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REMARKS
PALEY’S EVIDENCES.
A LETTER
TO
THE YOUNGER MEMBERS (GRADUATES AND UNDERGRADUATES)
OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE.
BY
AN OLD
PUBLISHED
BY
GRADUATE.
THOMAS
SCOTT,
NO. II THE TERRACE, FARQUHAR ROAD, UPPER NORWOOD,
LONDON, S.E.
!
18 73.
Price Sixpence.
�J,
�REMARKS ON PALEY’S EVIDENCES.
TO THE YOUNGER MEMBERS
[GRADUATES AND
UNDERGRADUATES)
OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE.
Gentlemen,
HATEVER may be the truth or value of that
system of doctrine and practice which is
popularly conceived to represent genuine Christianity,
it must be confessed by every candid mind that it
cannot in the long run be confirmed by defective
statement, or by the presentation of illegitimate
evidence.
A meritorious intention is not always a guarantee
of effective execution. It is not an uncommon thing
*
for an eager advocate to damage the best of causes
by his very eagerness, and by his insisting on intro
ducing as testimony that which either is no testimony,
or, in fact, invalidates his own argument. It must
not of course be asserted, without proof, that this is
the case with Paley’s famous work on ‘ The Evidences
of Christianity,’ but we may be permitted to remark
that this is not the first time that the value of the
controversial works of this author has been ques
tioned.
At the end of the last century faith in Christianity
had been reduced in many quarters to such a nebulous
W
�6
Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
state by the assaults of the English Deists and French
philosophers, that almost any production was wel
comed which seemed to restore it to a tangible con
dition, and re-establish its “ origines ” in the region
of historical fact. The particular form which Paley’s
lucubrations assumed, both on the subject of faith and
morals, is no doubt due to the influence of the philo
sophy of Locke. This philosopher and his followers
had indoctrinated a large class with a deep-rooted
distrust of all systems based on a priori considerations,
and hence, apart from the natural tendency of his own
mind, it was Paley’s desire to meet the general re
quirement by founding both ethics and religious
belief on the solid logic of facts. His views on
morality have been strongly objected to by many—
in this University by no less authorities than Dr
Whewell and the recently lamented Professor Sedg
wick ; so much so that the ‘ Moral and Political
*
Philosophy,’ which in my younger days was one of
the subjects for the B.A. Examination, has, I believe,
been removed from the list of class-books. His mode
also of presenting the Christian Evidences has met
with no little unfavourable criticism in high quarters,f
both among the fervent Evangelicals and that party
which piques itself upon its orthodoxy and respect for
Church principles. Although, therefore, I approach
the subject from a different standpoint from either of
these schools, I trust it may not be thought pre
sumptuous if I offer what appear to me some addi-
* See Whewell’s ‘Lectures on Moral Philosophy.’ Introd.
Leet. p. x., and elsewhere ; v. also his ‘ Elements of Morality,
including Polity.’ Suppt. c. III. See, also, Sedgwick’s ‘ Dis
course on the Studies of the University of Cambridge; ’ Sir
J. Mackintosh’s Works, I., 189 ; De Quincey’s ‘ Essays on
Philosophical Writers,’ I., 77.
f See Coleridge’s ‘ Aids to Reflexion,’ vol. i., p. 278 ; Arch
bishop Trench ‘ On Miracles,’ p. 31; ‘ Tracts for the Times,’
No. 85. See also Erskine’s ‘Internal Evidences of Chris
tianity,’ p. 21 and seq., and pp. 183 and 200.
�Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
7
tional objections to this production of Paley’s, on the
ground of its ambiguity and inconclusiveness.
I must appeal to your candour to weigh dispas
sionately what I wish to allege in support of these
conclusions. If what I say should wound any per
son’s prepossessions, or seem wanting in respect
for their religious feelings, it will be a matter to me of
regret. I shall endeavour, therefore, to clothe my re
marks in as respectful a form as possible, so far as it
is consistent with a due presentation of truth. The
interests of truth ought to be ample excuse for any
statement, however painful, or before any audience;
but addressing educated Englishmen, and at the same
time members of a University always distinguished
for its love of scientific accuracy and its manly tone of
thought, I feel I need not preface my remarks with
any of those rose-water qualifications or cloudy
euphuisms suited to timid women or squeamish
ascetics. Men of courage and honour will not take
offence at plain words.
Let us proceed, then, to examine a few of the
grounds on which I demur to Paley’s work on the
Evidences, for I must premise that it is only on a few
points that I shall endeavour to lay open the weakness
of his argument. To proceed seriatim through all the
topics to which he refers is beyond the compass of a
brief letter; but I venture to think that the principles
I shall point out will be capable of being applied far
more extensively.
Paley’s treatise commences, as you are aware, with
an introductory chapter, in which he prepares the
way for his argument by attempting to dispel some
antecedent objections, which might be considered to
leave it no place.
His first clause contains an assumption on the
very face of it, one, however, which probably has
much imposed on persons of uninquiring and im
pressible dispositions. He says, “ The question
�8
Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
lies between the Christian religion and none: for if
this be not credible, no one with whom we have to
do will support the pretensions of any other.” This
insinuates an “ argumentum ad odium et terrorem ”
on the threshold, and is well calculated to impart a
preliminary fright to weak and well-meaning persons,
lest they must of necessity fall into atheism if they
fail to follow the author’s conclusions.
But the invocation of such a phantom is quite
unwarranted, for the Deists or Theists, with whom
assuredly the writer’s argument largely “ had to do,”
are, in spite of frequent mendacious assertions, many
of them very religious people, although more back
ward than some in supporting their pretensions to
that character : the Jews, moreover, in all ages have
not been lacking in strenuously maintaining the
claims of their own revelation as exclusive and para
mount. Indeed, as far as argument is concerned,
they have always run Christian advocates very hard,
and not seldom have made sad inroads in Christian
*
Churches.
The professors of some other faiths,
likewise, might deem it not altogether candid on the
part of our Christian advocate to shut them alto
gether out of court in this manner, f
* See a list of works, in the controversy of the Jews against
the Christians, in Farrar’s Bampton Lectures on 1 Free
Thought,’ Appendix, Note iv. Their tenets seem at one time
to have spread considerably in the Eastern Church, and they
brought over the Archbishop of Moscow to their opinions.
See Milman’s ‘History of the Jews,’vol. iii., 394. I have
been informed that some of the clergy of Spain at the present
day are Jews, and have brought others over to their faith. In
the eighth century they appear to have converted a whole
Turcoman tribe and established an independent kingdom,
called Khazar, between the mouths of the Wolga and the
Don, ib. 129. There are other similar instances.
t See ‘ The Modern Buddhist,’ by H. Alabaster (Triibner
and Co.); and ‘ A Lecture on Buddhist Nihilism,’ delivered
before the Association of German Philologists at Kiel, by
Professor Max Muller.
�Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
9
A little further on the author introduces us to
another astounding assumption.
“In what way,”
says he, “ can a revelation be made but by miracles ?,
In none which we are able to conceive.” To revealis to unveil, to disclose. A revelation means the
imparting to anyone some truth he did not know
before, in an active sense, or it is sometimes taken in
a passive sense for the thing so imparted. So that,
if Plato or Cleanthes had instructed a Polytheist in
the doctrine of “ one living and true God,” this would
be to the latter a revelation. Is it meant to be asserted
by our author that this truth cannot be accredited
and accepted without miracles ? If so, he appears in
the latter part of his treatise to contradict himself,
for he there asserts that the religion of Mahomet was
propagated without miracles. He would probably
evade this dilemma, by replying that this of Maho
met’s was only a pretended revelation, and that his
statement referred to a true one. As between one
creed and another, however, this reply is a mere
begging of the whole question: and, moreover, in
this article of the unity of God as against Poly
theists and idolaters, I suppose he would not
deny either the verity or the value of the Creed
of Islam.
Mahometanism at least shows that
“we can conceive ” of a revelation without miracles.
But further, we may ask, what was to hinder the
Deity from so constituting the human mind that, at
*
a particular stage of its growth with a definite in
crease of knowledge, it should become intuitively
certain of the personality and unity of God, in the
same way as, when instructed in numbers, it per
ceives that two and two make four. Sight is a daily
revelation to an infant; six and seven are revelations
* Paley contradicts himself again in Part iii. c. vi., where
he concedes this very point: “ For anything we are able to
discern,” says he, “ God could have so formed man as to have
perceived the truths of religion intuitively,” &c.
�io
Remarks on Paley s Evidences.
to a savage whose mental faculties had never before
enabled him to count beyond five. To say the least,
then, it is quite as possible “ to conceive ” a revela
tion to arise from the natural law of progress, as
to suppose it ushered in by cataclysms, which one
would think must have a tendency rather to confuse
than clarify the perceptive faculties, and so interfere
with the very purpose of a revelation, if its object
is to increase light.
Further, it seems to me that Paley does not fully
comprehend the force, at any rate does not fairly repre
sent what he calls the “principle of the objection ” to
miracles, that “ it is contrary to experience that a mira
cle should be true, but not contrary to experience that
testimony should be false.” He says that the alleged
improbability of miracles does not properly arise from
the fact that they are contrary to experience, but
simply that there is a “ want of experience ” respect
ing them : he implies accordingly that the objection
is fallacious, since this “want” is inherent in their
nature; for, if they were matter of frequent expe
rience, they would cease to be miracles. This cannot
be considered a fair statement of the full meaning
of the objection, whose antithetical and somewhat
epigrammatic form Paley seems to have taken advan
tage of. What is evidently meant to be implied is an
inference similar to that which is now come to by
the majority of thoughtful and clear-headed men.
Thoughtful men do not contemplate the subject from
the negative but from the positive side. Their objec
tion is not that there is any “ want of experience ” of
miracles, for, on the contrary, in ancient and modern
times they are “ thick as leaves in Vallambrosa,” but
that there is an enormous positive experience of mira
cles (so called) founded on delusion, fraud, or hallu
cination. All history teems with miracles ; in certain
stages of human growth they spring up as sponta
neously as weeds in a fallow, and in particular states
�Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
II
of mind accounts of them are imbibed as greedily as
infants swallow sweets. The childish mind naturally
expatiates in tales of wonder, and delights to lose
itself in realms where there is an absence of limita
tion. The vast majority of persons were once but
children of a larger growth ; a large number still are.
Until the mind, by education and the habit of careful
and measured observation, has come to form a some
what clear notion of the order of nature and scientific
causation, it is really more inclined to credit than
to discredit everything marvellous. In the absence
of knowledge we are in a position to believe any
thing. As knowledge increases, marvel after marvel
is explained ; phantoms vanish into thin air; we begin
to see the sources of mistake, or the evidence of fraud
and delusion, as the case may be ; we are aware of the
impossibility of alleged conditions, the incongruity of
asserted relations. We perceive, too, that the ten
dency to credulity, although more general, was not
confined to ancient times, but that it is strictly de
pendent on peculiar conditions of mind and body
which physiology enables us to explain. We have a
large and daily growing experience that a certain
exaltation or excitement, or morbid action of the ner
vous system, either an enthusiastic and ardent or a
depressed state of feeling, with a low and ascetic
habit, of body, especially if there be an external cause
of dejection or triumph in national or domestic affairs,
have remarkable influence in the production of extra
vagant beliefs, and that these beliefs have a constant
tendency to become epidemic. It is not, therefore,
the limitation but the extent of our experience which
indisposes us to a belief in the miraculous. Whatever
marvels may be alleged, we have constantly found,
when we can get at them and obtain a fair opportunity of
observation, that they turn out to have originated in
fraud or mistake. The fair and inevitable inference,
therefore, is, that if we were only allowed proper
�12
Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
facilities of examination, we could show others to
have no better foundation. The real meaning, there
fore, that Paley’s objector intended to convey pro
bably was, that while it is contrary to general expe
rience that an alleged miracle, when examined, should
turn out to be true, we have a very large experience
of the falsity of that testimony which is adduced on
their behalf. There is a “ want of experience ” as to
their truth; for, if we can get sufficiently near them
as to be said in any real sense to have experience of
them, we find them untrue, so that, in strict speech,
they may be justly affirmed to be “ contrary to
experience.”
On the other hand, we have on all
sides abundant experience as to the fictitiousness
of vast numbers of miracles.
If men are to be
guided by experience at all, on which side does the
balance of probability lie ?
The author concludes his preparatory considera
tions with his famous “ simple case ” of the “ twelve
men of good sense,” whom he “undertakes to say that
not a sceptic in the world,” except Mr Hume, would
disbelieve. Whether, if twelve men were to do and say
all that these imaginary beings are supposed to do,
there might not still be sceptics I can not undertake
to say ; I should hesitate myself to commit so critical
a question to a “ common jury.” But, as far as
the actual case before us is concerned, the testi
mony of Paley’s consistent and stedfast dozen of
eye-witnesses is no more producible in Court than
the twelve signs of the Zodiac ; we may leave, there
fore, his hypothesis to stand for what it is worth,
and proceed to the consideration of his main pro
position. It is this : “ There is satisfactory evidence
that many, professing to be original witnesses of the
Christian miracles, passed their lives in labours, dangers,
and sufferings, voluntarily undergone, in attestation of
the accounts which they delivered, and solely in con
sequence of their belief of those accounts; and that they
�Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
13
also submitted, from the same motives, to new rules of
conduct.”
In a work which assumes so much the form of a
strict mathematical demonstration, we might have
expected the author to have given us a preliminary
definition of the sense in which he uses his terms;
we may, however, collect from what follows that by
“ Christian miracles ” he means those of the Gospel
history on which the main doctrines of the Christian
creed rest, and by “ original witnesses ” those who
were present when these miracles took place.
It is not quite clear what the author considers
satisfactory evidence.
Evidence may vary in its
satisfactoriness, according to the class of persons to
whom it is addressed, or the subject-matter to which
it relates. Evidence that will satisfy a village gossip
may be insufficient for a judge; and a common incident
requires less than an extraordinary phenomenon. If
we look at it in its kinds, there is, first, the evidence
of our own senses of sight and hearing, &c., which
some wise men have counselled us to be rather dis
trustful of in the case of very remarkable phenomena
untestified by general consent. Certainly the senses
are anything but infallible when uncontrolled by sound
reason. There is, secondly, the evidence of other
persons, which may be either Direct, as where the
witness testifies of himself that “ he saw it; ” or
Collateral or Indirect : and this may be in the first
degree, as where the witness says he heard a par
ticular person, A. B., say he saw it; or in the second
or lower degrees, as where the witness says he heard
A. B. say it was seen by somebody, or that he heard
that somebody had said it was a matter of general
rumour, and so on through descending grades of
indistinctness. Now, in a question like the one before
us, we must, of course, be dependent upon the
evidence of other persons, but I think that most
candid persons will confess that, in so serious a matter,
�14
Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
nothing less than the most absolutely direct testi
mony can be even moderately satisfactory. Let us
see how much the Advocate before us produces of this
description.
According to the terms of his statement, he has got
to make out, not only that he has witnesses who
can give this direct testimony, but that these same
original witnesses themselves underwent the dangers,
&c., in attestation of it. Even if our author could
make out his case, it will not easily appear to all
minds that his final conclusions would necessarily
follow. He means it to be concluded that, if he
can prove his propositions, the truth of orthodox
Christianity is established.
“ The religion,” he
says, “ must be true.” He does not define the words
“ Christianity” and “ Christian religion,” but it may
be concluded, I suppose, from his position and other
writings, that the sense in which he uses them is that
which is commonly called orthodox; though, indeed,
from certain expressions he lets fall, he seems
inclined, for the convenience of his argument, to leave
it in some places as vague as possible.
*
This is a
point, however, requiring to be alluded to, since the
loose sense in which the word Christianity is used,
and the Christian name claimed in many directions
at the present day may prevent some persons from
perceiving how much the strength of Paley’s argu
ment is disproportioned to his demand upon it, how
little calculated to support the ponderous edifice
reared upon it. If it had simply been a question that
at a certain period in past history a remarkable
person had appeared, who produced a marvellous
moral effect on his own age which has descended
to ours, however great the effect produced, or
however ardent the zeal of his followers, this would
* As, for instance,when he talks of “the substantial truth
of the Christian religion,” “the main story,” “the generals
truth of the religion,” &c.
�Remarks on Paley s Evidences.
15
not have been so much beyond what we observe
of the Providential Government of the world as to ,
demand more than fair historical evidence. Men
inspired with extraordinary genius, and with a force
and elevation of character far above their fellows,
have indisputably at certain times appeared in the
world to give a fresh impetus to the human race in
its onward course, and produce what seems almost
like a new creation. And, if there have been such
men, it is not only not improbable, but it is most
likely, that one of them will far transcend his fellows.
This, at any rate, is a matter of fair discussion, and
is maintainable by such testimony as is possible in
human affairs. But it is a very different matter that
our author undertakes to prove. When we are told
that a philanthropic carpenter, who was born of a
young Jewess 1800 years ago in an insignificant village
in the Roman Empire, was the Eternal God, the
Universal Source of All things, on whom the whole
realm of nature is dependent; or, to state the same
thing in orthodox language, was “Very God of
Very God, by whom all things were made ; ” that this
God, having excited the wrath of the rulers of his
country by declaiming against their hypocrisy and
corruption, was eventually hung as a malefactor and
perverter of the people,—but that after being dead
and buried, he nevertheless lived again in his body, and
therewith “ with flesh, bones, and all things appertain
ing to the perfection of man’s nature,”* ascended into
the heavens in the sight of his followers,—we have here
a story which makes the most tremendous demands
upon our belief, and which no man in the possession
of his senses could be expected to believe, in fact
which it would be utter unreason and madness to
believe, without evidence of the most incontrovertible
and absolutely overwhelming description. It may
* Third Article of Religion.
�16
Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
here be said that I am but reiterating, in a round
about fashion, Paley’s assertion that a revelation can
only be made by miracles. Of such a revelation this
is undoubtedly true, for it is itself the most stupendous
miracle that was ever proposed for human belief.
Its very vastness transcends all possibilities of human
evidence, and can only be accepted by some such
moral and intellectual spasm as Tertullian’s “ Credo,
quia incredibile.”* It is impossible for a less miracle
to substantiate a greater one: the belief in the most
improbable event in the world is not assisted by sur
rounding it with those minor improbabilities which
have always accompanied tales of theophany.
The Divine Creator, the ruler of infinite worlds,
becomes incarnate and walks the earth, and first
introduces his claims to his admirers by the trick of a
conjuror ! f The bathos is too terrible.
Let us now, however, examine what this supposed
satisfactory evidence is which our Advocate offers.
When we come to look into it we find that he him
self only professes to bring forward two witnesses
properly and distinctly original, viz., the first and
last evangelists; what their claims are to be con
sidered in this light we shall see presently. Our
author allows that the second and third evangelists
* Tertullian’s words are,—“ The Son of God died: it is
credible because it is absurd. When buried he rose again to
life : it is certain, because it is impossible.” De Came Christi,
sec. 5.
f Turning water into wine was a trick known to ancient
“Wizards ” of the South as well as “Wizards of the North.”
Some of the heathen deities also are asserted to have done the
same. Christian Saints performed a similar miracle on a more
extended scale. Epiphanius affirms that a fountain in Caria
and another in Arabia were turned into wine, and that he
himself had drunk of them. Another holy saint, Narcissus,
according to Eusebius, turned water into oil, and he declares
that some of the oil was preserved to his own time, about a
hundred years after the miracle. Epiphan. adv. Hser. L. 2,
cxxx. Euseb. Hist. Ecc. vi., 9.
�Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
17
composed their accounts from stories which they had
heard from others, although he implies that these
were persons of the first authority, being the apostles
Peter and Paul. But he gives no solid reason for
his assertion that St Peter had anything to do with
the gospel according to St Mark. The writer of that
gospel does not assert it on his own account, and the
whole supposition rests on the very vaguest tradition.
The connexion of St Paul with St Luke’s gospel
rests on as weak a basis. In fact, as the author of
that gospel prefaces his relation with a statement of
the sources of his information, it is not probable that
he would have omitted to mention his instruction by
so eminent a person as Paul if such a claim had been
correct. On the contrary, the author sets out with
the declaration that he intends to detail such things
as are “ surely believed among us, even as they
delivered them unto us (not me personally), which
from the beginning were eye-witnesses and ministers
of the word; ” that is to say, the rumours which were
commonly received among Christians, and which,
like all tales of similar kind, were asserted by their
propagators to have come from head-quarters, he
intended to set down for the edification of the
imaginary Theophilus.
*
This is the same kind of
allegation that Irenteus makes in support of his
stories, that he had heard them from somebody, who
had them from somebody else, who had seen some one
or other of the apostles. The introduction of Luke’s
gospel, in my mind, is a clear note of its having
been composed in the second or third stage of
Christian tradition. Let us concede, however, that
Paley’s hypothesis may be correct, that St Luke had
derived his information from St Paul, still the latter
cannot be metamorphosed into an original witness
by any ingenuity of orthodoxy. Paley in his zeal,
* Many think that Theophilus was a real person.' The
point is immaterial.
�18
Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
indeed, would make him almost a second founder of
the religion, and attaches immense importance to
him as an “independent witness.” Whether he is so
or not, he is certainly not an original witness, which
is what we are at present in search of. He certainly
allows his imagination pretty free play in developing
the Christian doctrines, for which he may have con
sidered he had obtained warrant in that third heaven
where he could not tell whether he was in or out of
his body, but for early Christian facts he must have
been dependent upon those ordinary hearsay reports
which, as St Luke says, were commonly believed
among them.
It is evident, then, that the authors of Mark’s and
Luke’s gospels were not original and direct witnesses
in the sense previously laid down. Let us see what
can be said for St Matthew.
The most direct
evidence we have concerning this gospel comes
to us from Eusebius, who wrote about three
hundred and twenty years after Christ. He states
that Papias, a writer of the first half of the
second century, said that Matthew “ wrote out
the sayings (of the Lord) in the Hebrew dialect.”
*
Eusebius also relates a tradition of one Pan top,mis,
“ who is said to have gone to the Indians ”f and found
a gospel of Matthew in Hebrew, which had been left
there by the apostle Bartholomew. There is other
early testimony to the fact that the authentic gospel
of Matthew was written in Hebrew. This work seems
to have been preserved for some time among the
Nazarenes and Ebionites, but eventually to have been
lost sight of. These last-named sects were persecuted
and denounced by other bodies of Christians as here
tics, chiefly on the ground of their denying the
miraculous conception of Jesus, and taking altogether
* I.e. Aramaic or Syro-Chaldee.
f Euseb. Hist. Ecc. v., 10.
�Remarks on Paley’s Evidences.
19
a more humanitarian view of his person. The fact
of their especially appealing to the authority of St
Matthew, and possessing the only gospel which had
any title to be considered authentic, raises a very
shrewd suspicion of what was the true original
character of Christianity. At any rate, it affords
conclusive evidence, if the fact were not otherwise
certain, that the gospel they possessed was not our
gospel of St Matthew, since the latter is very par
ticular on the fact of the miraculous birth, and puts
poor Joseph out of the question altogether. The only
document we possess bearing the name of Matthew
is written in Greek, and there is nothing worthy
of the name of evidence to determine who was its
author.
Competent modern critics have made it
clear that it could not have been written by an apostle
or an eye-witness: it is impossible to define its date
with exactness, the balance of evidence seems in
favour of the year 100 a.d. It would exceed the
limits of a letter to adduce proof of this here, for
which I must refer you to well-known works.
*
The only remaining work of a supposed original
witness is the gospel of St John. It may unhesi
tatingly be affirmed that the majority of exact and
competent critics, who have not a foregone purpose
to serve, agree that, whatever value this book may
have as a monument -of early Christian feeling, it
could not have come from the hand of the apostle
John. In thus speaking, I must be allowed to explain
that I cannot consider the work of M. Renan as an
exact criticism. His work is more like a pastoral
romance of the apostolic age thrown into a somewhat
dramatic form; his preference of the fourth, over the
* See the writers mentioned in Mackay’s ‘ Tubingen
School and its Antecedents,’ Part iii. (particularly Baur’s
‘Evangelien’), and Dr Davidson’s ‘Introduction to the New
Testament’ (ed. 1868), vol. i., p. 465, and seq. Note the
edition.
�20
Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
other gospels, is explained by the greater facility
with which it would lend itself to such a composition.
I am by no means insensible to the beauty and ability
of M. Renan’s production, but it is not criticism, if by
criticism is meant a due weighing of evidence and
historic probabilities. St John was a Galilean peasant,
and still appears in his old age to have retained so
much of his narrow-minded intolerance and fiery zeal
as to run from the bath that Cerinthus had occupied.
The author of the gospel is full of the spirit of
accommodation, has had his mind filled with the
lucubrations of Alexandrian Platonists, and uses the
words of Philo-Judaeus.
St John is said to have
been a supporter of the Oriental practice as to the
14th Nisan; the author of the gospel supports the
opposite view. Purther, from no Church writer before
160 A.D. can be produced a passage which shows any
clear knowledge of such a gospel, even inplaces where,
if such a document had existed, they must have referred
to it. Paley, indeed, asserts that Justin quotes John,
but this is an error; all that can be truly said is that
Justin makes use of some expressions sufficiently
resembling certain phrases of the fourth gospel as to
make it probable that he had come within the influence
of the same ideas which gave birth to it. But his
tone of thought is, in some respects, so similar to
that of the fourth evangelist, that he would un
doubtedly have made full use of him, and mentioned
him, if he had known of his work. Similar remarks
apply to the heretic Marcion, whose purpose of
*
spiritualising the doctrine of the synoptists the
gospel of St John would have admirably served, had
he been acquainted with it. No writer distinctly cites
the fourth gospel, and ascribes it to St John, before
Theophilus of Antioch (a.d. 176).
The internal evidence is also considered conclusive
* See Neander’s ‘Church History,’ vol. ii., p. 129, and seq. ;
and Bayle’s ‘ Dictionary,’ art. “ Marcionites.”
�Remarks on Raley's Evidences.
