without giving it form and
body in our mind ?
A. We cannot.
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A NEW CATECHISM
14. Q. What follows ?
A. That soul and body are, so far as we have a right to
speak or think, inseparable, and that, if one is immortal
the other must be so too.
15. Q. Is the desire for immortality general ?
A. Yes, but not universal. The ancient Jews evidently had
no . clear concept of another life; neither have the
Chinese of to-day.
16. Q. State the accepted doctrine of immortality.
A. The soul, at death, leaves the body and goes to another
world, to live there evermore.
17. Q. What is this other world also called?
A. Heaven, Paradise, the Isles of the Blest, and so on.
18. Q. What kind of a place is it ?
A. There are as many different views of heaven as there are
religions.
19. Q. What are some of them ?
A. To the Buddhist, heaven means the cessation of all
desire, or Nirvana ; to the Mohammedan, it is a place of
pleasure and dance; to the Christian, an eternal
Sabbath.
20. Q. Is everybody expected to go to heaven ?
A. No ; only those, it is claimed, who have the true faith ;
all others, according to the creeds, will go to hell.
21. Q. Where is that ?
A. That, too, is in the other world.
22. Q. Will good and great men and women who have not the
“ true faith ” be excluded from heaven ?
A. The creeds say they will.1 And hence the hope of
immortality for the majority of people is not a hope at all.
23. Q. Are heaven and hell both eternal ?
A. That is the ordinary belief.2
24. Q. What further view is there of the other world ?
A. That there is neither a heaven nor a hell, but that the
other world or life is the continuation of this.
25. Q. Will it be a better world than this ?
A. It will if we make it so.
1 “ Peoples earth with demons, hell with men.
And heaven with slaves.”
—Shelley.
® Henry Ward Beecher was the first among modern orthodox preachers to protest
against this doctrine (comp, the Author’s The Passing of Orthodox Religion).
�IMMORTALITY
75
26. Q. Does this view deny the possibility of a conscious here
after ?
A. No, but it leaves the question open.
27. Q. What are the arguments in favour of a conscious im
mortality ?
A. One of the strongest is that the belief in it is universal.1
28. Q. Does that prove it ?
A. No, many universal beliefs have turned out to be illusions
—e.g., the belief that man and the world were specially
created by divine fiat; that the sun, the moon, and the
stars were made to give light to our planet, and to revolve
about it; and the belief in witchcraft, magic, alchemy,
etc.2
29. Q. What is the next argument ?
A. It is said that man, as a soul or a thinking mind, is too
precious not to be preserved for ever.
80. Q. Does that prove his immortality ?
A. Not any more than Caesar’s opinion of himself proved his
divinity.
31. Q. What is the next argument ?
A. The moral argument, which is the strongest.
32. Q. State that.
A. As there is much undeserved suffering in this world, we
instinctively look forward to another where all accounts
shall be squared; where the tears shall be wiped from
the eyes of the sorrowing, and lovers shall meet again.
33. Q. Is this argument conclusive ?
A. It is very strong, but not conclusive. If God is as good
and as powerful now as he will ever be, and yet permits
crime and sorrow, there is no reason to expect a radical
change in his management of the universe at some future
time.
84 Q. What is the proper conception of an after life ?
A. That all we now think, say, and do will go to build the
world of the future, in which we shall all live again and
for ever as influences, tendencies, examples, and moral
1 Since all religions maintain immortality, then, if there is really no such thing,
the whole world is deluded. This is the argument which Pomponatius of Padua
answered by saying: “As there are three religions—those of Moses, Jesus, and
Mohammed—they are all three false, and then the whole world is deluded ; or two,
at least, are false, and then the majority are deluded.”
2 Even Lord Bacon, the founder of the Inductive Method, and Sir Thomas
Browne and Sir Matthew Hade shared the popular faith in witches.