21
against the authorship of a native of Palestine at all,
especially from the peculiarity of certain mistakes as
to geography and ignorance of localities in Jerusalem,
and also from an absence of knowledge respecting
some national peculiarities.
*
Our Advocate finally, with great skill, labours
to produce a combined effect by massing his evi
dence in a single view. He endeavours to make
up for the defectiveness of each of his witnesses
taken by himself by rolling them into one; as if
out of four cripples you could make one stout soldier.
He insinuates that among four witnesses the truth
must lie somewhere : “ i/,” he says, “ only one of them
be genuine.” This “ i/” betrays the weakness of his
argument. Neither four nor forty doubtful witnesses
will make up one good one. It is familiar to lawyers
how easy it is to multiply a certain kind of witness,
how difficult to obtain that one thoroughly respectable
man of known character and unmistakable identity who
will come forward and swear he saw the fact himself..
Now this is what we ask; and put the evidence in asmany different points of view as you like, it is not
forthcoming. Four grey horses will never make one
white, trot them round one after another or altogether,,
in any kind of light, as often as it pleases you. In the
dark, indeed, a white may be represented by a grey
or any other colour.
Before concluding my remarks on our author’s
witnesses, I must refer to a rather remarkable fact
concerning the apostle Paul, which Paley himself
alludes to, without seeming to see the inference to
which it unavoidably leads.
Those epistles which
are by common consent attributed to St Paul are
undoubtedly the earliest authentic compositions ad-
* See, for full details, ‘An Attempt to Ascertain the Cha
racter of the Fourth Gospel,’ by J. J. Tayler; or, ‘ Introduc
tion to the New Testament,’ by S. Davidson, D.D., and the
works named in Mackay’s ‘ Tubingen School.’
�22
Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
miffed into the New Testament Canon : probably the
two latest are the gospel of St John and the second
epistle of Peter. Between the date of the earliest
epistles of Paul (commonly supposed to be those to
the Thessalonians) and these works, we have an
interval of about a century and a quarter (a.d. 55 to
170, approximate dates).
Now it is a singular circumstance that in the earlier
works we have but slight allusion to miracles, whereas
in the latter they crowd upon us, and at the same
time increase in their marvellous proportions. St
Paul, indeed, alludes to the resurrection, but of this
he does not pretend to have been an eye-witness. He
seems to ground his own belief on the fact of his
having seen the Lord in the Spirit in those visions or
revelations which he conceived himself to have of
heavenly things. But to other miracles throughout
his whole epistles, genuine and doubtful, there are
but very few references : Paley himself confessing that
there are but “ three indubitable references.”* He
accounts for this by imagining “that the miraculous
history was all along presupposed: ” does it not
equally, however, give room for the surmise, that the
farther we get away from genuine and authentic
documents the less sense of responsibility we find in
* Paley’s indubitable references are Gal. iii., 5 ; Rom. xv.,
18, 19 ; 2 Cor. xii., 12. In the first, St Paul is reproving his
converts for falling back from faith to the carnal works of the
law. He appeals to their own experience at their first conver
sion, and asks them whether he, then, that gave them the
spirit, and worked miracles in them did it by the works of
the law, or the hearing of faith ? “ Miracles in you,” not
“among you,” as in the authorised version, is here the true
rendering, and evidently has reference to those spiritual mira
cles of sudden conversion which the early Christians described
as the “Holy Ghost falling upon them.” (See Professor
Jowett’s Commentary on the Galatians in loc. and the refe
rences there.) The passages, Romans xv., 19, and 2 Cor. xii.,
12, are equally capable of being understood of “signs and
wonders” of grace, combined with those ecstatical “gifts of
�Remarks on Paley’s Evidences.
23
the writers, the more unbounded scope given to the
imagination and that love of the marvellous inherent
in all half-educated and enthusiastic minds ?
It must be conceded, I think, from what has been
said, that the testimony of Paley’s “ original wit
nesses ” cannot be produced, and that therefore his
evidence, according to what was before stated, not
being direct, is not satisfactory. But now, let it be
granted for argument’s sake that we had “ satis
factory evidence ” of the chief feature of the circum
stance stated, viz., that there was clear testimony to
the effect that certain persons, honestly professing
their belief in a remarkable story, went about preach
ing a new religion, and endured all sorts of suffering
rather than deny their profession; I do not think it
can be asserted that this fact will justify the author’s
conclusions. In the first place, he seems to have
taken it for granted that because they suffered such
things they must have really seen the miracles, for
that no one would have shown such endurance on any
other supposition. But this by no means follows:
indeed, the sequel of the story itself proves the
the Spirit” which seemed to have accompanied the sudden
conversions and the ardent religious exercises of the primitive
believers, as they do even those of modern believers who have
been worked up to a high degree of excitement. Such “gifts”
were what they called “ speaking with tongues,” “ gifts of
healing,” “interpretation of tongues,” “discerning of spirits,”
“castingout of devils;” the notion of some of which arose
from a defective diagnosis of certain diseases, others from an
ignorance of common mental and nervous phenomena, and the
remainder were the result of that high-wrought enthusiasm
which is the invariable accompaniment of all religious out
bursts in their early stages. It is a noteworthy fact that St
Paul does not specify, as within his own experience, even
when it would have been most serviceable to his argument to
have done so, a single miracle of the material and tangible sort,
so often referred to by the other writers of the New Testament.
Probably, if he had been acquainted with the true principles of
physiology, the word miracle would have dropped out of his
vocabulary. For similar manifestations in later times to
�24
Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
contrary. For, suppose the first preachers of the
religion witnessed the facts and therefore suffered, their
followers of the next or the subsequent generations
did not see them; but they still, many of them,
continued to endure persecutions with the greatest
constancy. They, at any rate, had only reports or
tradition of miracles to inspire their courage. The
story itself, therefore, shows that men may be worked
up to as high a pitch of belief, and as great a degree
of constancy and endurance, by stories related
about miracles as by those of which they have
ocular demonstration. That is to say, men’s feelings
and imaginations may be as strongly worked upon
through their ears as their eyes, and when enthusiasm
is once thoroughly roused it does not ask for evidence,
and laughs at suffering. Its own innate persuasion
is its evidence, and the answering glow of sym
pathising companions dispels every chill of doubt;
each burning believer incites and encourages the
other and adds to the general contagion; the calm
and hesitating are contemned and cast forth as coldhearted and cowardly, and thus no counteracting
principle is left to prevent the spread of the everincreasing flame. Paley covertly implies that men
those mentioned in the epistles, see ‘ The full and particular
Account of Miracles at the Tomb of the Abbe Paris,’ by
M. de Montgeron, Conseilleur au Parlement de Paris ; ‘ An
Account of the Irvingite Manifestations ’ (I have forgotten the
Publishers); Bishop Layington’s ‘Enthusiasm of Methodists
and Papists Compared,’ passim. Appendix to vol. i.; ‘ The
Miraculous Life and Conversions of Father Bennett, of Caufield, in Essex‘ The Life and Times of the Countess of
Huntingdon,’ vol. i., p. 129, 400; and Southey’s ‘Life of
Wesley.’ ‘ The Life of St Dominic,’ by the Abbe Lacordaire.
‘ Voyage a, Migne.’ ‘ Recueil de temoignages concernant l’Apparition Miraculeuse de la Croix a Migne.’ See Dean Stanley on
‘The Gift of Tongues,’ ‘Comment, on Corinth,’ p. 254, and
seq., and Coleridge on ‘ The Gift of Tongues,’ note to ‘ The
Confessions of an Enquiring Spirit,’ p. 231.
�Remarks on Paley’s Evidences.
25
must have been great fools who acted in this manner.
“Would men,” he asks, “in such circumstances”
(i. e., of suffering and persecution), “pretend to have
seen what they never saw ?” No one imagines they
“ pretended ” to have seen anything : the early
believers saw with their hearts and souls. Had the
Corinthians, for instance, seen anything, except in
those visions and revelations of the inner man which
ardent spirits have experienced in all ages ? “We
walk by faith, not by sight,” said St Paul to them,
“ though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet
henceforth know we him no more.” Neither the
Apostle nor his hearers had seen Christ after the
flesh, but the moral conviction arising from a grand
idea heartily embraced, the undying aspiration of the
human spirit towards the infinite, supplied the place
of bodily sight. The "Apostle’s frequent language
shows the kind of sight he looked for, and wished to
arouse in his followers. Because the unbelieving
Jews could not see what the Christians saw, he said
a “ veil was upon their heartsbut that when they
turned to the Lord, then the veil should be taken
away. “ The God of this world,” said he, “ hath
blinded the minds of them that believe not,” “ but
God that commanded the light to shine out of dark
ness hath shined in our hearts to give the light of the
knowledge of the glory of God,” &c. This is not the
language of one who was in the habit of appealing to
the visible works of a thaumaturgist, and points much
more clearly to the real power which first gave wings
to primitive Christianity than Paley’s notion of a
machinery of material signs and wonders. There is
no doubt that the spiritual visions of the first founders
and the higher minds of the religion became quickly
materialised in the conceptions of their followers,
and that the gathering mists of mythus soon conglo
merated themselves into solid cloudy forms; but to
suppose that those phantasmagoria were the sole or
�26
Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
main forces that so stirred the trodden-down believers
of the first age, and projected their faith across the
centuries, is to take no true measure of the human
spirit, and to vulgarise a majestic episode of the
human drama into the proportions of a tale of hobgoblinry. If we are to believe in a direct divine
agency and a providential re-awakening of the human
race at the dawn of Christianity, it seems to me much
more easy to trace it through the nebular hypotheses
of Strauss than through the wooden machinery and
string-and-wire theories of Paley.
The second assumption to which Paley’s conclusion
introduces us is that a religion founded on the story
of men who were prepared to suffer in the way de
scribed must be true. If this assumption were reliable,
how many conflicting religions in the world’s history
would have equal evidence of their verity ? The
toughness of character which induces men to endure
persecution or undergo toil in support of their opinions
is not peculiar to orthodox Christians, but has often
displayed itself among heretics, infidels, and pagans.
In Church history alone we have abundant evidence
of it; the most admirable trait in the zealous contests
which have so often taken place between rival sects
being the patience and courage with which they
endured the mutual cruelties which each by turn
inflicted on the other, and the no less marvellous
faith with which both regarded their conflict
ing nostrums.
Christians by this time ought
to know pretty well from their own annals how
persecution, instead of killing, gives life to re
ligious beliefs.
Men, somehow, seem to have
got the notion that it is a fresh evidence of
the value and divinity of an object when it is sub
jected to the fierce assaults of the powers of this
world. A race despised and hunted from the face
of the earth naturally looks to the skies for a
deliverer, and thus everything in the nature of
�Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
*7
religion becomes the centre of all its hopes, and
re-consecrated by every fresh effort and sorrow..
The principle of resistance in human nature first
leads a man to maintain his liberty of thought,
. and then that for which he has suffered becomes
every day more sacred to him.
Christians have
had experience of this over and over again in their
own history. They have attempted themselves to
crush out opinions by measures little short of absolute
extermination. But they have miserably failed. The
growth which seemed stifled has sprung up again,
and often has spread all the more luxuriantly. Let
this teach them how far the endurance of persecution
can be accepted as evidence of the truth or value of
religious beliefs.
The persecution of the Christians by the Roman
authorities, however, was very far from being of such
an exterminating character, though our Advocate, as
in duty bound, endeavours to make the most of it,
and the ecclesiastical historians and apologists have
drawn it in dark colours. But the stories themselves
show frequently that the ruling classes were singu
larly forbearing, and sometimes protected the Chris
tians from the Jews, or from their mutual violence
to one another. Such things as shipwrecks and occa
sional shortness of provisions cannot be considered as
important elements of the question, for a man must
expect to meet his share of the ordinary accidents of
travel whether he sets out to propagate a faith or
puff a commercial firm. With respect to such inter
ludes of fierce and active persecution as really did
take place, we have positive evidence that they were
extremely partial and intermittent. Sometimes they
were brought on by the quarrels oi the Christians
themselves attracting notice; sometimes they were even
sought for by zealots, who thought a crown of mar
tyrdom a sure passport to both heavenly and earthly
glory. We find St Cyprian, in the middle of the
�28
Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
third century, even lamenting that the lack of per
*
secution had impaired the faith and morals of the
Christians. “As a long-f continuance of peace and
security,”says he, “had relaxed the vigour of that
holy discipline which was delivered to us from above,
it grew necessary to awaken our sluggish faith, and
rouse up our dormant principles by some smart
dispensation of Providence.He then proceeds
to enumerate the corruptions that had grown up
during the long period of ease. It has often been
shown that, of all things in the world, nothing is
more calculated to stimulate and diffuse a religious
belief than persecution which is occasional and spo
radic ; not enough to efface and eradicate, it is just
enough to create a few heroes and examples, to stir
the compassion of some, and excite the admiration and
emulation of others. It has passed into a common
place that persecution to be in the least effective must
be sweeping and “ thorough.” But in spite of all
that has been said, men do not yet seem to have hit
upon the method of making it sufficiently “ thorough ”
to accomplish its object in the extermination of a reli
gious belief; so that persecutors, now, like the devil,
have
“ Grown wiser than of yore,
And tempt by making rich, not making poor.”
They have found that the best mode of relaxing the
zeal of objectionable religionists is not to proscribe
but to endow them.
Our Advocate endeavours to back up his case by
putting the converse of his first proposition, which
may be in brief stated thus : that there is not satis
factory evidence that other believers in a miraculous
story have endured similar sufferings sooner than
* a.d. 251.
t That is to say, about forty years.
J See St Cyprian’s works, translation by Marshall, Fol. Ed.,
�Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
29
relinquish it. I have purposely omitted his reitera
tion of the term “ original witnesses,” having already
shown that there is no evidence of the testimony of
such persons, and, if there were, the majority of those
who carried on the propagation of the religion and
endured the consequent sufferings were not original
witnesses, but persons who had accepted certain
stories on hearsay. From what has already been
stated, it must be apparent there is no foundation
whatever for Paley’s statement; but as additional
evidence of its incorrectness, let me ask whether any
people have ever endured such severity of persecution
and for so long a period as the Jews ? They believe
in the miraculous origin of their religion, the thun
ders of Sinai, the fire of Elias, the inspiration of their
prophets, the angel of the Maccabees; they have
maintained this faith in every quarter of the known
world; they have endured an amount and a per
sistency of persecution and proscription absolutely
unparalleled, not merely intermitting through a
couple of hundred years, but steadily continued
through long centuries. Verily, if our test of truth
be the devotion of its followers, here is the people
*
who challenge our comparison and are entitled to our
suffrage! If from Western we turn our eyes to
Eastern Asia, where again will you find in past time
a people more devoted or more successful than the
followers of Buddha F From the time when they were
persecuted, driven out, and actually nigh exterminated
on the plains of India, they went abroad preaching
their faith by land and sea, carried it over a world
more extensive, and subdued before it empires
more ancientf than yet bow before the banners of
* See the account of the courageous martyrdom of Eleazar,
2 Maccab. vi.
f The most ancient races that embraced Christianity fell away
to Mahometanism. The Church has been chiefly recruited from
the nations of modern Europe and their descendants.
�30
Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
the cross. It is true this religion has become much
diversified in the various countries to which it has
found its way; but not more so than Christianity.
It is true also that it has corrupted itself by many
superstitions; but has not Christianity done the
same? Some travellers have informed us that, if
you go into a Greek, a Roman, or a Buddhist church,
you could hardly tell the difference between them.
The similarity of many of their miracles, their doc
trines, their religious ideas, and their practices, will
easily appear to anyone who will be at the pains to
study them. But we need not carry our view so far
off nor to such ancient times to find how easily simple
people may be induced to undergo labours and suffer
ings in support of what they conceive to be a mira
culous revelation. We need not, in fact, go much
further than our own doors. Read the account of
how death was braved and the terrible hardships
“ voluntarily undergone ” when, their leader having
been slain, the Mormon apostles bid their followers
relinquish their homes at Nauvoo, and seek a pro
mised land across the desert and the Rocky Moun
tains ; then listen to the language of some of
the poor emigrants and their teachers leaving our
ports for what they fondly look to as a “ New Jeru
salem,” a “ Chosen Zion,” and you will see that a
faith like in kind to that of the ancient believers
has
not altogether died out of the world.
You may say all this is but a poor parody on
Christianity.
That is true; but that does not
prevent it from being a convincing illustration of
how easily a certain class of minds may be con
vinced of a miraculous revelation, and how very
slight evidence of its truth results from the fact of
their undergoing suffering in consequence of such
conviction.
I know our author attempts to consolidate his
position by drawing a distinction between “other
�Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
31
miracles, and miracles in their nature as certain as
those of the Christians ; ” so as to be able when other
instances are adduced of persons suffering for a
miraculous faith, to elude his opponent by alleging
“ your miracles are not of my sort, and therefore do
not invalidate my argument.” But this is a mere
artifice founded on a gratuitous assumption. Whether
they are in their nature certain, depends like the rest
of the question upon testimony. What the intrinsic
difference is between the asserted Christian miracles,
and others, no one is able to say. Whether anything
corresponding to such events ever took place or no,
is the point at issue. As I have already said, and
must again reiterate, we have no account of an actual
original eye-witness, and therefore can only compare
such narratives as we have with similar stories heathen
and patristic. And in so comparing we must remem
ber that we look at the Christian miracles with an
educated eye and with the reverential associations in
which we have been indoctrinated from our earliest
days, whereas the strangeness of the style in accounts
to which we have not been accustomed at first
shocks us; but if we saw them for the first
time side by side in a newly discovered book, it
would be a different matter.
A philosopher
from another planet, unacquainted with both, might
find it difficult to know to which to award the
palm for poetic feeling and moral beauty. Each
collection would seem to him to have its grander
features, the cross of the dying God would stand over
against the rock of the benevolent and long-enduring
Titan, the incarnation of Buddha parallels the incar
nation of the Saviour; while both Jesus and Osiris
rise triumphant from the tomb. On the other hand,
on either part, he would find instances of a lower type,
and would have no difficulty in finding parallels for
such grotesque or gratuitously mythical examples as
�32
Remarks on Raley's Evidences.
the possessed swine, the tribute-paying fish, the
*
angel who troubled the pool of Bethesda,f or the
numerous dead who rose out of their graves after the
crucifixion.
By the distinctions he draws, our author means to
allege that there is a perfectly unique combination in
Christianity between the sufferings and the miracles,
which exists in no other instance. But this is a mere
arbitrary method of stating the case, which has no
foundation in fact. The early Christians were not
ready to undergo martyrdom on account of some
theory as to certain miracles, but, like votaries of
other faiths, they had embraced a story miraculous
on the whole, which involved principles that stirred
all the enthusiasm of their nature. They, the poor,
the trodden down of this world, rich in faith, were
the elect favourites of heaven,—their Lord was soon
to come again, when the wrong should be righted, the
lowly exalted, and the proud abased, this impure and
sinful world should be consumed by fire, while the
* Archbishop Trench makes the fish pay tithe instead of
tribute, and evolves a wonderful amount of mystery out of
the fact. He does not seem to think it likely a miracle would
have been wrought to discharge a mere worldly tax. While
referring to this writer I must take leave to protest against the
insolent intolerance and spiritual pride of many of his remarks.
He seems to consider that differing from his opinions is a con
clusive proof of moral obliquity. He not only accuses his
opponents of want of honesty, as he does poor Dr Paulus, but
of hate, malice, and other bad passions. It is futile, however,
to complain of one more instance of the uneven “balance of
the Sanctuary; ” it will be fully justified in the eyes of the
orthodox. When they use rude language, and reiterate their
well-worn jokes at the expense of free-thinkers, it is to be
regarded as holy zeal and pious indignation; when their
opponents retaliate, it is “ coarse ribaldry,” “ stark blas
phemy,” and so forth. See Trench on The Miracles, Pre
liminary Essay, and elsewhere. Passim.
t See Hammond’s curious attempt to rationalise this account.
Comment in loc.
�Remarks on Paley s Evidences.
33
faithful should reign triumphant in the New
Jerusalem. This prospect of a certain and shortly to
be fulfilled future was the motive power that first
set the ball rolling, and similar enthusiastic beliefs
have over and over again carried crowds across
*
continents.
There was nothing astonishing in their
shaping their beliefs in the forms of a miraculous
story; the astonishment would have been had it been
otherwise, since the whole atmosphere of the time
was miraculous; the mass of the people connected
religions and miracles together as a matter of course,
and nobody thought of questioning such things but a
few critics and philosophers. When details, perhaps,
at length come to be questioned, there is never a
lack in these cases of “ credible witnesses ” to state
what in fact they honestly believe, and if their belief
is bound up with enthusiastic religious hopes they
will suffer and die for it. Read the ardent assevera
tions of some of the early fathers and some modern
divines; they were not original witnesses ; these last
most certainly had no ground of their belief
beyond the fact that they had heard it stated again
and again; but it was bound up with their dearest
hopes and all the enthusiasm of their natures,
and, I have no doubt, that whether ancient or
modern, many of them if it had come to the pinch
would have died for it too.
Thus much may suffice to show the inconclusiveness
of our author’s general propositions- Much more
might be said on many of the details of the latter
part of his work, both as to his inadequate manner of
* See the account of the “Brethren of the Cross,” “The
Flagellants,” and the Children’s Crusade in the Middle Ages.
The superstition of the approaching end of the world has
cropped up over and over again. See Milman’s Hist. Lat.
Christianity, iv. 396; do. Hist. Jews, iii. 222. Neander’s
Church Hist. ix. 595. Kingston’s Life of Emp. Frederick II.,
• c. xv. 260. Robertson’s Charles V. “Proofs and Illustra
tions,” No. 13.
�34
Remarks on Paley s Evidences.
stating the objections of opponents, and his ex parte
representation of conflicting facts. I will conclude,
however, after the manner of our author himself, by
putting a simple case. Let it be remembered, as I
have already shown, that in the earliest writings of
the New Testament, and those only which can be
supposed to be genuine and authentic, the references
to miracles are extremely slight, and such as are quite
capable of being explained by the same theory which
Paley employs to discredit those of the Abbe Paris.
Let it also be remembered that the later the date of
the productions, the more does the miraculous element
predominate, and that none of the books in which it
predominates can be proved to be earlier than the year
110 a.d., their various probable dates ranging from
about 120 to 160, during which period the floating
traditions connected with the religion were “ co-acervating ” and developing, by mutual accretion, until
they were worked up into the form in which the
fathers of the latter part of the second and third
centuries have handed them down to us.
These
fathers, therefore, are the real persons who have
guaranteed the stones to us. Now, bearing these
things in mind, let us suppose that a wondrous
tale were brought, to us from the other side of
the Atlantic, which on the face of it surpassed
the bounds of probability. If, however, it were
brought to us by several men, not merely of ££ pro
bity and good sense,” but of calm judicial minds, ac
customed to weigh evidence, historical and scientific,
who all and each declared they had witnessed the inci
dents themselves, and who had no personal feelings,
affections, or aspirations enlisted in the matter, we
might think it at any rate worthy of our candid exami
nation, and we might, under certain circumstances,
feel ourselves bound to accept their statements as
facts even if we could not explain them. If, on the
other hand, the tale was conveyed to us by persons
�Remarks on Paley s Evidences.
35
of extremely excitable and enthusiastic dispositions
who had given many previous proofs of their extra
ordinary credulity, and who came from a district
greatly addicted to the marvellous, and celebrated
for the credulous and uncritical character of the
natives ; if, moreover, they could not truly affirm that
they were personal eyewitnesses, and the tale was
bound up with many of their strongest feelings and
aspirations, and at the same time added largely
to their personal influence and importance, without
attributing any sinister motives to them, we
should be strongly inclined to say, the story is
so improbable in itself that, under any circum
stances, we should have found it extremely difficult
of belief, but its credibility is altogether out of
the question when we consider the character of the
narrators.
Now these remarks exactly apply to the circum
stances of the case before us. The miraculous Chris
tian story took form in a remarkably and increasingly
credulous age, it received nourishment from such
circumstances as were peculiarly suited to foster it,
and it is presented to us by men who have given
repeated proofs of their want of judgment and critical
discrimination, their readiness to embrace anything
that fell in with their preconceptions, and their en
thusiastic and uncontrollable feelings. This is only
a fair description of the ecclesiastical fathers of the
end of the second, the third, and the fourth centuries,
who are. our only vouchers for the miraculous records.
Here is not the place for multiplying illustrations of
this assertion. I can only say if any one doubts the
substantial truth of my allegation let him read the
fathers for himself!
This uninviting task is now facilitated by the fact
that most of them are translated, so that a sufficient
knowledge of their contents may be obtained without
having to struggle through the contorted Latin and
�36
Remarks on Paley’s Evidences.
bad Greek for -which some of them are distinguished.
I subjoin a few instances of their credulity and want
of judgment.
To draw, then, this somewhat long epistle to a
close, I submit to your candid consideration whether
a work, which grounds on ; so unsatisfactory a
basis the evidences of Christianity, which puts the
material machinery and the thaumaturgic element of
its history into so much greater prominence than the
moral (the really strong point of the Christian religion),
and which, in its critical statements, is so far below
the information and requirements of the present day,
is such a work as should occupy a place on the list of
class-books of this great University. My object in
this letter is to express a hope that members of this
University may, each as far as lies in his power, exert
their influence to obtain its removal from such a
position.
I am, Gentlemen,
Your obedient Servant,
An Old Graduate.
�Remarks on Paley’s Evidences.
37
NOTES.
Origen, for instance, informs us that in his time it was a
common thing to cure innumerable evils and drive out devils
from men and beasts by adjurations and exorcisms (Conts.
Cels. L. vii. p. 374).
Justin Martyr not only affirms the old fable about the
Septuagint translators, but declares that he had himself seen.
at Alexandria the remains of the cells in which they were shut
up. (Cohort, ad Graec. p. 14.) The same Father tells us that
the Christians often drove out devils after other enchanters
had tried and failed (Apol. ii. 116).
Minutius Felix declares that Saturn, Serapis, and Jupiter,
when adjured by the Christians, confess themselves to be
demons (Octav.).
Several Fathers have fabulous tales of angels begetting
demons on the bodies of women, and indulging in sensual
enormities with women and boys.
Lactantius and the author of the Clement. Recogn. allege,
as proof of the immortality of the soul, that any magician
could call up the souls of the dead and make them foretell
future events, and say that Simon Magus wrought his miracles
by means of the soul of a boy who had been put to death for
the purpose (Fact. Div. Inst. L. vii., c. 13 ; Clem. Rec. L. ii.,
c. 13).
Irenaeus declares that the Dead were frequently raised in his
time by the prayers of the Church, and afterwards lived many
years among them (adv. Haeres. L. ii., c. 57).
Papias alleged the same according to Eusebius (Hist. Ecc.
iii. 39).
St Augustin, that famous Father, goes beyond this, and
relates that several persons were brought back to life by means
of the reliques of St Stephen (De Civ. Dei. L. xxii., c. viii.,
§ 18-21).
St Athanasius informs us that one day, Anthony, the Monk,
going to his door was accosted by a tall meagre person who,
being asked his name, answered that he was Satan. He adds
a large number of monstrous stories, declaring that he kneio
them to be true (Athan., Life of St Anthony).
Gregory, of Nyssa, has a wonderful story of an appearance
of the Virgin Mary and St John.
But, perhaps, the most astounding of all is a story of St
Augustin’s, which he declares he had from credible witnesses,,
to the effect that the ground where St John was buried heaved
�38
Remarks on Paley's Evidences.
up and down regularly according to the motion of his bodycaused by his breathing. This they supposed a fulfilment of
the promise that St John should not die (Augustin in loc., Joh.
xxi. 23).
These are but a few specimens of the marvels testified to by
some of the early Fathers. The other Fathers, not mentioned,
share their superstition and credulity. [I particularly recom
mend to the notice of those who have not read it, ‘An Inquiry
into the Miraculous Powers supposed to have subsisted in the
Christian Church,’ &c, (by Dr Conyers Middleton, formerly
Fellow of Trim, Librarian of this University, and Woodwardian Professor), from which work the above examples are
taken.] The professed historians of the Early Church were
very little better. Refer to Socrat, B. vii., c. 4. Sozomen,
B. ii., c. 1, c. 3, c. 7; B. iii., c. 14 ; B. iv., c. 3, and many other
places. Theodoret is full of superstitious fables. See par
ticularly B. I., c. 7, c. 14, 18, 23, 24 ; B. iv., c. 21, and, in fact,
passim.
�
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Conway Tracts
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Text
ON THE ATONEMENT
ANNIE BESANT.
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCOTT
NO. 11, THE TERRACE, FARQUHAR ROAD,'
UPPER NORWOOD, LONDON, S.E.
Price Sixpence.
��ON THE ATONEMENT.
HE Atonement may be regarded as the central doc
T trine of Christianity, the very raison d'etre of the
Christian faith. Take this away, and there would
remain indeed a faith and a morality, but both would
have lost their distinctive features : it would be a faith
without its centre, and a morality without its founda
tion. Christianity would be unrecognisable without its
angry God, its dying Saviour, its covenant signed with
“ the blood of the Lamb •” the blotting out of the
atonement would deprive millions of all hope towards
God, and would cast them from satisfaction into
anxiety, from comfort into despair. The warmest
feelings of Christendom cluster round the Crucifix, and
he, the crucified one, is adored with passionate devo
tion, not as martyr for truth, not as witness for God,
not as faithful to death, but as the substitute for his
worshippers, as he who bears in their stead the wrath
of God, and the punishment due to sin. The Christian
is taught to see in the bleeding Christ the victim slain
in his own place ; he himself should be hanging on
that cross, agonised and dying ; those nail-pierced
hands ought to be his; the anguish on that face should
be furrowed on his own; the weight of suffering
resting on that bowed head should be crushing himself
into the dust. In the simplest meaning of the words,
Christ is the sinner’s substitute, and on him the sin of
the world is laid: as Luther expressed it, he “ is the
greatest and only sinner j” literally “ made sin ” for
>
�6
On the Atonement.
mankind, and expiating the guilt which, in very deed,
was transferred from man to him.
I wish at the outset, for. the sake of justice and can
dour, to acknowledge frankly the good which has been
drawn forth by the preaching of the Cross. This good
has been, however, the indirect rather than the direct
result of a belief in the Atonement. The doctrine, in
itself, has nothing elevating about it, but the teaching
closely connected with the doctrine has its ennobling
and purifying side. All the enthusiasm aroused in the
human breast by the thought of one who sacrificed
himself to save his brethren, all the consequent longing
to emulate that love by sacrificing all for Jesus and for
those for whom he died, all the moral gain caused by
the contemplation of a sublime self devotion, all these
are the fruits of the nobler side of the Atonement.
That the sinless should stoop to the sinful, that holi
ness should embrace the guilty in order to raise them
to its own level, has struck a chord in men’s bosoms
which has responded to the touch by a harmonious
melody of gratitude to the divine and sinless sufferer, and
loving labour for suffering and sinful man. The Cross
has been at once the apotheosis and the source of self
sacrificing love. “ Love ye one another as I have
loved you : not in word but in deed, with a deep self
sacrificing lovesuch is the lesson which, according to
one of the most orthodox Anglican divines, 11 Christ
preaches to us from His Cross.” In believing in the
Atonement, man’s heart has, as usual, been better than
his head; he has passed over the dark side of the idea,
and has seized on the divine truth that the strong
should gladly devote themselves to shield the weak,
that labour, even unto death, is the right of humanity
from every son of man. It is often said that no doc
trine long retains its hold on men’s hearts which is not
founded on some great truth; this divine idea of self
sacrifice has been the truth contained in the doctrine
of the Atonement, which has made it so dear to many
�On the Atonement.
7
loving and noble souls, and which, has hidden its
“ multitude of sins ”—sins against love and against
justice, against God and against man. Love and self
sacrifice have floated the great error over the storms of
centuries, and these cords still bind to it many hearts
of which love and self-sacrifice are the glory and the
crown.
This said, in candid homage to the good which has
drawn its inspiration from Jesus crucified, we turn to
the examination of the doctrine itself: if we find that
it is as dishonouring to God as it is injurious to man, a
crime against justice, a blasphemy against love, we
must forget all the sentiments which cluster round it,
and reject it utterly. It is well to speak respectfully
of that which is dear to any religious soul, and to
avoid jarring harshly on the strings of religious feeling,
even though the soul be misled and the feeling be mis
directed ; but a time comes when false charity is cruelty,
and tenderness to error is treason to truth. For long
men who know its emptiness pass by in silence the
shrine consecrated by human hopes and fears, by love
and worship, and the “ times of this ignorance God (in
the bold figure of Paul) also winks atbut when
11 the fulness of the time is come,” God sends forth
some true son of his to dash the idol to the ground,
and to trample it into dust. We need not be afraid
that the good wrought by the lessons derived from the
Atonement in time past will disappear with the doctrine
itself; the mark of the Cross is too deeply ploughed
into humanity ever to be erased, and those who no
longer call themselves by the name of Christ are not
the most backward scholars in the school of love and
sacrifice.
The history of this doctrine has been a curious one.
In the New Testament the atonement is, as its name
implies, a simply making at one God and man : how
this is done is but vaguely hinted at, and in order to
deduce the modern doctrine from the bible, we must
�8
On the Atonement.
import into the books of the New Testament all the
ideas derived from theological disputations. Words
used in all simplicity by the ancient writers must have
attached to them the definite polemical meaning they
hold in the quarrels of theologians, before they can be
strained into supporting a substitutionary atonement.
The idea, however, of “ ransom ” is connected with the
work of Jesus, and the question arose, “to whom is
this ransom paid ? ” They who lived in those first
centuries of Christianity were still too much within the
illumination of the tender halo thrown by Jesus round
the Father’-s name, to dream for a moment that their
redeemer had ransomed them from the beloved hands
of God. No, the ransom was paid to the devil, whose
thrall they believed mankind to be, and Jesus, by
sacrificing himself, had purchased them from the devil
and made them sons of God. It is not worth while to
enter on the quaint details of this scheme, how the
devil thought he had conquered and could hold Jesus
captive, and was tricked by finding that his imagined
gain could not be retained by him, and so on.
Those who wish to become acquainted with this
ingenious device can study it in the pages of the Chris
tian fathers : it has at least one advantage over the
modern plan, namely, that we are not so shocked at
hearing of pain and suffering as acceptable to the
supposed incarnate evil, as at hearing of them being
offered as a sacrifice to the supreme good. As the
teaching of Jesus lost its power, and became more and
more polluted hy the cruel thoughts of savage and
bigoted men, the doctrine of the atonement gradually
changed its character. Men thought the Almighty to
he such a one as themselves, and being fierce and
unforgiving and revengeful, they projected their own
shadows on to the clouds which surrounded the Deity,
and then, like the shepherd who meets his own form
reflected and magnified on the mountain mist, they
recoiled before the image they themselves had made.
�On the Atonement.
9
The loving Father who sent his son to rescue his
perishing children by sacrificing himself, fades away
from the hearts of the Christian world, and there
looms darkly in his place an awful form, the inexor
able judge who exacts a debt man is too poor to pay,
and who, in default of payment, casts the debtor into
a hopeless prison, hopeless unless another pays to the
uttermost farthing the fine demanded by the law. So,
in this strange transformation-scene God actually takes
the place of the devil, and the ransom once paid to
redeem men from Satan, becomes the ransom paid to
redeem men from God. It reminds one of the quarrels
over the text which bids us “ fear him who is able to
destroy both body and soul in hell,” when we remain
in doubt whom he is we are to fear, since half the Chris
tian commentators assure us that it refers to our Father
in heaven, while the other half asseverate that the
devil is the individual we are to dread. The seal was
set on the “redemption scheme” by Anselm in his
great work, “ Cur Deus Homo," and the doctrine which
had been slowly growing into the theology of Christen
dom was thenceforward stamped with the signet of the
church. Roman Catholics and Protestants, at the
time of the Reformation, alike believed in the vicarious
and substitutionary character of the atonement wrought
by Christ. There is no dispute between them on this
point. I prefer to allow the Christian divines to speak
for themselves as to the character of the atonement:
no one can accuse me of exaggerating their views if
their views are given in their own words. Luther
teaches that “ Christ did truly and effectually feel
for all mankind, the wrath of God, malediction and
death.” Flavet says that “to wrath, to the wrath of
an infinite God without mixture, to the very torments
of hell, was Christ delivered, and that by the hand of
his own father.” The Anglican homily preaches that
“ sin did pluck God out of heaven to make him feel the
horrors and pains of death,” and that man being a fire-
�IO
On the Atonement.
"brand of hell and a bondsman of the devd, “ *vvas
ransomed by the death of his own only and well-beloved
son ; ” the “ heat of his wrath,” 11 his burning wrath”
could only be “ pacified ” by Jesus, “ so pleasant was
this sacrifice and oblation of his son’s death.” Edwards
"being logical, saw that there was a gross injustice
in sin being twice punished, and in the pains of hell,
the penalty of sin, being twice inflicted, first on Christ,
the substitute of mankind, and then on the lost, a
portion of mankind. So he, in common with most
Calvinists, finds himself compelled to restrict the atone
ment to the elect, and declared that Christ bore the
sins, not of the world, but of the chosen out of the
world; he suffers “ not for the world, but for them
whom Thou hast given me.”. But Edwards adheres
firmly to the belief in substitution, and rejects the
universal atonement for the very reason that “to
believe Christ died for all is the surest way of proving
that he died for none in the sense Christians
have hitherto believed.” He declares that “Christ
suffered the wrath of God for men’s sins : ” that “ God
imposed his wrath due unto, and Christ underwent the
pains of hell for ” sin. Owen regards Christ’s suffer
ings as “a full valuable compensation to the justice of
God for all the sins” of the elect, and says that he
underwent “ that same punishment which.......... they
themselves were bound to undergo.”
The doctrine of the Christian Church—in the widest
sense of that much fought-over term—was then as
follows, and I will state it in language which is
studiously moderate, as compared with the orthodox
teaching of the great Christian divines : if any one
doubts this assertion let him study their writings for
himself. I really dare not transfer some of their ex
pressions to my own pages. God the Father having
cursed .mankind and condemned them to eternal
damnation, because of Adam’s disobedience in eating
an apple—or some other fruit, for the species is only
�On the Atonement.
11
preserved by tradition, and is not definitely settled by
the inspired writings—and having further cursed each
man for his bwn individual transgressions, man lay
under the fierce wrath of God, unable to escape, and
unable to pacify it, for he could not even atone for his
own private sins, much less for his share of the guilt
incurred by his forefather in paradise. Man’s debt
was hopelessly large, and he had “ nothing to pay; ”
so all that remained to him was to suffer an eternity
of torture, which sad fate he had merited by the crime
of being born into an accursed world. The second
person of the Trinity, moved to pity by the helpless
and miserable state of mankind, interposed between
the first person of the Trinity and the wretched
sinners; he received into his own breast the fire
tipped arrows of divine wrath, and by suffering incon
ceivable tortures, equal in amount to an eternity of
the torments of hell, he wrung from God’s hands the
pardon of mankind, or of a portion thereof. God,
pacified by witnessing this awful agony of one who
had from all eternity been “ lying in his bosom ”
co-equal sharer of his Majesty and glory, and the
object of his tenderest love, relents from his fierce
wrath, and consents to accept the pain of Jesus as a
substitute for the pain of mankind. In plain terms,
then, God is represented as a Being so awfully cruel,
so implacably revengeful, that pain as pain, and death
as death, are what he demands as a propitiatory
sacrifice, and with nothing less than extremest agony
can his fierce claims on mankind be bought off. The
due weight of suffering he must have, but it is a matter
of indifference, whether it is undergone by Jesus or by
mankind. Did not the old Fathers do well in making
the awful ransom a matter between Jesus and the devil ?
When this point is pressed on Christians, and one
urges the dishonour done to God by painting him in
colours from which heart and soul recoil in shuddering
horror, by ascribing to him a revengefulness and
�12
On the Atonement.
pitiless cruelty in comparison with which the worst
efforts of human malignity appear but childish mis
chief, they are quick to retort that we are caricatur
ing Christian doctrine j they will allow, when over
whelmed with evidence, that “strong language” has
been used in past centuries, but will say that such
views are not now held, and that they do not ascribe
such harsh dealing to God the Father. Theists are
therefore compelled to prove each step of their
accusation, and to quote from Christian writers the
words which embody the views they assail. Were
I simply to state that Christians in these days ascribe
to Almighty God a fierce wrath against the whole
human race, that this wrath can only be soothed by
suffering and death, that he vents this wrath on an
innocent head, and that he is well pleased by the
sight of the agony of his beloved Son, a shout of
indignation would rise from a thousand lips, and I
should. be accused of exaggeration, of false witness,
of blasphemy. So once more I write down the
doctrine from Christian dictation, and, be it remem
bered, the sentences I quote are from published works,
and are therefore the outcome of serious deliberation ■
they are not overdrawn pictures taken from the fervid
eloquence of excited oratory, when the speaker may
perhaps be carried further than he would, in cold
blood, consent to.
Stroud makes Christ drink “ the cup of the wrath of
God.” Jenkyn says, “he suffered as one disowned
and reprobated and forsaken of God.”
Dwight
considers that he endured God’s “hatred and con
tempt.” Bishop Jeune tells us that “ after man had
done his worst, worse remained for Christ to bear.
He had fallen into his father’s hands.” Archbishop
Thomson preaches that “the clouds of God’s wrath
gathered thick over the whole human race : they
discharged themselves on Jesus only ; ” he “becomes a
curse for us, and a vessel of wrath.” Liddon echoes
�On the Atonement.
*3
the same sentiment : “ the apostles teach that mankind
are slaves, and that Christ on the Cross is paying their
ransom. Christ crucified is voluntarily devoted and
accursed
he even speaks of “the precise amount of
ignominy and pain needed for the redemption,” and
says that the “ divine victim ” paid more than was
absolutely necessary.
These quotations seem sufficient to prove that the
Christians of the present day are worthy followers
of the elder believers. The theologians first quoted
are indeed coarser in their expressions, and are less
afraid of speaking out exactly what they believe, but
there is no real difference of creed between the awful
doctrine of Flavel and the polished dogma of Canon
Liddon. The older and the modern Christians alike
believe in the bitter wrath of God against “ the whole
human race.” Both alike regard the atonement as so
much pain tendered by Jesus to the Almighty Father
in payment of a debt of pain owed to God by humanity.
They alike represent God as only to be pacified by the
sight of suffering. Man has insulted and injured God,
and God must be revenged by inflicting suffering on
the sinner in return. The “ hatred and contempt ”
God launched at Jesus were due to the fact that Jesus
was the sinner’s substitute, and are therefore the feel
ings which animate the divine heart towards the sinner
himself. God hates and despises the world. He
would have “ consumed it in a moment ” in the fire
of his burning wrath, had not Jesus, “his chosen,
stood before him in the gap to turn away his wrathful
indignation.”
Mow how far is all this consistent with justice ? Is
the wrath of God against humanity justified by
the circumstances of the case so that we may be
obliged to own that some sacrifice was due from sinful
man to his Creator, to propitiate a justly incensed and
holy God ? I trow not. On this first count, the
atonement is a fearful injustice. For God has allowed
�U
On the Atonement.
men to be brought into the world with sinful inclina
tions, and to be surrounded with many temptations
and much evil. He has made man imperfect, and the
child is born into the world with an imperfect nature. It
is radically unjust then that God should curse the work
of His hands for being what He made them, and con
demn them to endless misery for failing to do the
impossible. Allowing that Christians are right in
believing that Adam was sinless when he came from
his Maker’s hands, these remarks apply to every other
living soul since born into the world; the Genesis
myth will not extricate Christians from the difficulty.
Christians are quite right and are justified by facts
when they say that man is born into the world frail,
imperfect, prone to sin and error; but who, we ask
them, made men so ? Does not their own Bible tell
them that the “ potter hath power over the clay,” and,
further, that “ we are the clay and thou art the potter?”
To curse men for being men, i.e., imperfect moral
beings, is the height of cruelty and injustice ; to con
demn the morally weak to hell for sin, i.e., for failing
in moral strength, is about as fair as sentencing a sick
man to death because he cannot stand upright.
Christians try and avoid the force of this by saying
that men should rely on God’s grace to uphold them,
but they fail to see that this very want of reliance is part
of man’s natural weakness. The sick man might be
blamed for falling because he did not lean on a
stronger arm, but suppose he was too weak to grasp
it 1 Further, few Christians believe that it is possible
in practice, however possible in theory, to lead a
perfect life ; and as to “ offend in one point is to be
guilty of all,” one failure is sufficient to send the
generally righteous man to hell. Besides, they forget
that infants are included under the curse, although
necessarily incapable of grasping the idea either of sin
or of God; all babies born into the world and dying
before becoming capable of acting for themselves
�On the Atonement.
*5
would, we- are taught, have been inevitably consigned
to hell, had it not been for the atonement of Jesus.
Some Christians actually believe that unbaptized
babies are not admitted into heaven, and in a Roman
Catholic book descriptive of hell, a poor-little baby
writhes and screams in a red-hot oven.
This side of the atonement, this unjust demand on
men for a righteousness they could not render, neces
sitating a sacrifice to propitiate God for non-compliance
with his exaction, has had its due effect on men’s
minds, and has alienated their hearts from God. No
wonder that men turned away from a God who, like a
passionate but unskilful workman, dashes to pieces the
instrument he has made because it fails in its purpose,
and, instead of blaming his own want of skill, vents
his anger on the helpless thing that is only what he
made it. Most naturally, also, have men shrunk from
the God who “ avengeth and is furious ” to the tender,
pitiful, human Jesus, who loved sinners so deeply as to
choose to suffer for their sakes. They could owe no grati
tude to an Almighty Being who created them and cursed
them, and only consented to allow them to be happy
on condition that another paid for them the misery he
demanded as his due ; but what gratitude could be
enough for him who rescued them from the fearful
hands of the living God, at the cost of almost intoler
able suffering to himself? Let us remember that
Christ is said to suffer the very torments of hell, and
that his worst sufferings were when “ fallen into his
father’s hands,” out of which he has rescued us, and
then can we wonder that the crucified is adored with a
very ecstasy of gratitude ? Imagine what it is to be
saved from the hands of him who inflicted an agony
admitted to be unlimited, and who took advantage of
an infinite capacity in order to inflict an infinite pain.
It is well for the men before whose eyes this awful
spectre has flitted that the fair humanity of Jesus gives
them a refuge to fly to, else what but despair and
�16
On the Atonement.
madness could have been the doom of those who, with
out Jesus, would have seen enthroned above the wail
ing universe naught but an infinite cruelty and an
Almighty foe.
We see, then, that the necessity for an atonement
makes the Eternal Father both unjust in his demands
on men and cruel in his punishment of inevitable
failure; but there is another injustice which is of the
very essence of the atonement itself. This consists in
the vicarious character of the sacrifice: a new element
of injustice is introduced when we consider that the
person sacrificed is not even the guilty party. If a
man offends against law, justice requires that he should
be punished : the punishment becomes unjust if it is
excessive, as in the case we have been considering
above; but it is equally unjust to allow him to go free
without punishment. Christians are right in affirming
that moral government would be at an end were man
allowed to sin with impunity, and did an easy forgive
ness succeed to each offence. They appeal to our in
stinctive sense of justice to approve the sentiment that
punishment should follow sin: we acquiesce, and hope
that we have now reached a firm standing-ground from
which to proceed further in our investigation. But,
no; they promptly outrage that same sense of justice
which they have called as a witness on their side, by
asking us to believe that its ends are attained provided
that somebody or other is punished. When we reply
that this is not justice, we are promptly bidden not to be
presumptuous .and .argue from our human ideas of justice
as to the course that ought to be pursued by the absolute
justice of God. “Then'why appeal to it at all?” we
urge; “why talk of -justice in the matter if we are
totally unable to judge as to the rights and wrongs of
the case?” At -this point we are commonly over
whelmed with Paul’s notable argument—“Nay, but,
0 man, who art thou that repliest agaipst God ? ”
But if Christians value the simplicity and straight
�On the Atonement.
J7
forwardness of their own minds, they should not use
words which convey a certain accepted meaning in this
shuffling, double sense. When we speak of “justice,”
we speak of a certain well-understood quality, and we
do not speak of a mysterious divine attribute, which
has not only nothing in common with human justice,
but which is in direct opposition to that which we
understand by that name. Suppose a man condemned
to death for murder: the judge is about to sentence him,
when a bystander—as it chances, the judge’s own son
interposes: “My Lord, the prisoner is guilty and
deserves to be hanged; but if you will let him go, I
will die in his place.” The offer is accepted, the
prisoner is set free, the judge’s son is hanged in his .
stead. "What is all this ? Self-sacrifice (however mis
directed), love, enthusiasm—what you will; but cer
tainly not justice—nay, the grossest injustice, a second
murder, an ineffaceable stain on the ermine of the out
raged law. I imagine that, in this supposed case; no
Christian will.be found to assert that justice was done;
yet call the judge God, the prisoner mankind, the sub
stitute Jesus, and the trial scene is exactly reproduced.
Then, in the name of candour and common sense, why
call that just in God which we see would be so unjust
and immoral in man ? This vicarious nature of the
atonement also degrades the divine name, by making
him utterly careless in the matter of punishment:
all he is anxious for, according to this detestable
theory, is that he should strike a blow somewhere.
Like a child in a passion, he only feels the desire to
hurt somebody, and strikes out vaguely and at random.
There is no discrimination Used; the thunderbolt is
launched into a crowd; it falls on the head of the
sinless son,” and crushes the innocent, while the
sinner goes free. What matter? .It has fallen some
where, and the “ burning '■fire of his wrath” is cooled.
This is what men call the vindication of the justice of
the Moral Governor of the universe: this is “the act of
�On the Atonement.
God’s awful holiness,” which marks his hatred of sin,
and his immovable determination to punish it. But
when we reflect that this justice is consistent with
letting off the guilty and punishing an innocent per
son, we feel dread misgivings steal into our minds.
The justice of our Moral Governor has nothing in
common with our justice—indeed, it violates all our
notions of right and wrong. What if, as Mr Vance
Smith suggests, this strange justice be consistent also
with a double punishment of sin; and what if the
Moral Governor should bethink himself that, having
confused morality by an unjust—humanly speaking, of
course—punishment, it would be well to set things
straight again by punishing the guilty after all 1 We
can never dare to feel safe in the hands of this unjust
—humanly speaking—Moral Governor, or predicate
from our instinctive notions of right and wrong what
his requirements may be. One is lost in astonishment
that men should believe such things of God, and not
have manhood enough to rise up rebellious against
such injustice—should, instead, crouch at his feet, and
while trying to hide themselves from his wrath should
force their trembling lips to murmur some incoherent
acknowledgment of his mercy. Ah 1 they do not be
lieve it; they assert it in words, but, thank God, it
makes no impression on their hearts; and they would
die a thousand deaths rather than imitate, in their
dealings with their fellow-men, the fearful cruelty
which the Church has taught them to call the justice
of the Judge of all the earth.
The Atonement is not only doubly unjust, but it is
perfectly futile. We are told that Christ took away
the sin of the world ; we have a right to ask, “ how ? ”
So far as we can judge, we bear our sins in our own
bodies still, and the Atonement helps us not at all.
Has he borne the physical consequences of sin, such as
the loss of health caused by intemperance of all kinds ?
Not at all, this penalty remains, and, from the nature
�On the Atonement.
of things, cannot be transferred. Has he borne the
social consequences, shame, loss of credit, and so on. ?