�76
A NEW CATECHISM
and intellectual forces. We are the continuation of the
life that has preceded us, and the source of the life that
shall follow us. The soul of man is the sum of all his
faculties and powers, his thoughts and acts and affections.
These, no more than the particles which compose his
body, perish at death, but become incorporated into new
forms of life, and so on for ever.1
85. Q. What effect would such a belief have upon us ?
A. It would encourage us to cultivate and treasure up only
what is true and noble—to become the brain and soul of
the future.2
1 “ Death appears under this aspect no longer as an annihilation ; for our soul
is as little wiped out as the law of causation can be suspended” (Paul Caras, Whence
and Whither, p. 135).
2 When we have outgrown the illusion that existence is limited to our individual
person, when we expand our being into that of humanity, which is immortal, and
through which we continue to live for ever—death will, indeed, be no more than
“ the blinking of an eyelid, which does not interrupt sight.”
�CHAPTER XVI.
THE CHIEF END OF MAN
1. Q. What is the greatest thing in the world ?
A. Life with honour; for without life we cannot have any
thing else that is good.
2. Q. What, then, is the duty of man ?
A. To seek those things which increase and elevate life.
3. Q. What do we call those acts which make life larger and
better ?
A. Virtues; and those which diminish and degrade life,
vices.
4. Q. By what other names are they called ?
A. Right and wrong; moral and immoral; good and bad.
5. Q. How do we learn what is vice and what is virtue ?
A. Through experience; the accumulated experience of
humanity, as well as our own.
6. Q. Do we learn all we know about right and wrong from
experience ?
A. Positively all.
7. Q. Do we not need a revelation to tell us infallibly about
right and wrong ?
A. No. If we ourselves cannot discern the right from the
wrong, a revelation will be of no more help to us
than to the animals.
8. Q. What other proofs could you offer that a revelation is not
necessary for the purposes of the moral life ?
A. A revelation is only an accident,1 while the moral life is
a law of human nature.
9. Q. What is a law ?
A. An obligation imposed upon us by a higher authority.23
10. Q. What constitutes authority ?
A. Superior knowledge, goodness, and power.
1 An event which happens only once and under irregular or miraculous condi
tions may be termed an accident.
3 “ Law ” is used also in the sense of a formula, or an observed mode of action.
77
�78
A NEW CATECHISM
11. Q. Give me some examples.
A. The authority of the parent over the child; of the teacher
over the pupil; of the State over the individual; of
mankind over the State, and of Nature over all.
12. Q. What is Nature ?
A. The sum of all the forces which keep the world in move
ment.
13. Q. Why is the authority of Nature the highest ?
A. She is the first and oldest parent and teacher of man.
14. Q. Why obey Nature ?
A. Because we have learned through the experience of ages
that we must.1
15. Q. What if we do not ?
A. She will replace us quickly by those who will.
16. Q. There is no alternative, then ?
A. None whatever.
17. Q. What provision has Nature made to induce obedience to
her laws ?
A. She has joined together action and reaction, cause and
consequence.
18. Q. Explain this.
A. To each thought, word, and act Nature has given the
same power she has to the seed—to grow and bear fruit
after their kind.
19. Q. What other means does Nature employ to compel
obedience ?
A. She has lodged in us a representative of her authority,
which we may call “ conscience.”
20. Q. Analyse and define it.
A. Conscience is the mingled voices of the Past and the
Future in each individual. Man is the vibrating focus
of the collective experience and tendencies of the Past,
and the hopes, visions, and ideals of the Future—the
pressure of the one and the attraction of the other find a
voice in him ; this voice is conscience.2
1 “ But I follow cheerfully,
And did I not—
Weak and wretched, I must follow still” (Epictetus).
a Our habits ally us with the past, our freedom with the future; the conflict
between habit or instinct and freedom or will is the struggle between the Past and
the Future for supremacy. Man is the battleground of the struggle. Professor
Clifford defines conscience as “ the accumulated instincts of the race pouring into
each one of us, and overflowing as if the ocean were poured into a cup ” (p. 134).