They remain still to hinder us as we strive to rise after
our fall. Has he at least borne the pangs of remorse
for us, the stings of conscience 1 By no means; the
tears of sorrow are no less bitter, the prickings of
repentance no less keen. Perhaps he has struck at the
root of evil, and has put away sin itself out of a
redeemed world ? Alas ! the wailing that goes up to
heaven from a world oppressed with sin weeps out a
sorrowfully emphatic, “ no, this he has not done.”
What has he then borne for us ? Nothing, save the
phantom wrath of a phantom tyrant; all that is real
exists the same as before. We turn away, then, from
the offered Atonement with a feeling that would be
impatience at such trifling, were it not all too sorrow
ful, and leave the Christians to impose on their
imagined sacrifice, the imagined burden of the guilt of
an accursed race.
Further, the Atonement is, from the nature of things,
entirely impossible : we have seen how Christ fails to
hear our sins in any intelligible sense, but can he, in
any way, bear the “punishment” of sin ? The idea that
the punishment of sin can be transferred from one
person to another is radically false, and arises from
a wrong conception of - the punishment consequent on
sin, and from the ecclesiastical guilt, so to speak,
thought to be incurred thereby. ' The only true pun
ishment of sin is the injury caused hy it to our moral
nature: all the indirect punishments, we have seen,
Christ has not taken away, and the true punishment
can fall only on ourselves. For sin is nothing more
than the transgression of law. All law, when broken,
entails of necessity an appropriate penalty, and recoils,
as it were, on the transgressor. A natural law, when
broken, avenges itself by consequent suffering, and so
does a spiritual law : the injury wrought by the latter
is not less real, although less obvious. Physical sin
�20
On the Atonement.
brings physical suffering; spiritual, moral, mental sin
brings each its own appropriate punishment. “ Sin ”
has become such a cant term that we lose sight, in
using it, of its real simple meaning, a breaking of law.
Imagine any sane man coming and saying, “ My dear
friend, if you like to put your hand into the fire I will
bear the punishment of being burnt, and you shall not
suffer.” It is quite as absurd to imagine that if I sin
Jesus can bear my consequent suffering. If a man
lies habitually, for instance, he grows thoroughly
untrue : let him repent ever so vigorously, he must
bear the consequences of his past deeds, and fight his
way back slowly to truthfulness of word and thought:
no atonement, nothing in heaven or earth save his own
labour, will restore to him the forfeited jewel of in
stinctive candour. Thus the “ punishment ” of untruth
fulness is the loss of the power of being true, just as
the punishment of putting the hand into the fire is the
loss of the power of grasping. But in addition to this
simple and most just and natural “ retribution,” theolo
gians have invented certain arbitrary penalties as a
punishment of sin, the wrath of God and hell fire.
These imaginary penalties are discharged by an equally
imaginary atonement, the natural punishment remain
ing as before; so after all we only reject the two sets
of inventions which balance each other, and find our
selves just in the same position as they are, having
gained infinitely in simplicity and naturalness. The
punishment of sin is not an arbitrary penalty, but an
inevitable sequence : Jesus may bear, if his worshippers
will have it so, the theological fiction of the “ guilt of
sin,” an idea derived from the ceremonial uncleanness
of the Levitical law, but let him leave alone the
solemn realities connected with the sacred and immutable laws of God.
Doubly unjust, useless, and impossible, it might be
deemed a work of supererogation to argue yet further
against the Atonement; but its hold on men’s minds
�On the Atonement.
2I
is too firm to allow ns to lay down a single weapon
which can he turned against it. So, in addition to
these defects, I remark that, viewed as a propitiatory
sacrifice to Almighty God, it is thoroughly inadequate.
If God, being righteous, as we believe Him to be, re
garded man with anger because of man’s sinfulness,
what is obviously the required propitiation? Surely
the removal of the cause of anger, i.e., of sin itself, and
the seeking by man of righteousness. The old Hebrew
prophet saw this plainly, and his idea of atonement is
the true one: “ lolierewitli shall I come before the
Lord,” he is asked, with burnt-offerings or—choicer
still—parental anguish over a first-born’s corpse?
“ What doth the Lord require of thee,” is the reprov
ing answer, “but to do justly and to love mercy, and
to walk humbly with thy God?” But what is the
propitiatory element in the Christian Atonement ? let
Canon Liddon answer : “ the ignominy and pain needed
for the redemption.” Ignominy, agony, blood, death,
these are what Christians offer up as an acceptable
sacrifice to the Spirit of Love. But what have all
these in common with the demands of the Eternal
Righteousness, and how can pain atone for sin ? they
have no relation to each other; there is no appropriate
ness in the offered exchange. These terrible offerings
are in keeping with the barbarous ideas of uncivilized
nations, and we understand the feelings which prompt
the savage to immolate tortured victims on the altars
of his gloomy gods; they are appropriate sacrifices to
the foes of mankind, who are to be bought off from
injuring us by our offering them an equivalent pain to
that they desire to inflict, but they are offensive when
given to Him who is the Friend and Lover of Hu
manity. An Atonement which offers suffering as a
propitiation can have nothing in common with God’s
will for man, and must be utterly beside the mark,
perfectly inadequate. If we must have Atonement, let
it at least consist of something which will suit the
�22
On the Atonement.
Righteousness and Love of God, and be in keeping
with his perfection; let it not borrow the language of
ancient savagery, and breathe of blood and dying
victims, and tortured human frames, racked with pain.
Lastly, I impeach the Atonement as injurious in
several ways to human morality. It has been extolled
as “ meeting the needs of the awakened sinner ” by
soothing his fears of punishment with the gift of a
substitute who has already suffered his sentence for
him; but nothing can be more pernicious than to con
sole a sinner with the promise that he shall escape the
punishment he has justly deserved. The atonement
may meet the first superficial feelings of a man startled
into the consciousness of his sinfulness, it may soothe
the first vague fears and act as an opiate to the
awakened conscience ; but it does not fulfil the cravings
of a heart deeply yearning after righteousness ; it offers
a legal justification to a soul which is longing for
purity, it offers freedom from punishment to a soul
longing for freedom from sin. The true penitent does
not seek to be shielded from the consequences of his
past errors: he accepts them meekly, bravely, humbly,
learning through pain the lesson of future purity. An
atonement which steps in between us and this fatherly
discipline ordained by God, would be a curse and not
a blessing; it would rob us of our education and
deprive us • of a priceless instruction. The force of
temptation is fearfully added to by the idea that
repentance lays the righteous penalty of transgression
on another head ; this doctrine gives a direct encourage
ment to sin, as even Paul perceived when he said,
“ shall we continue in sin that grace may abound 1 ”
Some one has remarked, I think, that though Paul
ejaculates, “ God forbid,” his fears were well founded
and have been widely realised. To the atonement we
owe the morbid sentiment which believes in the holy
death of a ruffianly murderer, because, goaded by
ungovernable terror, he has snatched at the offered
�On the Atonement.
23
safety and been “ washed in the blood of the lamb.”
To it we owe the unwholesome glorying in the pious
sentiments of such an one, who ought to go out of this
life sadly and silently, without a sickening parade of
feelings of love towards the God whose laws, as long
as he could, he has broken and despised. But the Chris
tian teachers will extol the “ saving grace ” which has
made the felon die with words of joyful assurance,
meet only for the lips of one who crowns a saintly life
with a peaceful death. The atonement has weakened
that stern condemnation of sin which is the safe-guard
of purity ; it has softened down moral differences and
placed the penitent above the saint; it has dulled the
feeling of responsibility in the soul; it has taken
away the help, such as it is, of fear of punishment for
sin; it has confused man’s sense of justice, outraged
his feeling of right, blunted his conscience, and mis
directed his repentance. It has chilled his love to
God by representing the universal father as a cruel
tyrant and a remorseless and unjust judge. It lias
been the fruitful parent of all asceticism, for, since God
was pacified by suffering once, he would of course be
pleased with suffering at all times, and so men have
logically ruined their bodies to save their souls, and
crushed their feelings and lacerated their hearts to
propitiate the awful form frowning behind the cross of
Christ. To the atonement we owe it that God is
served by fear instead of by love, that monasticism
holds its head above the sweet sanctities of love and
home, that religion is crowned with thorns and not
with roses, that the miserere and not the gloria is the
strain from earth to heaven. The atonement teaches
men to crouch at the feet of God, instead of raising
loving joyful faces to meet his radiant smile ; it shuts
out his sunshine from us and veils us in the night of
an impenetrable dread. What is the sentiment with
which Canon Liddon closes a sermon on the death of
Christ; I quote it to show the slavish feeling
�24
On the Atonement.
engendered by this doctrine in a very noble human
soul : “ In ourselves, indeed, there is nothing that
should stay his (God’s) arm or invite his mercy. But
may he have respect to the acts and the sufferings of
his sinless son ? Only while contemplating the
inestimable merits of the Redeemer can we dare to
hope that our heavenly Father will overlook the count
less provocations which he receives at the hands of the
redeemed.” Is this a wholesome sentiment either as
regards our feelings towards God or our efforts towards
holiness? Is it well to look to the purity of another as
a makeweight for our personal shortcomings ? All
these injuries to morality done by the atonement are
completed by the crowning one, that it offers to the
sinner a veil of “ imputed righteousness.” Not only
does it take from him his saving punishment, but it
nullifies his strivings after holiness by offering him a
righteousness which is not his own. It introduces into
the solemn region of duty to God the legal fiction of a
gift of holiness, which is imputed, not won. We are
taught to believe that we can blind the eyes of God
and satisfy him with a pretended purity. But that
very one whose purity we seek to claim as ours, that
fair blossom of humanity, Jesus of Nazareth, whose
mission we so misconstrue, launched his anathema
at whited sepulchres, pure without and foul within.
What would he have said of the whitewash of
“imputed righteousness?” Stern and sharp would
have been his rebuke, methinks, to a device so untrue,
and well-deserved would have been his thundered
“ woe ” on a hypocrisy that would fain deceive God as
well as man.
These considerations have carried so great a wreight
with the most enlightened and progressive minds
among Christians themselves, that there has grown up
a party in the Church, whose repudiation of an atone
ment of agony and death is as complete as even we
could wish. They denounce with the utmost fervour
�On the Atonement.
25
the. hideous notion of a “bloody sacrifice,” and are
urgent in their representations of the dishonour done
to God by ascribing to him “ pleasure in the death of
him that dieth,” or satisfaction in the sight of pain.
They point out that there is no virtue in blood to
wash away sin, not even “ in the blood of a God.”
Maurice eloquently pleads against the idea that the
suffering of the “well-beloved Son” was in itself an
acceptable sacrifice to the Almighty Father, and he
sees the atoning element in the “holiness and gracious
ness of the Son.” Writers of this school perceive that
a moral and not a physical sacrifice can be the only
acceptable offering to the Father of spirits, but the
great objection lies against their theory also, that the
atonement is still vicarious. Christ still suffers for
man, in order to make men acceptable to God. It is
perhaps scarcely fair to say this of the school as a
whole, since the opinions of Broad Church divines
differ widely from each other, ranging from the
orthodox to the Socinian standing-point. Yet, roughly
speaking, we may say that while they have given up
the error of thinking that the death of Christ reconciles
God to us, they yet believe that his death, in some
mysterious manner, reconciles us to God. It is a
matter of deep thankfulness that they give up the
old cruel idea of propitiating God, and so prepare the
way for a higher creed. Their more humane teaching
reaches hearts which are as yet sealed against us, and
they are the John Baptist of the Theistic Christ. We
must still urge on them that an atonement at all is
superfluous, that all the parade of reconciliation by
means of a mediator is perfectly unnecessary as
between God and his child, man ; that the notion put
forward that Christ realised the ideal of humanity and
propitiated God by showing what a man could be, is
objectionable in that it represents God as needing to
be taught what were the capacities of his creatures,
and is further untrue, because the powers of God in
�26
On the Atonement.
man are not really the equivalent of the capabilities of
a simple man. Broad Churchmen are still hampered
by the difficulties surrounding a divine Christ, and are
puzzled to find for him a place in their theology which
is at once suitable to his dignity, and consistent with
a reasonable belief. They feel obliged to acknowledge
that some unusual benefit to the race must result from
the incarnation and death of a God, and are swayed
alternately by their reason, which places the cruci
fixion of Jesus in the roll of martyrs’ deaths, and by
their prejudices, which assign to it a position unique
and unrivalled in the history of the race. There are,
however, many signs that the deity of Jesus is, as an
article of faith, tottering from its pedestal in the
Broad Church school. The hold on it by such men as
the Rev. J. S. Brooke is very slight, and his inter
pretation of the incarnation is regarded by orthodox
divines with unmingled horror. Their moral atone
ment, in turn, is as the dawn before the sunrise, and
we may hope that it will soon develop into the real
truth : namely, that the dealings of Jesus with the
Father were a purely private matter between his own
soul and God, and that his value to mankind consists
in his being one of the teachers of the race, one “with
a genius for religion,” one of the schoolmasters
appointed to lead humanity to God.
The theory of M‘Leod Campbell stands alone,
and is highly interesting and ingenious—it is the
more valuable and hopeful as coming from Scotland,
the home of the dreariest belief as to the relations
existing between man and God. He rejects the penal
character of the atonement, and makes it consist, so to
speak, in leading God and man to understand one
another. He considers that Christ witnessed to men
on behalf of God, and vindicated the father’s heart by
showing what he could be to the son who trusted in
him. He witnessed to God on behalf of men—and
this is the weakest point in the book, verging, as it
�On the Atonement.
does, on substitution—showing in humanity a perfect
sympathy with God’s feelings towards sin, and offering
to God for man a perfect repentance for human trans
gression. I purposely say “ verging,” because Camp
bell does not intend substitution; he represents this
sorrow of Jesus as what he must inevitably feel at see
ing his brother-men unconscious of their sin and
danger, so no fiction is supposed as between God and
Christ. But he considers that God, having seen the
perfection of repentance in Jesus, accepts the repen
tance of man, imperfect as it is, because it is in kind
the same as that of Jesus, and is the germ of that feel
ing of which his is the perfect flow’er; in this sense,
and only in this sense, is the repentance of man
accepted “for Christ’s sake.” He considers that men
must share in the mind of Christ as towards God and
towards sin in order to be benefited by the work of
Christ, and that each man must thus actually take part
in the work of atonement. The sufferings of Jesus he
regards as necessary in order to test the reality of the
life of sonship towards God, and brotherhood towards
men, which he came to earth to exemplify. I trust I
have done no injustice in this short summary to a very
able and thoughtful book, which presents, perhaps, the
only view of the atonement compatible with the love
and the justice of God, and this only, of course, if the
idea of any atonement can fairly be said to be consis
tent with justice. The merits of this view are practi
cally that this work of Jesus is not an “ atonement ” in
the theological sense at all. The defects of Campbell’s
book are inseparable from his creed, as he argues from
a belief in the deity of Jesus, from an unconscious
limitation of God’s knowledge (as though God did not
understand man till he was revealed to him by Jesus)
and from a wrong conception of the punishment due
to sin.
I said, at starting, that the atonement was the raison
d'etre of Christianity, and, in conclusion, I would
�On the Atonement.
challenge all thoughtful men and women to say
whether good cause has or has not been shown for
rejecting this pillar “ of the faith.” The atonement
has but to be studied in order to be rejected. The
difficulty is to persuade people to think about their
creed. Yet the question of this doctrine must be
faced and answered. “ I have too much faith in the
common sense and justice of Englishmen when once
awakened to face any question fairly, to doubt what
that answer will be.”
Annie Besant.
TURNBULL AND SPEAKS, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH
�
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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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On the atonement
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Besant, Annie Wood
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 28 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Printed by C.W. Reynell, Little Pulteney Street, London. Date of publication from British Library catalogue.
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Thomas Scott
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[1874]
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English
Atonement
Conway Tracts
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RELIGION.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE “ HACKNEY AND KINGSLAND GAZETTE.
Sir,—As you have for some time past been favouring your readers
with the views of several of the ministers of the neighbourhood on Theology,
perhaps you will kindly find space for the following views of a layman on
what he presumes to call “ Religion,” and oblige,
Yours respectfully,
I believe in Rational Christianity, pure and simple, or Christian mo
rality, as was taught by Christ; in contra-distinction to the adulterated
clerical Christianity now so prevalent, and which has almost elbowed the
Christianity of Christ out of the world; whereby superstition and foolish
rites and ceremonies are substituted in the room of pure morality, true vir
tue, and genuine religion. I believe the Christianity of Christ to he
“ Peace on earth, goodwill to man,” the love of God and our neighbour,
universal charity and benevolence, and the golden rule of “ doing to
others as w7e would have them to do unto us,” and not in the incomprehensible
creeds and unintelligible dogmas of popular theology. I believe in a God
of perfect justice, who rewards the good in exact proportion to their merits,
and proportionately punishes the wicked ; such punishments being correc
tive and purifying : “ whatsoever a man sows so shall he reap.” That the
favour of God and happiness are to be procured by repentance and amend
ment; by personal not by vicarious agency. That well-matured reason and
conscience are the best guides to be depended on, and if we neglect or re
nounce their directions and admonitions, we lay ourselves open to all man
ner of delusion and priestcraft, hateful to God and destructive to mankind.
That instead of stereotyped creeds, blind zeal, and religious persecution for
“righteousness’ sake,” we should promote love, peace, temperance, gratitude,
charity and universal benevolence : so as to reduce religion to that plain,
simple system^ of aiming to attain that abstract perfection as taught by
Christ, wJ^Bjd“ Be ye perfect.” The principles to promote $hese are few
and easy: lst/l^^e is a God, an Almighty Creator, to whom all existence
belongs and is subject) and who ought to be worshipped by all mankind.
2nd, That by his7 immutable laws, the good are rewarded and the wicked
punished here and hereafter. 3rd, That repentance and reformation are
.required to obtain the one and escape the other. 4th, That true religion
�2
is that which was stated by Christ, “ Thou shalt love the Lord thy God
with all thy heart and soul and strength, and thy neighbour as thyself.”'
To love God is to love all “ Good,” as truth, justice, charity, and every
good work ; to love truth is to love the “ God of Truth,” &c.
I do not believe in the orthodox view of the atonement, that Christ
came to reconcile God to us, but rather that he came to reconcile us to God..
I do not believe in the necessity of his having to be crucified, and to take
upon himself the sins of all, before man could be saved ; if such were the
case how infinitely grateful we ought to be to those orthodox Jews who
cruelly put him to death, in order that we might be saved ! Neither do I
•believe in the orthodoxy of the present day, which says “there are three
Gods all equal,” and yet so unequal that one God is ever interceding, and
endeavouring to appease the wrath of another God ! if so, one must be in
the wrong ! I believe in the absolute perfection of a Divine Creator, and
who does not thus require to be changed in order that endless punishment
may be averted, for temporary sins. I believe that God is love, and that
his “ mercy” and not his chastisement “ endureth for ever.”
I do not believe in “ original sin” and that man was pre-ordained to
be its victim ; nor in the destruction of unbaptized infants, as the Roman
and Anglican priests tell us. I prefer Christ’s doctrine ; he says “ of such
is the kingdom of Heaven.” I do not believe in that best friend of priest
craft,—a personal devil, and who is said to be more mighty than the Allmighty in obtaining the greatest number of immortal souls, thus having
power to thwart God’s providence,—nor in a material hell-fire, which is
ever consuming those souls. I do not believe “ in three Gods, yet one
God” which the Church of England says we must believe or “ without
doubt perish everlastingly.” Its creeds are to me downright blasphemy.
1 do not believe that the Bible was divinely inspired” from beginning to
end and was all written by the “finger of God.” I believe the Bible was made
for man, not man for the Bible, that it is an historical, moral and spiritual
teacher, not altogether correct, but containing many truths and many
errors ; a compilation of different works by different authors, written at
different periods, and by the most learned and wise men of their day, but
that neither they nor their works are infallible, as the science of geology
and astronomy, and even their own contradictions prove. That men in
after ages collected and bound together such of these books as they thought
proper and called them the Bible, and that these selfsame human beings,
at the Council of Nice, &c., rejected such other books as they thought
of less worthy note ; that these men were also as learned and wise as the
times would permit, but not infallible and possibly not altogether without
prejudice or partiality.
I believe real Christianity to be absolute religion, which thinks and
works ; goodness towards man, and piety towards God; undogmatic, un
sectarian, liberal, broad and free, preached wdth faith and applied to life,
being good and doing good. There is but one real rel i gih we need
only open our eyes to see, and which requires neither creeds nor catechisms
to discern; only live it, in love to God and man, and we are blessed by
Him who liveth for ever, in spite of all that priests and their dupes may say
to the contrary, for thank God they are not to be our judges, other
wise few would escape.
�RELIGION.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE “ HACKNEY AND KINGSLAND GAZETTE.”
Sir,—As you have for some time past beeD favouring your readers
with the views of several of the ministers of the neighbourhood on Theology,
perhaps you will kindly find space for the following views of a layman on
what he presumes to call “ Religion,” and oblige,
Yours respectfully,
C.
I believe in Rational Christianity, pure and simple, or Christian mo
rality, as was taught by Christ; in contra-distinction to the adulterated
■clerical Christianity now so prevalent, and which has almost elbowed the
Christianity of Christ out of the world; whereby superstition and foolish
rites and ceremonies are substituted in the room of pure morality, -true vir
tue, and genuine religion. I believe the Christianity of Christ to be
“ Peace on earth, goodwill to man,” the love of God and our neighbour,
universal charity and benevolence, and the golden rule of “ doing to
others as we would have them to do unto us,” and not in the incomprehensible
creeds and unintelligible dogmas of popular theology. I believe in a God
-of perfect justice, who rewards the good in exact proportion to their merits,
and proportionately punishes the wicked ; such punishments being correc
tive and purifying : “ whatsoever a man sows so shall he reap.” That the
favour of God and happiness are to be procured by repentance and amend
ment; by personal not by vicarious agency. That well-matured reason and
■conscience are the best guides to be depended on, and if we neglect or re
nounce their directions and admonitions, we lay ourselves open to all man
ner ot delusion and priestcraft, hateful to God and destructive to mankind,
that instead of stereotyped creeds, blind zeal, and religious persecution for
“righteousness’ sake,’ we should promote love, peace, temperance, gratitude,
charity and universal benevolence : so as to reduce religion to that plain,
simple system of aiming to attain that abstract perfection as taught by
Christ, who said “ Be yeperfect.” The principles to promote these are few
.and easy: 1st, There is a God, an Almighty Creator, to whom all existence
belongs and is subject, and who ought to be worshipped by all mankind.
2nd, 1 hat by his immutable laws, the good are rewarded and the wicked
punished here and hereafter. 3rd, Ihat repentance and reformation are
.required to obtain the one and escape the other. 4th, That true religion
�2
is that which was stated by Christ, (t Thou shall love the Lord thy God
with all thy heart and soul and strength, and thy neighbour as thyself.”'
To love God is to love all “ Good,” as truth, justice, charity, and every
good work ; to love truth is to love the “ God of Truth,” &q.
I do not believe in the orthodox view of the atonement, that Christ’
came to reconcile God to us, but rather that he came to reconcile us to Gods
I do not believe in the necessity of his having to be crucified, and to take
upon himself the sins of all, before man could be saved ; if such were the
case how infinitely grateful we ought to be to those orthodox Jews who
cruelly put him to death, in order that we might be saved ! Neither do I
believe in the orthodoxy of the present day, which says “ there are three
Gods all equal,’" and yet so wnequal that one God is ever- interceding, and
endeavouring to appease the wrath of another God! if so, one must be in
the wrong ! I believe in the absolute perfection of a Divine Creator, and
who does not thus require to be changed in order that endless punishment
may be averted, for temporary sins. I believe that God is love, and that
his “ mercy” and not his chastisement “ endureth for ever.”
I do not believe in “ original sin” and that man was pre-ordained tn
be its victim ; nor in the destruction of unbaptized infants, as the Roman
and Anglican priests tell us. I prefer Christ’s doctrine ; he says “ of such'
is the kingdom of Heaven.” I do not believe in that best friend of priest
craft,—a personal devil, and who is said to be more mighty than the Allmighty in obtaining the greatest number of immortal souls, thus having
power to thwart God’s providence,—nor in a material hell-fire, which isever consuming those souls. I do not believe “ in three Gods, yet one
God” which the Church of England says we must believe or “ without
doubt perish everlastingly.” Its creeds are to me downright blasphemy.
I do not believe that the Bible was divinely inspired” from beginning toend and was all written by the “finger of God,” I believe the Bible was made
for man, not man for the Bible, that it is an historical, moral and spiritual
teacher, not altogether correct, but containing many truths and many
errors ; a compilation of different works by different authors, wr itten at
different periods, and by the most learned and wise men of their day, but
that neither they nor their works are infallible, as the science of geology
and astronomy, and even their own contradictions prove. That men in
after ages collected and bound together such of these books as they thought
proper and called them the Bible, and that these selfsame human beings,
at the Council of Nice, &c., rejected such other books as they thought
of less worthy note ; that these men were also as learned and wise as the
times would permit, but not infallible and possibly not altogether withottt
prejudice or partiality.
I believe real Christianity to be absolute religion, which thinks and
ivorks ; goodness towards man, and piety towards God; undogmatic, un
sectarian, liberal, broad and free, preached with faith and applied to life,
being good and doing good. There is but one real religion, which we need
only open our eyes to see, and 5vhich requires neither creeds nor catechisms
to discern; only live it, in love to God and man, and we are blessed by
Him who liveth for ever, in spite of all that priests and their dupes may say
to the contrary, for thank God they are not to be our judges, other
wise few would escape.
�
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Title
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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
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
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2018
Publisher
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
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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
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Religion. To the editor of the "Hackney and Kingsland Gazette."
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conner, W.E.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
[1865]
Publisher
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[s.n.]
Subject
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Theology
Religion
Rights
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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 (Religion. To the editor of the "Hackney and Kingsland Gazette."), 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>
Identifier
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G5257
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
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English
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: [s.l.]
Collation: 2 p. ; 22 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. A letter to the editor of the Hackney and Kingsland Gazette. Pencilled inscription on front page below the printed 'yours respectfully C.' : 'W.E. Conner, formerly of So. Pl. Chapel". An illegible word pencilled opposite the Conner signature. Reprinted from the Hackney and Kingsland Gazette, October 7, 1865. Ink stain on front page.
Christianity
Conway Tracts
Rationalism
-
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1356e0938373a1ad505b18e3a1f4bc12
PDF Text
Text
ON THE HINDRANCES
TO
PROGRESS IN THEOLOGY.
*
*
MBY THE LATE
EEV. JAMES CRANBROOK.
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCOTT,
MOUNT PLEASANT, RAMSGATE.
Price Threepence.
�L---------------------- ---------------
ILUIL—.
‘I
L
�ON THE
HINDRANCES TO PROGRESS IN THEOLOGY.
HEN one considers the great amount of intelli
gence and active thought existing in modern
society, especially as compared with the past, one is
apt at first to be surprised that so little progress has
been made amongst people in general in religious, or
more properly speaking, in theological questions.
Those who venture upon such questions, to think for
themselves and to doubt, or in any very serious
degree to modify, the old and long received dogmas,
are still the easily numbered few ; whilst the
unreasoning, quiescent and bigoted recipients of the
orthodox beliefs are the overwhelming majority. It
may help to encourage those of you who are for mak
ing progress in theology as well as everything else,
and possibly to awaken profitable reflection in those
who have hitherto been indifferent in the matter, if
I offer you this evening some considerations serving to
account for the still great preponderance of the old
beliefs.
In the first place, then, notwithstanding the
admittedly wide-spread intelligence of the present
day, I think the comparatively slow progress of
theology is due to the very imperfect education which
has been and still is generally received. It must be
observed that the active intelligence amongst us is
not due to the education in the technical or scholastic
sense of the term. Whatever improvements have
been made in the methods and subject-matter of
W
�4
On the Hindrances to
teaching, have been made within the last fifteen or
twenty years, and such improvements have not
affected those who have advanced to the middle
stage of life, and whose thinking constitutes the char
acter of the present generation. When they were at
school scarcely a single step had been taken out of the
old rut along which scholastic education had dragged
. its slow course for generations. There was nothing in
it to quicken the mind or to form those habits of
thought which alone constitute a liberal, broad and
national intelligence. Boys in the middle classes learn
ed a little Latin, less Greek, some Geography, scraps of
naratives called History, under the designation of
Astronomy the names of stars they never were
taught to identify, and were in many cases pretty
well drilled in Arithmetic. Girls learned still less of
what was useful; in arithmetic seldom got beyond
reduction, and became prodigies if they reached the
rule of three (as it was called); but were thought to
make up for the deficiency by acquiring the power
of tinkling dance music and battles of Prague on the
piano, of drawing on paper straight lines which did
not lie evenly between extreme points, and circles
whose radii were anything but equal to one another,
and of making embroidery and other fancy articles
the taste of which was an offence to gods and men.
In all this education received by both boys and girls,
there was nothing to teach them observation,
analysis, reflection, comparison, reasoning, or any of
those intellectual processes which are essential to the
full exercise and development of our rational nature
Of course there were exceptions to this. Here and
there were teachers far before their time, whose pupils,
if led through the same routine course, had breathed
■into them a spirit of enquiry which has made them
assume a place amongst the most progressive of the
day. These, however, were the exceptional cases, and
education was for the most part such as I have
described it.
Fortunately, however, there were influences at work
�Progress in Theology.
5
in society ready to meet these boys as soon as they
left the school for the business of life, which were
calculated to do in part the work their school educa
tion ought to have done. The great discoveries of
science, applied to manufactures and commerce, had
already begun to change the whole aspect of social
life. The most active thought had become necessary
to conduct the ordinary affairs of business. Accurate
observation and reasoning had become as necessary
in the shops and the mercantile counting-house, as in
the study of the savant and the philosopher. Infor
mation became essential; the cheapening of the
newspapers supplied the want, and with the com
mercial information, they furnished other kinds of
intelligence. Thought thus became amazingly quick
ened, and the intellectual activity of the present day
has ensued.
But now, observe, this kind of intellectual activity,
thus superinduced, does not necessarily extend itself
to all subjects coming within its sphere. On the
contrary, being called forth for a specific purpose, it
is very apt to confine its activity to the purpose for
which it has been called forth. It does not assume
the character of a general habit of mind, but is merely
a particular instrument employed for a particular end.
It is analogous to the development of the physical
powers. The physical powers may be developed by
proper training altogether, so that whenever anything
has to be done by any, or all of them, it will be done
with the full and most perfectly developed powers;
but instead of this general education, we may develop
for a particular end some one or the other of these
powers alone, that of the arm for working, hammering,
&c., or of the legs for running, walking, or say, turning
a lathe. Just so is it with our thoughts—there are
the general and the special education; and the special
education may be very complete for its purposes and
yet leave the thoughts without those habits of general
application which are essential to the completely
rational man.
�6
On the Hindrances to
Now that is precisely what we find (with daily
increasing exceptions, however, thank God) to be the
effect of the training or education forced upon men
by the business pursuits of the present day. The
special training for business does not extend its
influences over the general habits of thought, and
consequently men may be found most intellectually
efficient within the sphere of their active life, who
beyond it shew no more rationality than children.
The want of early training affects the whole sphere
of their thought excepting in that one direction in
which the necessities of their circumstances have
compelled them to become rational. As I have said,
there is a great increasing number of exceptions to
this statement, where men of all classes and pursuits
are exercising rational habits of thought upon all
subjects coming under their notice; but still, I have
described what up to this time has been the prevailing
fact. And the fact explains at once the slow progress
made amongst the majority of people in theology, or,
as it is generally termed, religion. They have received
their creed in the mass, there has been nothing in
their education to lead them to enquire into the truth
of either this doctrine and that, or of the system as a
whole. They listen to the teachings they receive from
Sunday to Sunday with absolute credulity, leaving all
their faculties of reasoning in abeyance; or if exer
cising them, exercising them upon the most insignifi
cant points. Or if they attempt to reason and enquire
upon the vital points, they never bring to bear upon
the subject the same acuteness of observation and
analysis, the same closeness of comparison and reason
ing, that they employ in their business concerns.
They treat religion as altogether a different kind of
thing, and indulge in all the loose habits of thought
their unsound education left untouched. And so,
when we consider all the other influences at work’
we. cannot wonder that such men remain fixed in
their , old superstitions, and become sometimes even
the bigoted, opponents of progress. Their education
has determined their destiny.
�Progress in Theology,
7
And all I have said of men applies equally to the
case of those women whose household affairs are of
sufficient magnitude to require the exercise of much
attention and judgment. Indeed, such women are
often better situated than men for acquiring general
rational habits of thought, for the objects they
have to attend to are of a more miscellaneous char
acter, and less likely, therefore, to confine the appli
cation of the rational powers to one narrow and
specific line. But then, on the other hand, there areother causes, chiefly arising out of the affections,
which counteract these more favourable circumstances,
and which nothing but an early training could in the
majority of cases correct. And thus it comes to pass
that amongst both men and women rational opinions
make but slow head-way, and only here and there are
found those, who, having risen above the education of
their youth, become rational in matters of religion.
The second cause I assign for the slow progress
of religious thought is fear—blind, unreasoning,
superstitious fear—which extends its influence over
all persons not yet redeemed from its curse. Fear
has been the prime and most effective motive power
in nearly all, if not all^the religions of the world up
to the present time. In some, of them its agency was
overwhelming. God, or the gods, were represented
in an awful aspect full of vindictiveness, revenge, and
cruelty. Men trembled at the thought of them.
Their religion became a mere effort to appease the
divine displeasure, or to purchase the divine favour.
Oriental speculations had considerably modified these
conceptions when Christianity arose and became (at
all events as presented by its founders) the gentlest
form of faith the world then had known. The
teaching of both Christ and Paul, so far as it is ascer
tainable, presented the character of God in a benign
relation to the world, and encouraged trust and love
rather than- fear. One dark and gloomy doctrine
however was still retained, which although neutralized
�8
On the Hindrances to
in the loving spirits and teaching of these noble men,
became developed into fearful forms under the influ
ence of the fiery and dark minds which succeeded
them. I refer, of course, to the doctrine of eternal
punishment. That doctrine I am compelled to own
both Paul and Christ distinctly taught. I should be
glad to think that the philanthropic apostle, and
above all that the gentle, loving Jesus had given no
countenance to the immoral doctrine. But all honest
criticism forbids me from doing so. The methods of
criticism adopted by those who hold the contrary
conclusion seem to me altogether subversive of rational
interpretation, and would leave every document at
the mercy of the interpreter.
Now, the doctrine they sanctioned, and which the
whole ®f the New Testament teaches or recognises,
has ever since been made more or less an efficient
instrument of terror. In the hands of the best men
of the church it has been used merely for the purpose
of restraining vice or stimulating faith. But the
darker spirits have used it with Satanic power to
mould men to their will. Especially has this been
the case in times of doubt, heresy, and schism. Then
with all the vehemence of eloquence, and with all the
invention of art, its awful, sulphurous terrors have
been drawn forth before the affrighted imaginations,
of men, in the expectation that the fear of the horrible
torments of an endless life might preserve them
within the orthodox fold of Christ. In the present
day such representations are much modified, and the
fear arising out of them is consequently less active.
The genteel, tolerably-educated minister of your city
churches would not venture to deal out flames and
fiery darkness as his fathers did. It is only in some
out of the way parish, situated at what seems the
worlds end, in some little conventicle where the
preacher is innocent of a day’s schooling, that you now
hear of eternal damnation in all the fulness of its
horrors. Yet the influence if it has a strong hold of
men s, and especially of women’s feelings.
�Progress in Theology.
9
Fear has always restrained enquiry.
The
anathemas of the church long held back the mind
of Europe from enquiry into the protestant dogmas.
“ What if the Church’s dogmas should prove to be
true ? The eternal perdition would be incurred by
the doubting of her creed.” The same fear virtually
operates now. “ One’s first concern is the salvation
of the soul. What if one exposed it to jeopardy by
pursuing these inquiries about the incarnation, the
atonement, the inspiration and authority of the
Bible ? Leave such questions alone, and tread not on
such dangerous ground.”
Such dangerous ground !—that is of course,
assuming, before the enquiry, that these orthodox
dogmas are true. But what if they be untrue ?
Which will be the dangerous ground then ? And
how can you tell whether they be true or untrue
until you have thoroughly investigated the matter ?
Should they prove to be untrue, and untrue I
thoroughly believe them to be, they must be working
intellectual and moral mischief in your souls. For
every lie entails intellectual and moral mischief.
But it is of no use to tell a large portion of the
orthodox this. The fear of losing the soul has so
taken possession of the feelings that it shuts out all
reason, all common sense, and leaves them the miserable
victims of their superstitious delusions. They turn
a deaf ear to all argument, evidence, and proof of
every kind, and see nothing but the hazard of eternal
woe in the questionings of reason. They have no con
fidence in the divine fatherhood that the gospel of
John tells them about ;•—no confidence that the God
of truth will guide aright the mind seeking to know
the truth, much less have they any confidence in the
rational faculties with which man is endowed, and in
the certainty that all honest enquiry must bring a
blessing of some kind with it. But that grim devil
the ignorance of barbarous times conjured into
existence, and those dreaded torments over which he
presides, frighten them out of their seven senses into
�io
On the Hindrances to
the irrational act of clinging tenaciously, as if for
their life, to the unexamined dogmas of orthodoxy.
One grieves to see the gentle nature of women so
abused, but grows indignant when men, pretending
to a higher intellect and a stronger understanding,
show the same foolish weakness.
And yet all
around us the dark superstition is keeping both men
and women, parsons and people, from all thorough
going rational enquiry. It is as powerful in this
respect amongst large masses as ever ; and no doubt
it will require another generation before the multitude
arise above it.
In the third place, I think an ignominious love of
ease, comfort, or peace of mind, keeps a large number
from enquiry. There are very few who love truth for
its own sake. It is courted rather for the fortune it
brings, the blessings of a physical and spiritual kind.
Most seek some ulterior end, and above all ease,
comfort, peace of mind and great enjoyment. Now if
you do not harass your brains by entertaining doubts
and making enquiries, orthodoxy will furnish you
with these desired blessings. On cheap terms it will
assure you of the salvation of your soul and God's
present and eternal favour, and in addition will
bring you the approbation, sympathy, and regard of
the respectable people around you. But if you once
set off upon the dangerous road of free enquiry,
instantly all these blessings disappear, and there is
no saying to where you will be led. Knowing this,
the majority of quiet well-to-do people are very care
ful to shun enquiry.
And the mischief feared lies in two directions :
first, in the dogmatical. When verities which have
been venerated for ages are once called into question
and doubt, their mind loses all its anchorage ground,
and seems to itself like a ship out at sea in the midst
of a storm. Whither it will be driven no one can
tell. And there are again two things which distress
it; the one is the uncertainty and suspension of faith
into which it is brought. Most minds rebel at this.
�Progress in Theology.
11
It requires thorough mental training and discipline
to be able to suspend one’s judgment without pain
during the examination of evidence. We become
impatient of it, and want to settle down on the one
side or the other. The mind wants rest; but as long
as enquiry lasts there can be no rest—no reposing
on assured truths—no drawing of comfort from’
sweetly consolatory doctrines ! It is all hard work,
and moving on from point to point. And so rather
than embark upon such troubled waters, shoals of men
superstitiously keep the harbour of the old faiths.
There at least, so long as they do not doubt, they
find quiet and comfort.
And then the other thing which keeps them from
enquiry is that they find many are led when once
they loosen their moorings, lengths which seem to
them perfectly horrifying. Some who once were good,
sound, orthodox believers have become what these
people call perfect infidels; and mistrust of themselves,
apparently, or mistrust of the truth, leads them to
fear such if they once set out might become their
own fate. Some could go as far as Robertson of
Brighton, but it would be dreadful to get to the
length of Martineau! Some could go as far as
Carlyle, but it would be ruin to think like Stuart
Mill 1 Some could accept of the theism of Newman,
but the positivism of Comte would be perdition ! So
each and all have their several bugbears of infidelity
which terrify them from thought. It does not seem
to occur to such people that it is just possible that
those who have gone the lengths they fear to go,
may have reached the truth. They only think of the
consequences to which they presume it will lead.
“ Oh, say they, we could find no comfort, no ease, in
such horrible doctrines, however true they might
appear. All peace would be thrust from our souls
for ever.”
Well, and suppose it were so; did you come into
this world for ease and comfort, or to find the truth
and live by it 1 Is blessedness to be had in a false
�12
On the Hindrances to
peace, or in the living facts of the universe ? Ease !
Comfort! For shame ! Go get you into a cradle and
call out some crazy beldame from the workhouse to
rock you your worthless life long. That is all such
drowsy souls are fit for. And yet although all reason
must condemn them, although they themselves must
for very shame be forced to own that in the pure and
perfect truth man’s supreme bliss can alone be found,
and that in this day of the disruption of parties and
the dissolution of churches each one must search out
that truth for himself, this bugbear of extreme
Infidelity keeps thousands, and will continue to keep
thousands, from all manly and honest enquiry. One
grieves over their weakness, but the remedy seems
far away.
The other disturbance to one’s comfort and peace
lies in the social direction. Men like to be at ease
when their professional or business engagements are
over. It is comfortable to get home, sit down by the
fireside, chat with one’s wife and children, read the
newspapers, or doze over a glass of wine. Besides,
these are acquaintances, perchance friends, amongst
whom one likes to spend a pleasant evening now and
then over a game at cards, or in conversation upon
the social and political gossip of the day. But now,
earnest religious enquiry is very apt to break in upon
all this, to make one’s home a scene of constant con
tention and tears, and to make one’s acquaintances
very shy and distant. If the wife have not the
intellect to enter into the questions with the
husband, or the husband with the wife, to what
bickerings, sometimes angry discussion and wordy
contentions, it leads. And then who can resist those
tears and those earnest appeals, “ if not for your own
sake, for the sake of the souls of our darling
children give up such wicked doubts!” And
then the good people, too, aid the home influence.
Who will associate with an infidel ? Who will have
anything to do with him who denies the verities of
the faith ? “ My dear fellow, such notions are
�Progress in Theology.
13
not respectable, and I can assure you if it became
known that you hold opinions so dangerous it will
materially affect your business. You have a young
family rising up, and cannot afford to indulge in such
speculations. Besides, I confess all your friends
concur with my own feeling in the matter, that is,
however much we respect you, we should not like it
to be known we associate with the companion of
infidels. You are all right, you know, but you will
be thrown amongst all sorts of vagabonds, and people
will suspect that you have fallen into the vices to
which Infidelity always leads. Give it up, my dear
fellow, give it up, if you do not wish every respectable
acquaintance to give you up.”
Who could withstand such arguments as that ?
So the poor fellow does give it up, dismisses his
doubts, henceforth walks demurely with his wife and
sweet babies every Sunday regularly to church, and
by and by gets held up by his minister as the very
type of “ That large and respectable class of intelli
gent men who amidst the doubts and scepticism of
a licentious age hold fast by the old faiths 1”
Another reason just alluded to operates with some.
I referred to the low character imputed to those who
depart from the old beliefs. It is the common con
clusion of weak minds that he who doubts the accepted
dogmas is a bad man. And even what the world
calls respectable men and women, great professors of
religion, think it no shame to either create or pro
pagate all sorts of lying slanders against the infidels.
Now and then this is done unconsciously of the wrong,
the ignorant people not knowing that slander is a form
of immorality and that to speak evil of one another
without sufficient evidence is a crime. But generally
the evil is known, but committed under the palliating
thought that it does God service. Now the effect of
this is twofold: 1st, Ignorant people who do not
know the wickedness of which religious people can be
guilty, believe the slanderers, and shrink very natu
rally from connecting themselves with such seemingly
�14
Hindrances to Progress in Theology.
disreputable parties. And 2dly, They are very apt to
conclude that bad men cannot have found the truth.
Of course the character of a person cannot affect the
truth or untruth, the validity or invalidity, of his
arguments and propositions. And a rational person
would judge of the doctrines by these alone. But in
matters of religion, as we have seen, the majority are
not rational. And so these slanderers succeed in
their efforts to deter the weak-minded from enquiry,
and in God’s name effectually do the devil’s work.
Other reasons might be added to these to account
for the large number shunning all enquiry upon the
questions of religion; but these must at present suffice.
And they are sufficient to encourage our faith and
hope in the gradual progress of the truth. That which
lies at the root of them all, the want of a sound judg
ment, a disciplined mind habituated to exercise its
reason upon all things, must gradually give way
before the more enlightened system of education all
classes are feeling their way towards. And in time
it will affect women as well as men. Those tender
affections which now bind them to superstition will
not always be so perverted. When woman receives
the education her nature requires, the intellect will
assert its proper supremacy. Already there are some
noble pioneers, the vanguard of the advancing race.
When the whole host has come forward, then divine,
bliss-giving, beauteous truth shall be our sovereign
mistress, and all men will dare to follow whithersoever
she may lead.
Turnbull and Spears, Printers, Edinburgh.
�
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On the hindrances to progress in theology
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Cranbrook, James
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Thomas Scott
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ON THE HINDRANCES
TO
PROGRESS IN THEOLOGY.
BY THE LATE
REV. JAMES CRANBROOK.
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCOTT,
MOUNT PLEASANT, RAMSGATE.
Price Threepence.
��ON THE
HINDRANCES TO PROGRESS IN THEOLOGY.
HEN one considers the great amount of intelli
gence and active thought existing in modern
society, especially as compared with the past, one is
apt at first to be surprised that so little progress has
been made amongst people in general in religious, or
more properly speaking, in theological questions.
Those who venture upon such questions, to think for
themselves and to doubt, or in any very serious
degree to modify, the old and long received dogmas,
are still the easily numbered few ; whilst the
unreasoning, quiescent and bigoted recipients of the
orthodox beliefs are the overwhelming majority. It
may help to encourage those of you who are for mak
ing progress in theology as well as everything else,
and possibly to awaken profitable reflection in those
who have hitherto been indifferent in the matter, if
I offer you this evening some considerations serving to
account for the still great preponderance of the old
beliefs.
In the first place, then, notwithstanding the
admittedly wide-spread intelligence of the present
day, I think the comparatively slow progress of
theology is due to the very imperfect education which
has been and still is generally received. It must be
observed that the active intelligence amongst us is
not due to the education in the technical or scholastic
sense of the term. Whatever improvements have
been made in the methods and subject-matter of
W
�4
On the Hindrances to
teaching, have been made within the last fifteen or
twenty years, and such improvements have not
affected those who have advanced to the middle
stage of life, and whose thinking constitutes the char
acter of the present generation. When they were at
school scarcely a single step had been taken out of the
old rut along which scholastic education had dragged
its slow course for generations. There was nothing in
it to quicken the mind or to form those habits of
thought which alone constitute a liberal, broad and
national intelligence. Boys in the middle classes learn
ed a little Latin, less Greek, somewGeography, scraps of
naratives called History, under the designation of
Astronomy the names of stars they never were
taught to identify, and were in many cases pretty
well drilled in Arithmetic. Girls learned still less of
what was useful; in arithmetic seldom got beyond
reduction, and became prodigies if they reached the
rule of three (as it was called); but were thought to
make up for the deficiency by acquiring the power
of tinkling dance music and battles of Prague on the
piano, of drawing on paper straight lines which did
not lie evenly between extreme points, and circles
whose radii were anything but equal to one another,
and of making embroidery and other fancy articles
the taste of which was an offence to gods and men.
In all this education received by both boys and girls,
there was nothing to teach them observation,
analysis, reflection, comparison, reasoning, or any of
those intellectual processes which are essential to the
full exercise and development of our rational nature.
Of course there were exceptions to this. Here and
there were teachers far before their time, whose pupils,
if led through the same routine course, had breathed
into them a spirit of enquiry which has made them
assume a place amongst the most progressive of the
day. These, however, were the exceptional cases, and
education was for the most part such as I have
described it.
Fortunately, however, there were influences at work
�Progress in Theology.
5
in society ready to meet these boys as soon as they
left the school for the business of life, which were
calculated to do in part the work their school educa
tion ought to have done. The great discoveries of
science, applied to manufactures and commerce, had
already begun to change the whole aspect of social
life. The most active thought had become necessary
to conduct the ordinary affairs of business. Accurate
observation and reasoning had become as necessary
in the shops and the mercantile counting-house, as in
the study of the savant and the philosopher. Infor
mation became essential; the cheapening of the
newspapers supplied the want, and with the com
mercial information, they furnished other kinds of
intelligence. Thought thus became amazingly quick
ened, and the intellectual activity of the present day
has ensued.
But now, observe, this kind of intellectual activity,
thus superinduced, does not necessarily extend itself
to all subjects coming within its sphere. On the
contrary, being called forth for a specific purpose, it
is very apt to confine its activity to the purpose for
which it has been called forth. It does not assume
the character of a general habit of mind, but is merely
a particular instrument employed for a particular end.
It is analogous to the development of the physical
powers. The physical powers may be developed by
proper training altogether, so that whenever anything
has to be done by any, or all of them, it will be done
with the full and most perfectly developed powers;
but instead of this general education, we may develop
for a particular end some one or the other of these
powers alone, that of the arm for working, hammering,
&c., or of the legs for running, walking, or say, turning
a lathe. Just so is it with our thoughts—there are
the general and the special education; and the special
education may be very complete for its purposes and
yet leave the thoughts without those habits of general
application which are essential to the completely
rational man.
�6
Pt
On the Hindrances to
Now that is precisely what we find (with daily
increasing exceptions, however, thank God) to be the
effect of the training or education forced upon men
by the business pursuits of the present day. The
special training for business does not extend its
influences over the general habits of thought, and
consequently men may be found most intellectually
efficient within the sphere of their active life, who
beyond it shew no more rationality than children.
The want of early training affects the whole sphere
of their thought excepting in that one direction in
which the necessities of their circumstances have
compelled them to become rational. As I have said,
there is a great increasing number of exceptions to
this statement, where men of all classes and pursuits
are exercising rational habits of thought upon al]^
subjects coming under their notice j but still, I hay
described what up to this time has been the prevailing
fact. And the fact explains at once the slow progress
made amongst the majority of people in theology, or,
as it is generally termed, religion. They have received
their creed in the mass, there has been nothing in
their education to lead them to enquire into the truth
of either this doctrine and that, or of the system as a
whole. They listen to the teachings they receive from
Sunday to Sunday with absolute credulity, leaving all
their faculties of reasoning in abeyance; or if exer
cising them, exercising them upon the most insignifi
cant points. Or if they attempt to reason and enquire
upon the vital points, they never bring to bear upon
the subject the same acuteness of observation and
analysis, the same closeness of comparison and reason
ing, that they employ in their business concerns.
They treat religion as altogether a different kind of
thing, and indulge in all the loose habits of thought
their unsound education left untouched. And so,
when we consider all the other influences at work,
we cannot wonder that such men remain fixed in
their old superstitions, and become sometimes even
the bigoted opponents of progress. Their education
has determined their destiny.
�Progress in Theology.
7
And all I have said of men applies equally to the
case of those women whose household affairs are of
sufficient magnitude to require the exercise of much
attention and judgment. Indeed, such women are
often better situated than men for acquiring general
rational habits of thought, for the objects they
have to attend to are of a more miscellaneous char
acter, and less likely, therefore, to confine the appli
cation of the rational powers to one narrow and
specific line. But then, on the other hand, there are
other causes, chiefly arising out of the affections,
which counteract these more favourable circumstances,
and which nothing but an early training could in the
majority of cases correct. And thus it comes to pass
that amongst both men and women rational opinions
make but slow head-way, and only here and there are
found those, who, having risen above the education of
their youth, become rational in matters of religion.
The second cause I assign for the slow progress
of religious thought is fear—blind, unreasoning,
superstitiou-s fear—which extends its influence over
all persons not yet redeemed from, its curse. Fear
has- been the prime and most effective motive power
in nearly all, if not all, the religions of the world up
to the present time. In some of them its agency was
overwhelming. God, or the gods, were represented
in an awful aspect full of vindictiveness, revenge, and
cruelty. Men trembled at the thought of them.