�THE CHIEF END OF MAN
79
21'. Q. Is that the commonly accepted definition?
A. No. Many people believe conscience is “ the voice of
God in the soul but, as this voice is not infallible,
nothing is gained by calling it the “ voice of God.”
22. Q. What other theories are there ?
A. ^>me philosophers teach that conscience is a separate,
spiritual faculty or organ, whose function it is intuitively
to tell the right from the wrong. It is also held that
there is such a thing as the Moral Law, which is eternal
and absolute, and whose commandments are imperative.1
But these are metaphysical speculations.
23. Q. What is the teaching of Evolution on this subject ?
A. That just as light fashioned the eye, and sound the ear,
with all their wonderful mechanism, human relations
formed, through the education and experience of ages,
the moral sense; and that morality is acquired just as
language, music, love, or humanity.
24. Q. Why should we do the right according to thift theory ?
A. For its utility, beauty, and joy.
25. Q. Is it obligatory to do the right ?
A. Yes, if we wish the well-being of everybody as well as of
ourselves.
26. Q. What is the reward of goodness and justice ?
A. To be just and good.2
27. Q. But will we be just and good without future rewards and
punishments ?
A. If we will not, others will, and by the law of the Survival
of the Fittest theirs will be the kingdom and the power
and the future.
28. Q. Is the right increasing in the world ?
A. Through many oscillations backward and forward, man
kind is gaining steadily, though very slowly.
29. Q. Why are there still wrong and suffering in the world ?
A. Because we do not obey all the laws of Nature.
30. Q. Why do we not obey them ?
A. Largely from ignorance.
31. Q. Is it right that we should be punished for our ignorance?
A. Yee, if it is the only way we can be made to learn and
observe these laws.
1 The Categorical Imperative of Kant has been likened to a God made to order,
a “ deus ex machina.”
a “Do you seek any greater reward ?” (Epictetus).
�■
A NEW CATECHISM
Q. What is the thing we need most to make the world ana
ourselves better ?
A. KNOWLEDGE ; for we cannot do anything unless we
know how to do it; and, in order to act in the best way,
we must know what is for our highest good.1
Q. What else will knowledge do ?
A. It will employ the immense forces now stagnating in
ignorance, replace prejudice by sympathy, oppression
and greed by justice and humanity, war and bloodshed
by peace and brotherhood.
Q. What is the saviour of the world—the true Christ of
humanity ?
A. Truth! which is the most perfect knowledge we can
possess; and confidence that such knowledge may be
depended upon for the highest aims of life.
Q. What, then, is the chief end of man ?
A. To seek the supreme wisdom by the reason, and practise
the sovereign good by the will,2 and for the good of
humanity.
The aim of science is knowledge, the aim of art is action ; but we can neither
produce nor create without knowledge. It is equally irrelevant to insist that a
correct philosophy of life is unnecessary for the ends of Virtue. Thought or
Knowledge is the seed of which Conduct is the flower and fruit. It is true, how
ever, that our knowledge improves and increases as often as we “do” what we
“ know.” Charlemagne, in a letter to Sturm, the Abbot of Fulda, wrote : “ Although
action is better than knowledge, still it is impossible to act without1
’ ”
knowledge.”
a Giordano Bruno and De Tocqueville.
THE END.
■■ fe'VK
�
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Victorian Blogging
Description
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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A new catechism
Creator
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Mangasarian, Mangasar Mugwiditch
Holyoake, George Jacob
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 80 p. : ill. (port.) ; 23 cm.
Series title: R.P.A. Extra Series
Series number: No. 6
Notes: Includes bibliographical references. Issued for the Rationalist Press Association, Limited. First published in 1902. Publisher's advertisements inside and on back cover. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection.
Publisher
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Watts & Co.
Date
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1904
Identifier
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E052
N466
Subject
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Religion
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (A new catechism), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
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English
Catechisms
NSS