Their religion became a mere effort to appease the
divine displeasure, or to purchase the divine favour.
Oriental speculations had considerably modified theseconceptions when Christianity arose and became (at
all events as presented by its founders) the gentlest,
form of faith the world then had known. The
teaching of both Christ and Paul, so far as it is ascer
tainable, presented the character of God in a benign
relation to the world, and encouraged trust and love
rather than fear. One dark and gloomy doctrine
however was still retained, which although neutralized
�8
On the Hindrances to
in the loving spirits and teaching of these noble men,
became developed into fearful forms under the influ
ence of the fiery and dark minds which succeeded
them. I refer, of course, to the doctrine of eternal
punishment. That doctrine I am compelled to own
both Paul and Christ distinctly taught. I should be
glad to think that the philanthropic apostle, and
.above all that the gentle, loving Jesus had given no
countenance to the immoral doctrine. But all honest
■criticism forbids me from doing so. The methods of
criticism adopted by those who hold the contrary
'conclusion seem to me altogether subversive of rational
interpretation, and would leave every document at
the mercy of the interpreter.
Now, the doctrine they sanctioned, and which -the
whole of the New Testament teaches or recognises,
has ever since been made more or less an efficient
instrument of terror. In the hands of the best men
of the church it has been used merely for the purpose
of restraining vice or stimulating faith. But the
darker spirits have used it with Satanic power to
mould men to their will. Especially has this been
the case in times of doubt, heresy, and schism. Then
with all the vehemence of eloquence, and with all the
invention of art, its awful, sulphurous terrors have
been drawn forth before the affrighted imaginations
of men, in the expectation that the fear of the horrible
torments of an endless life might preserve them
within the orthodox fold of Christ. In the present
day such representations are much modified, and the
fear arising out of them is consequently less active.
The genteel, tolerably-educated minister of your city
churches would not venture to deal out flames and
fiery darkness as his fathers did. It is only in some
■out of the way parish, situated at what seems the
world’s end, in some little conventicle where the
preacher is innocent of a day’s schooling, that you now
hear of eternal damnation in all the fulness of its
horrors.. Yet the influence if it has a strong hold of
men’s, and especially of women’s feelings.
�Progress in Theology.
9
Fear has always restrained enquiry.
The
anathemas of the church long held back the mind
of Europe from enquiry into the protestant dogmas.
“ What if the Church’s dogmas should prove to be
true ? The eternal perdition would be incurred by
the doubting of her creed.” The same fear virtually
operates now. “ One’s first concern is the salvation
of the soul. What if one exposed it to jeopardy by
pursuing these inquiries about the incarnation, the
atonement, the inspiration and authority of the
Bible ? Leave such questions alone, and tread not on
such dangerous ground.”
Such dangerous ground !—that is of course,
assuming, before the enquiry, that these orthodox
dogmas are true. But what if they be untrue ?
Which will be the dangerous ground then ? And
how can you tell whether they be true or untrue
until you have thoroughly investigated the matter ?
Should they prove to be untrue, and untrue I
thoroughly believe them to be, they must be working
intellectual and moral mischief in your souls. For
every lie entails intellectual and moral mischief.
But it is of no use to tell a large portion of the
orthodox this. The fear of losing the soul has so
taken possession of the feelings that it shuts out all
reason, all common sense, and leaves them the miserable
victims of their superstitious delusions. They turn
a deaf ear to all argument, evidence, and proof of
every kind, and see nothing but the hazard of eternal
woe in the questionings of reason. They have no con
fidence in the divine fatherhood that the gospel of
John tells them about ;•—no confidence that the God
of truth will guide aright the mind seeking to know
the truth, much less have they any confidence in the
rational faculties with which man is endowed, and in
the certainty that all honest enquiry must bring a
blessing of some kind with it. But that grim devil
the ignorance of barbarous times conjured into
existence, and those dreaded torments over which he
presides, frighten them out of their seven senses into
�IO
On the Hindrances to
the irrational act of clinging tenaciously, as if for
their life, to the unexamined dogmas of orthodoxy.
One grieves to see the gentle nature of women so
abused, but grows indignant when men, pretending
to a higher intellect and a stronger understanding,
show the same foolish weakness.
And yet all
around us the dark superstition is keeping both men
and women, parsons and people, from all thorough
going rational enquiry. It is as powerful in this
respect amongst large masses as ever ; and no doubt
it will require another generation before the multitude
arise above it.
In the third place, I think an ignominious love of
ease, comfort, or peace of mind, keeps a large number
from enquiry. There are very few who love truth for
its own sake. It is courted rather for the fortune it
brings, the blessings of a physical and spiritual kind.
Most seek some ulterior end, and above all ease,
comfort, peace of mind and great enjoyment. Now if
you do not harass your brains by entertaining doubts
and making enquiries, orthodoxy will furnish you
with these desired blessings. On cheap terms it will
assure you of the salvation of your soul and God’s
present and eternal favour, and in addition will
bring you the approbation, sympathy, and regard of
the respectable people around you. But if you once
set off upon the dangerous road of free enquiry,
instantly all these blessings disappear, and there is
no saying to where you will be led. Knowing this,
the majority of quiet well-to-do people are very care
ful to shun enquiry.
And the mischief feared lies in two directions :
first, in the dogmatical. When verities which have
been venerated for ages are once called into question
and doubt, their mind loses all its anchorage ground,
and seems to itself like a ship out at sea in the midst
of a storm. Whither it will be driven no one can
tell. And there are again two things which distress
it; the one is the uncertainty and suspension of faith
into which it is brought. Most minds rebel at this.
�Progress in Theology.
11
It requires thorough mental training and discipline
to be able to suspend one’s judgment without pain
during the examination of evidence. We become
impatient of it, and want to settle down on the one
side or the other. The mind wants rest; but as long
as enquiry lasts there can be no rest—no reposing
on assured truths—no drawing of comfort from
sweetly consolatory doctrines ! It is all hard work,
and moving on from point to point. And so rather
than embark upon such troubled waters, shoals of men
superstitiously keep the harbour of the old faiths.
There at least, so long as they do not doubt, they
find quiet and comfort.
And then the other thing which keeps them from
enquiry is that they find many are led when once
they loosen their moorings, lengths which seem to
them perfectly horrifying. Some who once were good,
sound, orthodox believers have become what these
people call perfect infidels; and mistrust of themselves,
apparently, or mistrust of the truth, leads them to
fear such if they once set out might become their
own fate. Some could go as far as Robertson of
Brighton, but it would be dreadful to get to the
length of Martineau! Some could go as far as
Carlyle, but it would be ruin to think like Stuart
Mill! Some could accept of the theism of Newman,
but the positivism of Comte would be perdition ! So
each and all have their several bugbears of infidelity
which terrify them from thought. It does not seem
to occur to such people that it is just possible that
those who have gone the lengths they fear to go,
may have reached the truth. They only think of the
consequences to which they presume it will lead.
“ Oh, say they, we could find no comfort, no ease, in
such horrible doctrines, however true they might
appear. All peace would be thrust from our souls
for ever.”
Well, and suppose it were so; did you come into
this world for ease and comfort, or to find the truth
and live by it ? Is blessedness to be had in a false
�12
On the Hindrances to
peace, or in the living facts of the universe ? Ease !
Comfort! For shame ! Go get you into a cradle and
call out some crazy beldame from the workhouse to
rock you your worthless life long. That is all such
drowsy souls are fit for. And yet although all reason
must condemn them, although they themselves must
for very shame be forced to own that in the pure and
perfect truth man’s supreme bliss can alone be found,
and that in this day of the disruption of parties and
the dissolution of churches each one must search out
that truth for himself, this bugbear of extreme
Infidelity keeps thousands, and will continue to keep
thousands, from all manly and honest enquiry. One
grieves over their weakness, but the remedy seems
far away.
The other disturbance to one’s comfort and peace
lies in the social direction. Men like to be at ease
when their professional or business engagements are
over. It is comfortable to get home, sit down by the
fireside, chat with one’s wife and children, read the
newspapers, or doze over a glass of wine. Besides,
these are acquaintances, perchance friends, amongst
whom one likes to spend a pleasant evening now and
then over a game at cards, or in conversation upon
the social and political gossip of the day. But now,
earnest religious enquiry is very apt to break in upon
all this, to make one’s home a scene of constant con
tention and tears, and to make one’s acquaintances
very shy and distant. If the wife have not the
intellect to enter into the questions with the
husband, or the husband with the wife, to what
bickerings, sometimes angry discussion and wordy
contentions, it leads. And then who can resist those
tears and those earnest appeals, “ if not for your own
sake, for the sake of the souls of our darling
children give up such wicked doubts!” And
then the good people, too, aid the home influence.
Who will associate with an infidel ? Who will have
anything to do with him who denies the verities of
the faith ? u My dear fellow, such notions are
�Progress in Theology.
T3
not respectable, and I can assure you if it became
known that you hold opinions so dangerous it will
materially affect your business. You have a young
family rising up, and cannot afford to indulge in such
speculations. Besides, I confess all your friends
concur with my own feeling in the matter, that is,
however much we respect you, we should not like it
to be known we associate with the companion of
infidels. You are all right, you know, but you will
be thrown amongst all sorts of vagabonds, and people
will suspect that you have fallen into the vices to
which Infidelity always leads. Give it up, my dear
fellow, give it up, if you do not wish every respectable
acquaintance to give you up.”
Who could withstand such arguments as that ?
So the poor fellow does give it up, dismisses his
doubts, henceforth walks demurely with his wife and
sweet babies every Sunday regularly to church, and
by and by gets held up by his minister as the very
type of “ That large and respectable class of intelli
gent men who amidst the doubts and scepticism of
a licentious age hold fast by the old faiths ! ”
Another reason just alluded to operates with some.
I referred to the low character imputed to those who
depart from the old beliefs. It is the common con
clusion of weak minds that he who doubts the accepted
dogmas is a bad man. And even what the world
calls respectable men and women, great professors of
religion, think it no shame to either create or pro
pagate all sorts of lying slanders against the infidels.
Now and then this is done unconsciously of the wrong,
the ignorant people not knowing that slander is a form
of immorality and that to speak evil of one another
without sufficient evidence is a crime. But generally
the evil is known, but committed under the palliating
thought that it does God service. Now the effect of
this is twofold : 1st, Ignorant people who do not
know the wickedness of which religious people can be
guilty, believe the slanderers, and shrink- very natu
rally from connecting themselves with such seemingly
�14
Hindrances to Progress in Theology.
disreputable parties. And 2dly, They are very apt to
conclude that bad men cannot have found the truth.
Of course the character of a person cannot affect the
truth or untruth, the validity or invalidity, of his
arguments and propositions. And a rational person
would judge of the doctrines by these alone. But in
matters of religion, as we have seen, the majority are
not. rational. And so these slanderers succeed in
their efforts to deter the weak-minded from enquiry,
and in God’s name effectually do the devil’s work.
Other reasons might be added to these to account
for the large number shunning all enquiry upon the
questions of religion; but these must at present suffice.
And they are sufficient to encourage our faith and
hope in the gradual progress of the truth. • That which
lies at the.root of them all, the want of a sound judg
ment, a disciplined mind habituated to exercise its
reason upon all things, must gradually give way
before the more enlightened system of education all
classes are feeling their way towards. And in time
it will affect women as well as men. Those tender
affections which now bind them to superstition will
not always, be so perverted. When woman receives
the education her nature requires, the intellect will
assert its proper supremacy. Already there are some
noble pioneers, the vanguard of the advancing race.
When the whole host has come forward, then divine,
bliss-giving, beauteous truth shall be our sovereign
mistress, and all men will dare to follow whithersoever
she may lead.
Turnbull and Spears, Printers, Edinburgh.
�
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On the hindrances to progress in theology
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Cranbrook, James
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Place of publication: Ramsgate
Collation: 14 p. ; 18 cm.
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[1871]
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Christian Education-Great Britain
Conway Tracts
Theology
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PDF Text
Text
THE OPINIONS
OF
Professor DAVID F. STRAUSS,
AS EMBODIED IN HIS LETTER
TO THE BURGOMASTER HIRZEL,
PROFESSOR ORELLI,
AND PROFESSOR HITZIG, AT ZURICH.
WITH
AN ADDRESS TO THE PEOPLE OF ZURICH,
By PROFESSOR ORELLI.
LONDON:
PRINTED FOR THOMAS SCOTT, WEST CLIFF, RAMSGATE,
1865.
�“ --------------------------------------------------- ------->
............
,
..J.
—
'W
W M
.P .II
H
I M .W M W
I
L
NII IM I.il
H
�PREFACE.
---------4,——
STRAUSS, the celebrated author of “ The Life
of Jesusf when elected, in 1839, by the proper
authorities to the then vacant chair of Professor of
Theology at the University of Zurich in Switzerland,
and ready to leave his abode in Germany for his new
place of destination, was prevented from doing so on
account of an insurrection of the people of Zurich
and of the surrounding country. Instigated and
headed by their clergy, they took up arms, and
declared their determination to prevent his coming,
calling him “ a heretic and an unbeliever.”
The
authorities tried all possible means to tranquillize
them, to convince them of their being wrong,
and of the groundlessness of their apprehensions ;
but in vain : the people remained firm in their reso
lution, obeying their spiritual leaders. It was at this
critical time that the following letter of Dr Strauss
was written, in order to reconcile the people to his doc-
�4
Preface.
trines, which, he thought were misunderstood by them,
because misrepresented by their clergy. Nothing,
however, could induce them to retrace their steps ;
and at last they actually succeeded in forcing
the authorities to institute a new election, the result
of which was, that another Professor, whom they did
not object to, was chosen, and thus the peace of the
country restored. The letter of Strauss, though not
of very recent date, conveys the clearest idea of his
views in regard to the Christian religion, and for that
reason it may just now be read by some with no small
degree of interest.
*
�A
PROFESSOR ORELLl’S ADDRESS
TO THE PEOPLE OF ZURICH.
Dear Fellow Citizens!
EAD, I beg and entreat you, read quietly and
dispassionately, this little book, in which the
enlightened Doctor Strauss propounds and explains
the tendency of his theology, and of his Christian
belief, in a manner quite intelligible to every one.
With the same candour and clearness did Zwingli
and Luther, those highly enlightened men of God,
formerly communicate their religious persuasions to
the people, in opposition to popcry, when a new and
more beautiful life began to dawn upon them.
After having read the letter, examine first the doc
trine of Doctor Strauss yourselves with all conscien
tiousness : do so in the retirement of your closets,
when the peace of God reigns over you and in your
hearts. Hold fast what is good, that is to say, what
ever appears to you, as rational Christians, to be true,
and good, and beautiful ; reject the rest, which may
seem to you untrue, un Christian, or at least doubtful.
Ask also your ministers by their synodical vow,
R
�6
Professor Orell?s Address.
and on their conscience, what in the letter accords
with the doctrine of our divine Saviour; what, on
the contrary, is opposed to it, and therefore heretical
and condemnable.
Entreat your ministers to enter quietly, and with
a mild spirit, honestly, and without any disguise, as
becomes ministers of Christ, upon whatever points
you may confidently consult them.
Entreat them not to cast angry imprecations
against Doctor Strauss and this little book: such a
proceeding would only become the Pope of Rome.
Beseech your pastors to refute those parts of the
Letter of Strauss which they think to be false, with
sound reasons, and with valid proofs, taken from the
treasure of their erudition.
Dear fellow-citizens, I say with the holy Apostle
Paul (1 Cor. vii, 23-24) : “ Ye are bought with a price ;
be not ye the servants of men. Brethren, let every
man, wherein he is called, therein abide with God.”
Take to heart, without any passion, what an old
friend of religious liberty, of the constitution and
laws, which all of us have confirmed by oath, and
especially also of the freedom of popular education,
kindly advises you to do.
Your’s,
Johann Kaspar Orelli;
�LETTER
OF
PROFESSOR DAVID FRIEDRICH STRAUSS.
----------- *-----------
HEN I read in the public papers of the disturb
W ance which my election to the University of
Zurich has created in your town and in your canton
—of the meetings held on that account—of the
speeches which are made—of the writings which are
exchanged ; when I consider the attacks made upon
you, most honourable men, and upon all those who
assisted in bringing about my election—the invectives
thrown out against you, the injuries done to you
from so many sides,—a deep and just sorrow comes
over me, that men to whom I feel myself so highly
indebted should have to pay so dear for their kind
interest in my behalf. And I, for whom you expose
yourselves to the boisterous waves of a popular com
motion, am lying quietly all the while in a calm
harbour, scarcely hearing from afar the roaring storm
and the resounding breakers, and only able to send
you a sympathizing word, but not to appease the
wild waters.
�'The Opinions of
When after a Jong and obstinate resistance my
election was at last brought about, I thought your
struggle would now be at an end, and I flattered
myself with the hope of being now soon to be placed
personally in the midst of you, and of being able to
begin gradually paying you the debt of gratitude
which has run up so high, by meeting you in the
kindest manner—by shewing you every respectful
attention, and giving you the most friendly assistance
for the common purpose of diffusing truth and light.
But, behold! it was only the beginning of your
troubles ; and the time when I shall be able to shew
myself personally grateful to you—who knows when
it will come ? for it would be in vain for me to sow
the seed of knowledge on a soil overflown by so
many wild waters. Noah was also obliged to wait
till the flood had subsided before he could cultivate
the field and plant vineyards. But why do I speak
to you of gratitude ? Men of your disposition, if
unfavourable circumstances render active gratitude
impossible, are satisfied with that gratitude which
lives in the heart, and that, you may rest assured,
will only be extinguished with life itself.
But how am I to justify it before the tribunal of
the public weal and of science, that on account of
my election men like you are disturbed in their
activity for both in such a deplorable manner ? How
many a fruit, carefully cultivated for the general good
by your active attention, most honourable Burgo
master, is torn unripe from the tree, or, at least, delayed
in ripening by the present storms ! How many an hour
�Professor David F. Strauss.
9
which you, most honoured Orelli, would have dedi
cated to the ancients, for the benefit of all friends of
classic literature, is embittered to you by these nego
tiations, or by indignation at the circumstances in
question! And you, dear Hitzig, how often may
your faithful acting or feeling for me have hindered
you in those labours through which you diffuse such
a, pleasing light in the hitherto darkest parts of the
Old Testament' But here may my desire for the
promotion of the public weal and the progress of
science hold me excused before their united tribunal,
for you intended to do a service to both by bringing
me to your University ; and though, perhaps, you
may have overrated my powers of execution, in my
good-will you were certainly not mistaken. But at
present I am not even allowed to try how far I might
be able to answer your expectations; and so it seems
that you have in vain withdrawn your time and
labour from your more important occupations.
Do not think so, honoured gentlemen! Your
voices have found an echo far and wide, and, still
more, silent sympathy, though they may have no
resting-place in your own immediate neighbourhood :
like the feathered seed of plants, appearing, indeed,
to be blown away by the wind, but often alighting on
a little piece of earth in a distant country, where it
can take root and spring up- Now, or later, through
me, or through another one, at Zurich, or wherever
else in Germany, or in Switzerland, no matter, but
the day will certainly come, when we shall be able to
think and speak rationally and freely of religion,
�IO
The Opinions of
without being called ungodly; and to be really pious
and godly, without abusing reason and condemning
science.
Of this the present occurrences, the
discussions of the three councils, the speeches and
opinions which were heard there, are forebodings not
to be mistaken. Even without any immediate success,
it is, nevertheless, infinitely much that once, in an
assembled council of the people, thoughts have been
uttered like this,—“ that you may be a Christian
without believing in all the words and relations of
the Bible.” They are now wishing, from certain
quarters, to have the results of those discussions, and
the resolutions of those assemblies, repealed. I hope
they will not succeed; but even suppose they do,
those who brought it about would have little reason
to triumph. If they were more judicious leaders than
they appear to be, they would say, in case of success,
with that ancient general, “ another such victory,
and we are lost.” For a single victory and a single
defeat decides nothing yet; the germ of future
defeats lies often concealed in a victory: on the
contrary, the surety of future victories in a defeat—
all depends on the manner in which the contest was
carried on. On the side of those whom they are now
endeavouring to overpower, it was carried on
in open deliberation, where speech was opposed
to speech, where the defender stood up against
the accuser, and where the assembly, as judge,
after having heard both parties, decided for
him who was accused and defended;—an honest,
open contest, an impartial sentence. But on the side
�Professor David F. Strauss.
11
of those who would fain annul this sentence, the
contest is carried on, as on that side all contests have
been carried on at all times. The council-hall is for
certain people unwelcome ground to fight upon,
because there each thrust has to expect a counter
thrust : a much more convenient scene of action for
them is the church, where the breastwork of the
pulpit forms an invincible barrier, and where the
orator must be in the right, because nobody is
allowed to contradict him. This is a court where
only the accuser is heard, but not the accused and his
defender; where the judging congregation pronounce
their “ guilty ” on the mere statement of the former.
A just judgment, an honourable contest, it cannot be
denied!—if the good congregation, who are here to
decide on the Christianity and admissibility of an
elected Professor at the University had only acquired
from elsewhere a knowledge of their own concerning
his doctrines, that they might be able to compare
what their clergymen accuse him of, with what they
know of him themselves, and judge of it accordingly!
But if you ask these people, What do you think that
Strauss really does, teach ? I cannot help smiling
when I fancy what their -answer may be. The
modest and simple burghers who form the greater
part of those communities, will, I am sure, be ready to
confess that they have not read and scarcely seen
the book in question* ; and also the better educated
amongst them, as far as they are not of a learned
profession, should at least confess that, although they
* The Life of Jesus.
�I2
The Opinions of
may have read it, they have not possessed the means
of thoroughly understanding and justly appreciating
it. There remains, therefore, only the judgment of
the clergyman, who, the judges having no judgment
of their own in this affair, is of course accuser and
judge in one person.
But should not the communities be able to rely
with security on the judgment of their clergy ?-—
Certainly, in all those points which refer to the indi
vidual salvation of the members of the community.
On the question, What shall I do that I may inherit
eternal life ? the clergymen have to give an answer
to those committed to .their care, and, without
particular reasons for the contrary, it is always to be
supposed that they will give the right one. But who
would appoint a clergyman, as such, to judge, for
instance, of the best manner of cultivating the soil,
of establishing manufactures, of governing the State ?
“ Well,” you will say, “ that is not his business ; but
the clergymen must certainly know how to judge of
the orthodoxy of a professor of theology, as they have
studied theology themselves.” That they have ; but
will you permit me to make a comparison, in order
to show that nevertheless the majority of the clergy
are at present the least qualified to be impartial
judges in this cause, in which they are themselves so
much concerned. When Guttenberg invented the
art of printing, who were at the time the bitterest
adversaries of the new art, but those who had till
then been engaged in copying books ? And, to
choose some instances of our own days, who opposed
�Professor David F. Strauss.
13
the spinning-engines with the greatest zeal, but those
who had hitherto also been employed in spinning,
but without engines? Who did most passionately
curse the steam navigation? Was it not those who
were also navigators, but only prepared to go by
means of oars and sails ? Would ever a printingoffice have been established if the copiers of books
had been listened to ; or a steam-carriage constructed,
if it had depended on the decision of the coachmen ?
These instances shew sufficiently that the most
implacable adversaries of every new invention, in any
line of business, are for the first time the very mem
bers of the corporation who have hitherto carried on
the same business without the new contrivance.
This may be fully applied to the behaviour of most
of the clergy with regard to those alterations which,
a,mangst others, I am also endeavouring to introduce
in the science of theology. It was at all times, and
it will also in future continue to be, the duty of the
clergy to excite pious feelings in their auditors, to
strengthen their virtuous resolutions, to implant in
children the fear of God, to guard the same in grown
persons against the impulses of passion and of worldly
occupations, to comfort the sick through the word of
God, and to inspire the dying with blissful hope, as a
companion on their last journey.
The Protestant
clergy were, till now, accustomed to perform this task
in the following manner:—They took the Bible in
hand, and said, Behold ! there is a God who in ancient
times created this world in six days, and rested on
the seventh, in commemoration of which the seventh
�14
The Opinions of
day was sanctified for the believers as a day of rest.
At that time God also made man of the dust of the
ground; but man, first innocent and without fault,
was persuaded by a serpent, behind which, perhaps,
the devil was concealed, to eat of a forbidden fruit;
whereupon he was driven out of the garden of Para
dise, and the earth was cursed for his sake. All men,
descended from him, are born sinners since that time,
on account of which hereditary sin they would have
justly incurred eternal damnation from their very
birth; but God revealed Himself henceforth to several
members of the corrupted race;—He appeared to
Abraham in the form of man, wrestled in person with
Jacob and dislocated his thigh: through Moses He
led His people out of Egypt, and gave them the law
from Mount Sinai with His own audible voice. A
series of miracles runs from thence through the whole
history of this people. Balaam’s ass spoke on their
account; Joshua ordered the sun and the moon to
stand still in their course; Elijah obtained fire from
heaven through his prayers, and went up thither in a
fiery chariot. Then the Prophets rose one after
another, foretelling the coming of Christ; and when the
time was fulfilled, Christ appeared himself. He was
in all things like the rest of mankind, with the ex
ception of sin, and of the circumstance that he had
not, like all of us, with a human mother also a human
father; but, in his case, the Divine Spirit supplied
the place of a father. Angels announced his birth at
Bethlehem to the shepherds, and a star guided the
wise men from the distant east, like a torch carried
�Professor David F. Strauss.
15
before them, to the place and the very house of the
Divine Child. When he had grown a man, and was
being baptized by John the Baptist, the Spirit of God
descended npon him in the visible shape of a dove, and
God the father Himself said, in audible words, that He
was well pleased in him. From that time his life was
a succession not only of beneficent actions, but also
of miracles : he raised the dead, fed thousands of
people with a few loaves, walked upon the sea, and
turned water into wine. But he fell into the hands
of his enemies: he died on the cross; he shed his
blood for the atonement of the world. However,
after three days he rose again from the dead, and after
forty more he visibly, and before the eyes of his dis
ciples, ascended into heaven ; from whence he poured
down upon them the Holy Ghost in a rushing mighty
wind, and in tongues of fire ; and from whence he
will come back one day to resuscitate the dead, and
to judge them, together with those who shall then be
still living.
This is the old Christian belief; and who would
be insensible to the elevating beauty and comfort it
contains ? We, certainly not; but for that reason
they ought to be fair enough on the other side also
to acknowledge its insurmountable difficulties, which
are more clearly developed as time advances. God
is said to have walked with Adam in Paradise, and
appeared to Abraham in a visible form, though St
John says that no man has seen God at any time:
and our reason agrees with the Apostle. God formed
man of the dust of the ground: is He not there
�i6
The Opinions of
represented as a human being with hands ? He took
food with one of the Patriarchs, and wrestled with
the other; does not that suppose Him possessed of
bodily limbs ? In Paradise the serpent spoke, and
afterwards the ass of the heathen seer; but is a
speaking animal anything which we are able to
imagine, far less to have a clear idea of ? The sun
stood still in his course ; or, rather, the earth was
stopped in its daily revolution round its own axis.
We know what happens when a carnage is suddenly
stopped at its full speed through some obstacle ;—a
shock ensues, which throws him who has not a very
firm hold out of the carriage; and when, at that
time, the earth was stopped in its incomparably
quicker movement, would Joshua, with his troops,
have been able to pursue the enemies unshaken ?
Would not Israelites and Amorites, together 'with
the towers and houses, not only of Gibeon, but of
the whole earth, have fallen to the ground, from a
shock stronger than that of the most violent earth
quake ? Then, the ascension of Elias and of Jesus;
is, then, the throne of God really above the clouds ?
Do not stars surround the terrestrial globe above
as well as on all other sides ? And are not the stars
worlds ? and is not God everywhere ? If, according
to the Apostle Paul (Acts xvii, 28), we live and move
and have our being in God, what occasion has He
to remove whomever He wants to call to Him
self from the surface of the earth, be it in a fiery
chariot or on a cloud ?
“ But these,” they reply, “ and all other parts of
�Professor David F. Strauss.
17
sacred history which you are offended at—for
instance, the casting out devils, the healing the sick,
the raising the dead—are the very miracles through
which God has proved that it is He who has made
heaven and earth, and all things therein.” What!
would it be impossible, then, to know, by the existing
regulation and the ordinary course of the world
and of nature, that it is God who has created it ?
Who is ungodly enough to dare such an assertion ?
or, shall I rather say, childish enough ? For, indeed,
such a judgment is exactly like the behaviour of
children, who do not think anything of it, when
they are told that the clock, whose pendulum you see
vibrating with such uniformity, and which you hear
striking so regularly every hour, was made by this
artist here; but as soon as this man condescends to
lift up the hammer of the bell with his hand, and
to let it strike out of the common way, once, twice,
01* as often as the child wishes, then the clockmaker
is with the children the celebrated and favoured
man. It is a pity that mankind should be so slow in
putting away childish things. The miracles in the
sense of the old popular belief cannot be of any
particular value but to him who is unable to discover
the power and wisdom of the Creator in the natural
regulation of the world; and we, who are accused
of not believing those miracles which God performed
in Judea at the time of Moses and the prophets—of
Jesus and the Apostles—we do not think much of
them, only because to us they are lost, like a drop in
the ocean, amongst the innumerable wonders which
B
�18
(The Opinions of
God is daily and hourly performing in all parts of
the world created and supported by Him. “ Behold
the finger of God,” they cry ; “ he has stopped the
sun and the moon at the time of Joshua! ” What!
only his finger ? we reply: we see the whole hand,
the powerful arm of Him, who not only stopped the
sun and the moon once for some few hours, but who,
from the creation of the world until now, has upheld
and supported all suns, and moons, and earths, and the
whole host of stars, moving them in their right orbits.
According to your belief, dumb animals have spoken
like men, and thereby proclaimed the glory of God ;
also, according to ours, do the animals proclaim the
glory of God through the artificial construction of
their limbs, through their wonderful instinct and
their various abilities. Why force us to believe that
an animal has spoken with human language, since the
truly great and glorious thing in the creation of God
is this,—that He is praised by each creature in its
own language, by a chorus of beings of so many
voices? You find it particularly elevating, that
Christ has twice fed thousands of people with a
small provision, through the power of his Father.
What, only twice ! and a long time ago, has your
God been doing what ours is doing every year—yea,
every day ? For it is, indeed, but a small provision
which we intrust every year as seed to the soil of
our fields and gardens ; but the seed brings fruit, as
Christ says, “some an hundred fold, some sixty,
Some thirty,” (Matth. xiii, 23) satisfying every
day far more than only four or five thousand, so that
�Professor David F. Strauss.
19
many fragments are remaining. In short, you cannot
mention any miracle which we have not also, and
even greater and more splendid.
“ But is, then, our Saviour no longer anything
extraordinary ? ” they ask. “ Is the Son of God
nothing but a common man ? ”—A. man, a real man ?
yes ! but a common one ? No! the Son of God
he is also to us, only not in that coarse sense which
must always be an offence to reason. Tell me, is
Christ called only Son of God in the Scripture ?
Is he not quite as often called the son of man ? And
is this not a sufficient proof that it must be possible
for an individual to be the Son of God, and yet at
the same time the son of man ? Therefore, to us
Christ is the son of Joseph and Mary : God sanctified
the fruit of their union; He breathed into it the
beautiful and pure soul, the high and powerful spirit
which the child showed already at an early age; and
for that reason we call the son of man very justly also
the Son of God. And so the other miraculous events
of his life. God himself is said to have pronounced
upon him twice, that he was His beloved Son in
whom He was well pleased, adding that mankind
ought to listen to him. What do we lose by doubting
these relations? Having removed the offence we
took in fancying God speaking with human voice,
we certainly do not feel inclined to call that a loss.
But we do not lose anything else; for, considering
the godliness and purity of the life of Jesus, and
then thinking of God and his holiness on one side,
and of our destination on the other, we know,
�20
The Opinions of
without a positive declaration, that God must have
been pleased with a life like that of Jesus, and that
we cannot do anything better than adhere to him.
We do not, therefore, lose more with those voices
from, heaven than is lost for a beautiful picture from
which a ticket is taken away that was fastened to it,
containing the superfluous assurance of its being a
beautiful picture. Whether Christ has healed sick
persons through a mere word or touch—what is that
to us, who are no longer benefited by it, and who
will never be able to do the same ? God may have
endowed him with particular powers for the purpose of
such performances : that was calculated for those who
were his contemporaries. He does not help us any
longer by means of those powers, like the blind man
at Jericho, or the leper and the lame man at
Capernaum, or the dead at Nain and Bethany ■ but
he opens our eyes through his doctrines, that we may
know the holy will of God; he strengthens our feeble
endeavours to follow his example through exhorta
tions and promises; he purifies our hearts through
his Spirit, and awakens us through the communion
of his life, into which he receives us, to a new life of
holiness and righteousness.
“ But what,” they ask us, “ becomes of the atoning
death of Jesus according to your creed ? Is he to
you as well as to us the Lamb of God, slain for the
sins of the world ? ” Here we must ask you a
question in return : Do you consider the atonement
in this way, that God was during the whole time of
the Old Testament always an angry and jealous God,
�Professor David F. Strauss.
21
seeking vengeance on mankind, and that only the
blood of Christ appeased his wrath and softened his
disposition towards the human race ?
Whoever
considers it thus is, not to speak of the unreasonable
ness and unworthiness of the whole idea, contradicted
by Jesus himself, who declared that the love of God
towards the world was the principal motive why God
gave his only begotten Son (John iii, 16). If,
therefore, God was already beforehand merciful and
inclined to forgive, it is impossible to conceive that,
besides repentance and improvement on the side of
man, the death of an innocent person should have
been required, and that without it God should not
have been able to indulge in his mercy, and really to
pardon the sins of those that are penitent. Never
theless, the death of Jesus is also to us an image
and surety of our forgiveness and salvation. If that
man whose mind was one with God did not desist
from loving sinful mankind even unto death, yea,
prayed to God for his murderers, we are able by the
mildness of this godly man to measure the mercy of
God Himself, and His willingness to pardon even
those who have most grossly offended Him, provided
only they repent. If an Elias, who caused fire to
fall from heaven upon those who were sent out to
apprehend him, seemed to teach an angry God
(though the Lord had revealed himself even to him
in a still small voice, 1 Kings, xix, 12-13) we
see, by the forbearing and placable disposition of the
dying Christ, that God is love.
According to the old Christian belief, Christ rose
�22
The Opinions of
again from the dead, and ascended into heaven. So
he did also according to ours; but not only once,
and at the end of his life; but at all times he arose
from those dead, whom he orders to bury their dead
(Matth. viii, 22), and to such a life he awakens
already at this side of the grave all those who follow
him; for he says himself, “ He that heareth my
word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath ever
lasting life, and is passed from death unto life.”
(John v, 24). In like manner there was no occasion
for his being carried up to God into heaven by a
cloud at the end of his career, as he soared thither
already during his lifetime in each prayer which he
said at night on lonely mountains, or in the day,
surrounded by his disciples.
Moreover, what St
Paul demands of the Christians (1 Thess. v, 17)
being fully the case with him, that is to say, his
life being a praying without ceasing, he was
continually with God, which he intimates himself
by saying to Nicodemus, “ The Son of man which is
in heaven ” (John iii, 13), where also the conversation
of the true Christian is already in this life, according
to St Paul (Phil, iii, 20).
“ But do you also believe,” they ask us, “ that
Christ will come back to judge the world ? ” We do
believe it, we reply; only, his coming to judge is to us
not, as it is to you, such a one that is always delayed
from century to century, and never takes place:
but in us the Lord passes judgment every day, for he
has given his spirit into our hearts to judge us,
punishing us when we are doing or coveting’ evil, and
�Professor David F. Strauss.
23
rewarding us with peace and happiness, when we are
guided and governed by it. And since thus our
inward judge, our conscience, purified and sharpened
by the spirit of Christ, is adjudging and preparing to
us already in this life reward or punishment, happi
ness or sorrow, according to what we deserve, does
not this clearly indicate that also in a future fife the
Divine Judge will assign to each of us that mansion
in his Father’s house which he has made himself
worthy of here upon earth ? Is there any occasion
for a particular solemn day of judgment to do this ?
I do not think so: the rich man was at least con
demned, and the poor Lazarus made happy, imme
diately after death, and without any day of judgment.
“ But are also our bodies to be raised again to eternal
happiness or damnation ? ” The apostle Paul speaks
of a trance, in which he was caught up to the third
heaven; adding, whether he was in the body or out
of the body, he could not tell, God knew it; but he
knew that he was caught up into Paradise, and heard
unspeakable words (2 Cor. xii, 2). We do also hope
with the Apostle to enjoy bliss and happiness in a
future life; but whether in the body or out of the
body, we leave to God, who will arrange it so as it is
best for us.
“ All this sounds well enough,'5 perhaps many a
one will say to us, who thinks more clearly and more
quietly about the matter; “ but still you throw away
too much of what is related and taught in the Bible,
and you despise the Divine revelations, the collection
of which you convert into a book of fables.” We do
�24
The Opinions of
not despise the revelations and their records ; we
only try to obtain a more correct idea of them.
We do certainly not believe that God spoke like a
man with Abraham and Moses, nor that he sug
gested to those who composed the writings of the
Old and New Testament, word for word, what they
were to write. But God revealed Himself to mankind
at all times in their own minds, in the works of
the creation (Rom. i, 19), in the history of the
nations, and finally in some particularly gifted men,
whom he raised amongst them as lawgivers and
prophets, as teachers and apostles. Such men rose
amongst all nations, but chiefly amongst the JewSy
who very early entertained the notion that there is
but one God, that He is the Almighty Creator of
heaven and earth, that He is not to be repi’esented
by any image or likeness, that He is the holy Law
giver and the just Ruler of the destinies of mankind.
The religious writings of the ancient Jewish nation
being the only ones in which this foundation of true
religion is to be found so pure and strong (for which
reason even the New Testament relies on and appeals
to the Old in this respect), they are also holy to us ;
and the books of Moses and Samuel, the Psalms and
the Prophets, are indispensable to our edification.
But it is a mistake to think that the holiness of those
books obliges us to consider every idea which they
contain, and every history they relate, as literally
true. Poi* instance, the history of the creation,—a
pious Israelite, lost in contemplation of the wonderful
works of God, and reflecting upon their origin,
�Professor David F. Strauss.
imagined the particulars of this event in his peculiar
way. With simplicity of mind he divided the labours
of God, as we men do ours, into daily portions;
he related the formation of the inorganic and of the
organic worlds in corresponding verses or sentences ;
and, as a Jew, being accustomed to the celebration of
the seventh day, he made also the Creator rest on
this day. Afterwards he, or another one, reflected
on the immorality and misery of mankind : he could
not believe that they had been originally created by
the good God in such corruption and for such misery :
their getting into such a bad state he thought must
have been their own fault, and so he wrote down the
history of the fall of our first parents. Several
remarkable events had happened to the Israelitish
nation, chiefly in the earlier period of their history ;
they had escaped from servitude in Egypt under
strange circumstances, and after a long migration
they had conquered the land of Canaan in bloody
wars. These occurrences, of course, continued to
live in the mouths of the people from generation to
generation. They were right in seeing the finger of
God in these events : but being unable to see that the
very doing of God had been this, that He had let the
people grow strong during their servitude in Egypt,
that hereafter at the right time He caused a man like
Moses to rise, and endowed him with all the gifts
necessary for the deliverance of His people, moreover
thatHeletthe Israelites meet in Canaan with corrupted
tribes, divided amongst themselves—being unable to
understand this invisible influence of God, and yet
�i6
The O'pinions of
being justly convinced of a co-operation of God,
they imagined the Divine activity with regard to
the departure from Egypt in this way, as if God had
ordered Moses in an oral conversation to deliver His
people—as if He had visibly, in the pillar of cloud
and of fire, marched before the army, and so forth.
This was written down in after-times, which is the
real origin of the relations thereof in those writings
that are commonly called the books of Moses. It is
a similar case with the New Testament. Thus, the
first Christians asked themselves, whence in Christ
comes this clearness of mind, this sublimity of spirit,
this purity of heart, which is nowhere else to be
found in any human being ? He was not produced
by sinful seed, was their answer; he immediately
descended from God, the fountain of all light,—which
gave rise to the relations of his supernatural produc
tion, contained in the Gospels of St Matthew and St
Luke. As a higher’ spirit, he appeared to have come
down upon this earth for a short time; but after his
departure from it, to have returned to God, whence
he came; which caused the relations of his resur
rection and ascension, and so forth.
By this view of the matter the Bible is by no
means degraded, nor are Christians dissuaded from
reading it; on the contrary, it is the only point of
view from which the reading of the Bible will be truly
edifying for a thinking Christian. As long as he
fancies himself bound to believe literally in all the
histories of the Bible, he finds with every step a
stumbling-block for his reason, the removal of which
�Professor David F. Strauss.
27
causes him. so much trouble, and puts his mind into
such a state of doubt and disquietude, that the best
profit from reading the Bible is lost to him. How
many a one has never yet attempted to consider the
moral doctrines of Jesus on account of his mind being
constantly occupied with the miracles, either faithfully
admiring or curiously reflecting on them ! How many
a one, on the contrary, has thrown aside the whole
Bible with scorn and indignation, because its miracu
lous stories offended him! The view we take of it
prevents both these results. He who adopts it will no
longer be induced by the splendour of the supernatural
to turn away from the less shining but more important
parts of the contents of the Bible ; nor will he be
deterred from reading it by the incongruities
in its relations. We rejoice in the piety and
simplicity of its authors, and in the deep meaning
of their narratives, though often obliged to con
sider them as mere tradition or poetry.
The
author of the Gospel of St Matthew tells us, and
certainly believed himself, that some heathen wise
men of the east had been guided by a star to the
newly-born babe Jesus : we do not take this literally,
but we explain it as a beautiful symbol of the light
which, in Christ, dawned also upon the heathen. In
like manner, the relation of the fall of man in the Old
Testament, if it does not teach us how the first man
fell, certainly shews us, as it were in a mirror, how
men are led, by consciousness of present misery and
imperfection, to picture to themselves a forfeited
prior state of innocence and happiness ; and also how
�28
"The Opinions of
it is that at this day we bi’ing ourselves to fall, or
suffer ourselves to be led away to siu. Thus the
Bible remains to us a fountain of edification: but
we are also edified through the creation, and through
the way in which mankind is guided in great as well
as in small things ; of which the Bible forms only
one single part, but the most remarkable and the
most instructive one. These three books, that of
Nature, that of History, and the Bible, must supply
each other. We ought not to neglect one on account
of the other, for only together do they constitute the
one entire revelation of God.
But where have I got to ? All this I certainly do
not wish to tell you, most honoured gentlemen, who
know it as well as I do, and who know also very
well that these are my opinions. My words have
insensibly turned to others who cannot know this
as well as you do, and who may, perhaps, still take
your advice about it. I do not, indeed, expect this
of that excited multitude, who, glowing with a hatred
of heresy by no means Christian-like, are now pre
paring, under the cloak of piety, to defend all other
worldly interests whatsoever: to these I have
nothing to say, remembering the words of Christ,
which expressly forbid us to lay the treasure of
religious persuasion before such people. But the
chief thing which I wanted to say to you, and from
which I made this digression, was, that the aversion
of the greater part of the clergy to the new view of
the Christian religion is as little to be wondered at,
as everywhere the irritation of the members of a
�Professor David F. Strauss.
29
corporation against a new invention, by means of
which their business is carried on in a simpler way
than that in which they learned it. Most of the clergy,
I said, are accustomed to excite pious feelings in
their auditors by means of clinging to the letter of
the Bible relations and ideas: our professing to
be edified and to edify others with a more liberal
view of the same narratives, puzzles them and excites
their indignation, because they are not prepared for
such a thing.
Let them be as angry as they like, and let them
abuse and calumniate us as much as they please,
they or their successors will at last as surely be
obliged to accommodate themselves, and to come
round to our new method, just as any new inventions
in the department of mechanical business, such as we
mentioned above for the sake of comparison, must
at last be adopted, even by those who at first most
objected to the inconvenient innovation. Of course ;
for who orders now-a-days a book to be copied by
hand which he may have cheaper and handsomer in
print? In like manner, it must, sooner or later,
come to this, that nobody will condescend to listen to
a clergyman who thinks of edifying his auditors by a
sermon in which the dry passage of the children of
Israel through the Red Sea—the walking of Jesus
upon the water—the finding of the piece of silver in
the fish’s mouth by Peter — are defended and
explained as real miracles. Then they will ask the
clergyman,—Are you not able to tell us something
more important of Jesus and Peter than this ? Can
�30
Opinions of Professor Strauss.
you not prove the divine omnipotence through some
thing greater than what he is said to have done once
at the time of Moses ? When it shall have come to
this—though it may yet require a good while, for
daily experience shows that God has not in mankind
a pupil who makes too rapid steps in learning—
whether they will then still think of us I do not
know, nor is it of any consequence; but we are even
now permitted to give ourselves this testimony, that
we have done what was in our power to bring about
the time promised by Christ, when God shall be
worshipped in spirit and in truth.
May the consciousness of this elevate you, most
honoured gentlemen, above the many adversities
that now surround you, as it has in similar disappoint
ments kept up the spirits of
Your sincerely devoted servant,
and, I may say, colleague,
though at present still in partibus,
David Friedrich Strauss.
Stuttgart, 1st March, 1839.
PRINTED BY C. W. REYNELL, LITTLE PDLTENEY STREET, HAYMARKET.
�
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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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The opinions of Professor David F. Strauss, as embodied in his letter to the Burgomaster Hirzel, Professor Orelli, and Professor Hitzig, at Zurich : with an address to the people of Zurich
Description
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 30 p. ; 19 cm.
Notes: Printed by C.W. Reynell of Little Pulteney Street, Haymarket. Includes bibliographical references. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
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David Friedrich
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1865
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Thomas Scott
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Theology
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RA1606
CT150
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English
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<img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /><br />This work (The opinions of Professor David F. Strauss, as embodied in his letter to the Burgomaster Hirzel, Professor Orelli, and Professor Hitzig, at Zurich : with an address to the people of Zurich), identified by <span><a href="www.conwayhall.org.uk">Humanist Library and Archives</a></span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.
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Orelli, Johann Kaspar von and Strauss (ed)
Church Controversies
Conway Tracts
Theology
Zurich
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Unfehlbarkeit bisher für wal;r gehalten haben, konnten fic
bodf nidft glauben, bicfeS SBort im dfriftlidjen ©inne
genommen. Bwifchcn ©tauben (fide divina) unb zwifdjen
ber vcrftanbeSmäfzigcn Einnahme einer für wahrfdfcinlid)
gehaltenen Meinung ift ein unermeßlicher Uttterftfueb.
©tauben kann unb barf ber Katholik nur baSjenige was
ihm als göttlich geoffenbarte, zur ©ubftanz ber ^eilslchre
gehörige, über jeben Bweifct erhabene SBahrljeít von ber
*) 2Iu$ ber SlitgSfmrger SlHgemeinen ¿dtung, 1870 5¡r. 21.
j
Stimmen auö b. fatlj.Äirdje üb. b. Äirdjenfr. b. (Segenm. 7
©Bllinger, jtvet ©utadjten.
�88
©ödinger,
(2)
Jlirc^c felbft mitgetljcilt unb vorgcjcidjnct wirb, nur ba8=
fettige, an beffcn tBetcnntnifj bie ^ugeljörigteit jur Jtirdße
gcfnüpft ift, babfenige beffcn ©egentlfeil bic 5tircf»c fd)le^t=
fyin nidjt biilbct, als offenbare 3»rrlcl)re verwirft. $n
2öat;r(}cit Ijat alfo fein -Dicnfd) von Anfang ber ^ird;c bis
junt heutigen Jage bic Unfehlbarkeit bcS ^ßa^fteö geglaubt,
b. I). fo geglaubt wie er an ©ott, an ©tjriftus, an bie
Dreieinigkeit beS SSaterS, «SoIfneS unb ©eiftcS u. f. w.
glaubt, fonbern viele Ijabcit cS nur vermutet, ljaben eS
für waljrfdjeinlidj ober IfödfftenS für mcitf^Iid; gewifj (fide
humana) gehalten bafj biefe Prärogative bem pa^ft jufomntc. ©emnadj Wäre bie SScränbcrung in bem ©tauben
unb ber Scljrc ber Jlirdje Wcldje bic 2lbrejj=33ifd;öfc burd^=
geführt Wiffcn Wollen ein in ber @efc^id;te ber Jtiräßc
cinjig baftcljcnbcS ©reigniff; in acfitjclm ^aljrfyunberten ift
nidjtS WjnlidfcS vorgcfommeit. ©S ift eine firdjlidje ERe=
Volution, welche fic begehren, um fo bur^greifenber als
eS fid; Ijier um baS fyunbament ljanbclt Welches beit reli=
giöfen ©tauben fcbeS Witfdfen künftig tragen unb galten
foll, als an bic «Stelle ber ganjcit, in 3cit unb 9tanm
univcrfalcn ätirefje ein einzelner ^Qienfd;, ber Pa'pft, gefegt
werben foH. «isljcr fagte ber Katholik: 3d; glaube biefe
ober jene ßcljre auf baS 3cugnij3 ber gaitjcn J?ird;e aller
3eitcit, weil fie bic Scrljcijjung l;at, bafj fic immerbar be=
fielen, ftctö im Scfifc ber 2öai>ri?eit bleiben foH. künftig
aber müfjte ber Jtatl;olit fagen: idj glaube weil ber
für unfehlbar erklärte patft cS ju teuren unb ju glauben
befiehlt. ©afj er aber unfehlbar fei, baS glaube itf;, weil
er cS von fid; behauptet. ©enn 400 ober 600 5Bifd;öfe
�(3)
bie llnfefylbarfeitöabrefie.
89
haben ¿war im 3ahre 1870 3U ^om befchloffen, baß ber
ißapft unfehlbar fei; allein alle Bifdjöfe unb jebeS Goncil
aljne ben ^b'apft finb bet Wglicljtcit beS ^rrthumS untere
ivorfen; Untrüglichfeit ift baS auSfchließenbe Borrecht unb
Befifcthum beb Sßapfteö, fein ¿eugniß können bie Bifd;öfe,
viele ober wenige, webet verftärken noch abfcfywacfyen; jener
Befchluß ljat alfo nur fo viel ¿traft unb Slutorität, als
oer 5ßapft ihm, inbem er fiel; benfclben ancignet, verliefen
hat. Unb fo löft fic^ beim SllleS julefet in baS Selbfh
jeugniß beS ^ßapftcö auf, was freilich fcljr einfach ift.
£abei fei nur erinnert, baff vor 1840 3ahren e*n uiu
enblicp Roherer einmal gefagt Ijat: „SBenn ich mir felber
ßeugniß gebe, fo ift mein 3eugniß nicht glaubwürbig."
(M 5, 31.)
SDie Slbrcffe gibt inSbefonbere ju folgenben Siebenten
Einlaß:
©rftenS: fie befdjräntt bie Unfehlbarkeit beS ißapfteS
auf biejenigen 5luSfprüd;e unb ©ecrete, welche berfelbe an
bie ®efammtl)eit aller ©laubigen richtet, alfo ¿ur Belehr
ung ber gangen fatholifdjen ¿tirdje erläßt.
daraus würbe alfo folgen, baß, wenn ein ^ßapft nur
an einzelne Sßerfonen, ¿törperf¿haften, ^articularkirchen fiep
wenbete, er ftets bem ^rrthum preisgegeben war. 9lun
haben aber bie ißäpfte gwölf ober brei^n 3ahr^un^cUe
lang bie Bebingung, an welche bie ^rrthumölofigkeit ihrer
©ntfeheibungen ober Belehrungen geknüpft fein foU, nie
verwirklicht: alle ¿tunbgebuiigen ber ißäpfte über fragen
ber Sehre vor bem Gnbe bcS 13. 3ahrhunbertS finb nur
an beftimmte ^ßerfonen ober an bie Bifcpöfe eines ßanbeS
�90
SöUirtßer,
(4)
u. f. w. gerichtet. £)er ganzen orientalifchcn Jtirc^e ift
niemals in bem ^ahrtaufenb bet Bereinigung ein att=
gemein lautcnbeS Secret eines papfteS mitgetfyeilt worben,
nur — nnb in langen 3^^i^cnräumen — an einzelne
Patriarchen ober an äbaifer haben bie päpfte bogmatifcfje
Schreiben gerichtet.
@S ift alfo flar, baff bie päpfte felbcr von biefer
Bebingung, von welcher bie Sicherheit nnb Unfehlbarfeit
ihrer (Sntfd;eibnngen abhängen foll, minbeftenS taufenb
3ahre lang feine Slhnuitg gehabt haben, wie benn biefe
Behauptung auch crft fehr fpät erfonnen nnb ber Jtirche
vor 1562 unbefannt gewefen ift. 3n tiefem $ahre Xjat fie
nämlich ber Söwencr ^hcologc Johann ^effels ¿um erften«
mal vorgetragen, von bem fie BeHarmin entlehnte, nnb
mit Stellen aus beit falfchcn 3fiborifchcn ©ccretalcn nnb
mit ben erbidhtetcii ^cugniffen bcS heiligen GpriHuS ftüt^te.
Biit einem einzigen vorgefetjten SBorte, burch bie blofje
2luffchrift hätten bie päpftc ihren bogmatif^en Jtunb=
gebungen nach biefer SSheorie bie hWte Prärogative ber
¿rrthumSlofigfeit verleihen fönnen. Sic haben eS nicht
gethan, haben perfonen nnb ©emeinben in bie ©cfahr
verfemt, burch Einnahme ihrer, ohne bie Bürgfchaft gött=
lieber Gewißheit gegebenen Gntfcheibungen in ^rrthümer
¿u verfallen.
3weitens. (5s ift unwahr, baß „gemäjf ber aH=
gemeinen nnb conftantcn Srabition ber Kirche bie bogmati=
fehen Urteile ber päpftc irrcformabcl finb." ®aS @egen=
theil liegt vor aller Singen, ©ic Jtirclje hat bie bogmatifchen
Schreiben ber päpftc ftets erft geprüft, nnb ihnen in {yolge
�(5)
bie Unfefjlbarfeitöabreffe.
91
tiefer Prüfung cntweber ¿ugeftimmt, wie baS Goncil von
Gtjalcebon mit bcm Schreiben £eo’S getljan, ober fie als
irrig verworfen, wie baS fünfte Goncil (553) mit bem
Gonftitutum beS 33igiliuö, baS fctfgte Goncil (6S1) mit
bem Schreiben beS ^onoriitS getljan Ijat.
Srittens. ©3 ift nidjt richtig, bafj auf bem ¿weiten
Goncil von Sijon (1274) burcf) bie ^uftimmung ber ©riedjen
fowofyl als ber Lateiner ein ©laubcnSbefenntniß angenom=
men worben fei, in wcldjem erflärt wirb: baß „Streitig;
feiten über ben ©tauben burcf) baS Urtljeil beS ^ßaipfteö
entfliehen werben müßten." SESeber bie ©riedjen nodj bie
Lateiner, baS Reifst, bie ¿u Sijon verfammcltcn abenbfänbi;
fefjen 33ifd)öfe, eigneten fid) biefeS ©laubenSbefenntnifj an,
fonbern ber verdorbene ^ßapft GlemenS IV. fjatte es bem
Äaifer 2)lid)acl ipaläologuS als ißebingung feiner 3u(affung
¿ur Jtirdjengemcinfdjaft gefdjidt. SDUdjael, im unfidjeren
SSeftis ber erft für^lid) wieber eroberten jpaniptftabt, fdjwer
betrogt von bem lateinifdjen ^gifer Salbuin unb bem Äönig
«Karl von Sicilien, beburfte bringenb beS fßa^fteS, ber allein
feinen «fpauptfeinb ¿ur 9iuf;e nötigen fonntc, unb verftanb
fid^ baljer ¿u ben iBebingungen firdjfidjcr Unterwerfung,
welche bie Sßäpfte iljm Vorfdwieben, wiewofjl unter bem
beharrlichen Sßiberfprudje ber gried)ifd;cit Eßifdjöfe unb ber
Nation. Gr rüefte alfo bie il;m auferlegte formet in baS
Schreiben ein, welches auf bcm Goncil vorgefefen unb von
feinem ©efanbten bem Sogotljeten beftätigt würbe. Gr
felber erffarte ¿u «fpaufe, in «Konftantinopel, bie brei 3U=
geftanbniffe, bie er bcm ißapft gemadjt habe, für itluforifdj.
(Pachymeres de Michaele Palaeol. 5, 22.) Sie Ver=
�92
©öHtnger,
(6)
fammelten 53ifchöfe aber haben fich gar nicht in ber Sage
befunben, über tiefe formet eine Meinung abgugeben.
Viertens. ©a§ ©ccret ber glorentinifchen Stynobe
wirb tyier verftümmelt angeführt; gcrabe ber ^paitptfats, beffen
ftormulirung in $olge tanger iBerljanblungen ¿wifc^cn ben
©riechen unb ben Italienern gu Staube tarn, unb auf ben
baS größte ©cwicht gelegt würbe, weil baS SSorauägehenbe
nur gemäfj ber barin enthaltenen tBefdgänfung verftanben
werben follte, ift weggelaffen, ber Satj nämlich: juxta
eum modum, quo et in gestis et in sacria canonibus
oecumenicorum conciliorum continetur. ©er £ßa£ft unb
bie ©arbinäle verlangten nämlich beharrlich, baff als nähere
iöeftimmung, wie ber Primat beö ißapfteS gu verfielen fei,
beigefefct werbe: juxta dicta Sanctorum. ©aS wiefen bie
©riechen mit gleicher ¿Beharrlichkeit gurüct. Sie wußten
wohl, baff unter biefen „$eugniffen ber ^eiligen" fich eine
beträchtliche SIngahl fel)r weitgehenber erbichteter ober ge=
fälfchtcr Stellen befinbe. <£»atte hoch ber latcinifche ©rg=
bifci;of Slnbreaö, einer ber Otebncr, fich f<hon *n ber 7.
Sifcung auf bie berüchtigten (üjrilluö ^cugniffe berufen,
bie, feitbem ©homaö von Slquin unb ißapft Urban IV.
guerft baburch htatergangen worben waren, im ©ccibent
eine gewaltige unb nachhaltige SBirtung hervorgebracht hat=
ten, feist aber von ben ©riechen gurüefgewiefen würben, ©er
Äaifer bemerkte noch: wenn einer ber Sßäter in einem
¿Briefe an ben ißapft fich l,n ©omplimenten=Sti)l geäußert
habe, fo bürfe man barauo nicht gleich ¿Rechte unb ißrivi=
legien ableiten wollen, ©ie Lateiner gaben enblich nach,
bie dicta Sanctorum verfchwanben au3 bem ©ntwurf, unb
�7)
bie Unfe^lbarfeitöabreffe.
93
rafür würben alé DJia^ftab unb ©dorante beé ípctpfttnfyen
primaté bie 2)erl;anbíungcn ber ofumeitifchen Goncilien
anb bie {»eiligen Ganoneé gefegt. ©amit war jeber ©ebanle
an ¡papftlidje Unfehlbarkeit auégefchloffen, ba in ben alten
(Toncilien unb in ben, beiben Äircfyen gemeinjc^aftlidjen,
vor=ifiborifchen (Sanoned fid^ nicht nur nichts finbet, waé
auf ein berartigeé SSorredjt fyinwiefe, fonbern bie ganje alte
(SJefefjgebnng ber Äircfye, fowie baS Verfahren unb bie ®e=
idjidjtc ber fieben ötumenifdjen Goncilicn (biefe waren ge=
meint) gan¿ cvibent einen 3uftanb vorauéfeijt, in weldjem
bie hoffte Autorität ber fiebre nur ber gefammten Kirche,
nicfjt aber einem einzelnen ber fünf Patriarchen (baS war
oer Papft in ben Äugen ber ©rieten) jufteljt. Ueberbiefj
oatte @r¿bifcí;of Sßeffarion im tarnen fämmtlidjer ©riechen
crft turj vorder erklärt: bafc ber Papft geringer alé baé
'Soncil (alfo aud) nicht unfehlbar) fei. (Sess. IX, Concil.
Labbei XIII, 150.) @3 ift alfo eine SSerftümmelung,
welche einer 23erfälfd)uug gleidj kommt, wenn man aué bem
©ecret ber Florentiner Spnobe gerabe beit £>auptfa£, auf
weldjen bie, für welche baS ©ecret gemacht würbe, ben
wchfteu Söcrtl) legten, wegftreidjt ©er Sah war in ben
Äugen ber ©riechen fo unentbehrlich, baft fie unverrichteter
©inge abreifen ju wollen erklärten, wenn man iljn nid)t
einrüde. Äudj barauf beftanben fie, unb festen eö burch,
oaf) alle ntcd)te unb Privilegien ber übrigen Patriarchen
im ©ccret Vorbehalten würben; bafs aber baé Dtedjt felbft=
ftänbig an ber ^eftftellung ber gcmeinfdjaftlidjcn lirdjlicpen
¿ehre theil¿unehmen, unb nicht etwa blofj ben Änfprüdjen
eines unfehlbaren ÜRcifteré fidj unterwerfen ¿u müffen,
�94
©ödinger,
(8)
ben Patriarchen guftefye, Ratten bic Spd^pfte früher fetber
erflärt.
(S3 liegt freilich noch ein anberer ®runb ¿u ber von
beut (Joncipientcn ber Slbreffe begangenen SBerftümmelung
be3 {ytorentinifeijen Secreta vor; follie er nämlich ben la=
teinifc^en Sext in feiner urfprünglicfyen, bem (55riecf)ifdjen
entfprecljenbcn Raffung geben, ivie fie §(aviu§ 23lonbu3,
«Secretar be£ ^?apfteö (Sagen IV. unb bie älteren Geologen
haben: quemadmodum et in actis Conciliorum et in
sacris canonibus continetur? Ober füllte er bie (¿uerft
von Abraham 23arti)oloinäw3 angebrachte) ^älfcljung, wo
)
*
ftatt be£ et gefegt ift: etiam, fidj aneignen? ©urei; biefeö
etiam wirb ber Sinn beö ©ccretö völlig geänbert, uitb bie
5lbfid;t bc3 BufaijeS vernichtet; eö ift aber, obgleich eö eine
hanbgrcifliche fyälfchung ift, in bie (Soncilicn = Sammlungen
nnb bogmatifdjen Sehrbücher übergegangen, unb e$ wäre
hohe $eit, biefen Stein bc3 SlnftoffeS für bie Orientalen
wegjuräumen unb ben echten Sext, nämlich ben bem grie=
*) Stuf bie Slutorität beb päpftiidjen «Sefietärb ^-laüio 23ionbo
bin, welcher ben griedfifchen ©ert richtig überfefjt Ijat, nahm ich an,
bafj bie unrichtige unb ben Sinn beb ©riedjifdjen unüerfennbar alte=
rirenbe «ßerfion beb quemadmodum etiam eine (patere «öeränberung
fei. (jdj habe mich aber feitbem fowohl auö Jriebniann’ß ©arlegung
in ber Sllig. Leitung, alö auö beni Mbbrutf beö ©riginab©ofumentö
in bem Archivio Storico Italiano 1857, II. p. 219 iiberjeugt, baff
biefe «Sorte aderbingb gleich int erften lateinifdjeii ©erte fdjon (tauben,
(o bafj vom erften Slnfang an griedjifdjer unb lateinifdjer ©ept Don
einanber abwidjen. ©afj bie ©riedjen ben ©ert, wie er im Vateinifdjen
lautet, nidjt angenommen tjaben würben, wenn fie iljn gefannt unb
oerftanben hatten, beweifen bie DorauSgegangenen Skrhanblungen
(29. Mpril).
�(9)
bie UnfeljIbarfeitSabrefje.
95
djifcben SSortlaut entfpredjenben, fyerjuftellen. Sann aber
wäre freilid) baö Secret für bie 3we(^c ^er Sfnfallibiliften
nic^t meljr brauchbar, wie ber G-rjbifdjof von iparis, Se
SRarca, fdjon vor 200 ^aljrcn nadjgewiefcn ljat. (Concord.
Sacerd. et imperii 3, 8.) Gr bemerft richtig: Verba
41 Graeca in sincero sensu accepta modum exercitio
>5 potestatis pontificiae imponunt ei similem quem ecclesia
Gallicana tuetur. At e contextus latini depravata
lectione eruitur plenum esse Papae potestatem, idque
probari actis Conciliorum et canonibus.
I
Sie Slbreffe ertlärt fit mit befonberer ^nbignation
(acerbissimi catholicae doctrinae impugnatores —
blaterare non erubescunt) gegen bie, weiche bie flöten=
tinifdje Si)nobe nidjt für öfumenifd) galten. Sie Sl)atfad;en
mögen fpredjen. Sie Sijnobe würbe betanntlid) berufen,
um ba£ Goncil jn 23afc( ¿u @runbe 511 ridjten, als biefeS
wi mehrere bcr römifdjen Gurie läftige [Reformen ju befdjliefjen
I begonnen ljatte. 2lm 9. 5lpri( 1438 würbe fie 311 gerrara
eröffnet, unb nun muffte fcd;S Wnatc lang gewartet wer=
ben, oljne bafj irgenbetwaS gefefjab, fo gering war bie 3af)l
I ber Ijerbeigcfommcncn 23ifdjöfe. Sius bem ganzen nörblidjen,
bamald nod; völlig fatlfolifdjen Guropa, aus Scutfdjlanb,
ben ffanbinavifdjen Säubern, ißolen, Söljmen, bem bama=
ligen ^rantreidj, Gaftilien, Portugal u. f. w. tarn' üRie=
manb; man tann fagen: neun 3el)iitl)cile bcr bamaligen
fatl)olifd;en Sßclt beteiligten fidj grunbfä^lid; nid;t an bcr
<5t)itobe, Weil fie bicfelbc ber iöafclcr 23er[ammlung gegeiv
über für illegitim Igelten, unb Dobermann wuftte, bafs für
■ bie bringenbfte 3lngclegen()eit, bie [Reform ber JHrd)e, bort
�96
SJöüinger,
(10)
nichts gefd)el)cn werbe. So brachte enblicp Gugen mit
äRüpe eine Schaar italienifcper iBifcijöfe, gegen 50, ju=
fammen, wo^u bann ltocp einige vom 5?er$og von 53urgunb
gefepitfte IBifcpöfe, einige Provenzalen unb ein paar Spanier
famen — in allem waren eS 62 23ifcpöfe, welcpe unters
¿eigneten. Sie grieepifepen Prälaten mit iprern Jtaifer
waren in ber äufcerften ©efapr beS Untergangs burep bie
SSerpeifjung von ©elb, Scpiffen unb Solbaten bapin ge=
¿ogen worben; ber Papft patte jubem verfproepen, bie
Jtoften ipreö 3lufentpaltS in $errara unb Florenz unb
iprer Rücfreife $u tragen. 2llS fie fiel) unnaepgiebig geigten,
entzog er ipnen bie Subfibien, fo bafj fie in bittere Rotp
gerietpen, unb enbiiep, gezwungen burep ben «ftaifer unb
burep junger gebrängt, Singe unterjeiepneten, bie fie fpäter
faft alle wiberriefen. SaS Urtpeil eines grieepifepen $eit=
genoffen, beS SlmprutiuS, welcpeS ber römifepe ©eleprte
2IHatiuS (de perp. censens. 3, 1, 4) anfüprt, ift bamalS
baS perrfepenbe Urtpeil unter ben ©rieepen gewefen: „Söirb
wopl", fagte er, „^emanb im (Srnft biefe Spnobe für eine
otumenifepe auSgebcn, welcpe ©laubenSartitel mit ©elb
ertaufte, welcpe fimoniftifcp ipre SSefcplüffe nur burep 2luS=
fiept auf finanzielle unb militarifepe ^ülfeleiftung burcp=
Zufefjen vermoepte?" ^n fyraulreicp ift vor ber Revolution
bie Tylorenttnifcfie Spnobe als uneept verworfen worben;
baS pat ber Garbinal ©uife, opne irgenbeinen Söiberfprucp
ju erfapren, auf bem Xribentinifcpen Qoncil ertlart. Ser
portugiefifepe Speologe ißapva be 2lnbraba fagt barüber:
Florentinam (Synodum) sola Gallia — pro oecumenica
nunquam habuit, quippe quam neque adire dum agita-
�11)
bie UnfefyfôarfeitSabreffe.
97
etur, neque admittere jam perfectam atque absoluam voluerit. (Defens. fid. Trident, pag. 431, ed.
olon. 1580.)
©er übrige ©ert ber dlbreffe befcbâftigt fich mit ber
Ausführung, bajg bie dlufftettung beS neuen ®laitbcnS=
rtifeïS gcrabe jcfjt geitgemâfj, ja bringcub notfymenbig fei,
eil einige iÇerfoncn, bie fid) für jtatholifcn auSgcben,
■’mgft biefe Meinung von ber pâpftlichen Untrüglichfeit
~ eftritten fyaben. 20aS bie dtbreffe Îjicr thcilS fagt, theils
IS (in iRom) befannt vorauôfetjt, ift mcfcntlidh ^olgcnbeê.
in unb für fich, meint fie, mare es nicht gerabc abfoïut
otijmenbig gemcfcn, bie
ber ©laubenSlehren burdj
n neues ©ogma gu vermehren, aber bie Sage fjabe fich
o geftaltct, baf? bicS jctjt unausmeichtich fei. (Seit mehreren
fahren Ijat nâmïidj ber ^cfuitcn-Drben, unterftüfct von
nem dlnhang ©leidjgefinnter, eine digitation gu ©unften
?S gu macfycnben ©ogmaS gugleidh in Station, ^ranfreich,
: deutfdjtanb unb ©nglanb begonnen, ©inc eigene religiôfe
' ^efeÏÏfctjaft, gu bem 3mccfc für bie ©rlangung beS neuen
ä Dogmas gu beten unb gu mirfcn, ift von beu Sefuiten
~ egrünbet unb öffentlich angcfünbigt morbcn; iijr ^aupt=
: rgan, bie in Hlorn crfcf;einenbc ©iviltà, Ijat eS gum voraus
'S bie Hauptaufgabe beS ©onciïs bcgcicfjnet, ber parrenbcn
_ Seit bas ©cfdienf beS. feptcnben ©taubenSartifelS entgegen
t a bringen ; iïjre „Saazer «Stimmen" unb Wiener ^3ubti=
r. itionen Ijaben baffelbe ©hema breit unb in unermüblid^er
*. Siebert»olung erörtert.
Sei biefer digitation marc es nun bie Pflicht aller
' InberSbenfenbcn gcmefen, in ehrfurchtsvollem «Schmeigen
t
�98
©ödinger, bie UnfeljIbarfeitSabreffe.
(12)
¿u bcrfyarren, bie ^efuitcn unb ityrcn Slnfjang rutyig ge=
waljrcn ¿u laffen, bie von irrten in ¿atylreidjen Schriften
toorgebradjtcn Argumente feiner Prüfung
unterbieten.
Seiber ift bicö nic^t gefetzten; einige Ticnf^cn t^ben bie
unerhörte ^rccljteit gehabt, ba§ tc^9c ©feigen ¿u brechen
unb eine abtx>eidpenbe Meinung funb 311 geben, tiefes
Slergernifj fann nur burdj eine SSermctrung beS @Iaubcn§=
bcfenntniffeS, eine JBeranberung ber 5tated)i§men unb aller
^etigionäbü^er gefüllt werben.
�¿)ie neue ^e^äfisorbnuitg be$ goncifc unb
ißre tfjeofoaifdje gdebeutung.
$)ie neue ® efchaftSorbnung, voeXc^e bem Zoncil burcl)
i bie fünf Zarbinal^ßegatcn auferlegt worben, 'ift völlig ver| fliehen von allem, wa§ fonft auf Zoncilien gebräuchlich
<war, unb guglcidj maf^gebenb unb entfdScibcnb für bcn
I ferneren Verlauf biefer SSerfammlung unb für bie gal)t=
I reichen betrete, welche burdj fie gu (Staube gebracht werben
| foUen. <Sie verbient baljer bie forgfältigfte Sßeadjtung. Bur
gefdjici)tlid)cn ©rientirung mag nur in ber ^ürje erwähnt
* werben, bafj für bie allgemeinen Zoitcilien ber alten Äirdje
i; im erften 3afjrtauienb eine beftimmtc ©efdjaftSorbnung
it nidjt eyiftirte. Br für römifc^e unb fpanifdje $rovingial=
i Zoncilien gab e§ ein liturgifcljeS Zeremoniell. SlllcS mürbe
)
*
| in voller 53erfammlung vorgetragen; jeber 23ifdjof tonnte
j Einträge fteUen, welche er wollte, unb bie ißrafibenten, bie
tj weltlichen fowoljl, welche bie ^taifcr faubten, al§ bie geift=
I liehen, forgten für Orbnung unb leiteten bie Serhanblungen
ii in einfacher Söeife. ©ie großen Zoncilien gu Äonftang
i unb 23afcl machten fich eine eigene £>rbnung, ba bie ^heil=
3 ung unb Slbftimmung nach Nationen eingeführt würbe.
*) 2Iufßenonunen von (pfeubotfibor, unb abgebrutft bet Mansi
Concil. Coll. I, 10.
�100
©öUinger, bie neue ©efdjäftSorbnung.
(14)
3n Orient würbe biefe Einrichtung wieber verlaffen, aber
bie ßegaten, Welche präfibirten, vereinbarten bie <55efc^äft^=
orbnung mit ben æifcbôfen, ber Earbinal be ÏÏRonte tief?
barüber abftimmcn unb alte genehmigten fie. 3Son feiner
)
*
Seite erfolgte ein SSBibcrfpruc^. So ift benn bie heutige
romifche Stynobe bie erfte in ber Ecfchidüe ber J^irdße, in
Welcher ben verfammelten Tätern ohne febe Spcilnahme von
ihrer Seite bie procebur borgefchriebeit worben ift. ©aS
erfte Regolamento erwies fiel; fo hemmenb unb urtpraftifh,
bajg wieberhoite Oefndße um Slbänberung unb Eeftattung
freierer ^Bewegung von vertriebenen $raftionen bcS EpiSfo=
pats an ben Sßa^ft gerichtet würben. ©icjj war vergeblich;
aber nach britthalb Monaten fanben bie fünf Segaten cnb=
lieh felber, bafj, wenn bas Eoncil nicht ins Stocfen geraden
foHe, eine îlenberung unb Ergänzung bringenb nothwenbig
fei. 5luf bie Petitionen ber SBifdjöfe ift inbefj in ber neuen
Einrichtung feine Dlücfficht babei genommen worben.
3wei $üge treten barin vor allem hcrvor. Einmal
ift alle ÜRadht unb aller Einfluß auf ben (Sang beS EoncilS
in bie 5pänbe ber prafibirenben ßegaten unb ber ©cputa=
tionen gelegt, fo bafj baS Eoncil felbft ihnen gegenüber
machtlos unb willenlos erfefjeint. Sobann follen bie ge=
Wicfjtigften fragen beS (Staubens unb ber Sehre burch ein=
fadhe Mehrheit ber ^opfjahl, burd) îlufftehen unb Si^en«
bleiben, entfliehen werben.
$Ran hat befanntlich in ben ¿Wei fahren, welche ber
/
*) Le Plat, Monumenta, III. 418: Dicant Patres, utrum
hic modus procedendi eis placeat. SQorauf abge[ìimmt tuurbe.
�(15)
101
bii neue @ef(^aftöorbnung.
Eröffnung beS EoncilS vorpergegangen, eine HJiengc von
3lbpanblungen mit baju gehörigen Decreten nnb EaitoneS
ausarbeiten laffen, biefe follen nun von bem Eoncil ange=
nommen unb bann vom ^ßapft „approbante Concitio“
als ®efet3c, als Sepr= unb (SlaubenSnormen für bie ganje
tatpolifepe Epriftenpcit vertünbigt werben. Es finb im ganzen
einnubfünfjig foldper Scpemate, von welcpen bis jefct erft
fünf biScutirt finb.
Das ©erfapren, wclcpeS bet ber iBeratpung unb 3lb=
ftimmung ftattfinben foli, ift nun folgenbeS:
1. ©aS (Scpema wirb mehrere (jepn) ©age vor ber
iBeratpung ben Tätern beS (SoncilS auSgettjeilt, welche bann
fcpriftlicpc Erinnerungen, $IuSftettungen, ©erbefferungSantrage
machen tonnen.
2. $n biefem §aU rnüffen fie fogleicfj eine neue formet
ober Raffung beS betreffenben SIrtitelS ftatt beS von ipnen
beanftanbeten in 23orfcf)(ag bringen.
3. Solcpe Einträge werben burep ben Secretär ber
einfeplägigen Deputation (eS finb bereu vier) übergeben,
welche bann nacp iprem Ermeffen bavon (Sebraucp maept,
inbem fie bas Scperna, wenn fie es für gwetfmä^ig palt,
reformirt, unb bann in einem, aber nur fummarifcp ge=
paltenen, Sericptc bem Eoncil von ben gefteUten Anträgen
eine D^otij gibt.
4. Die ißräfibenten tonnen jebeS Scpema entweber
blos im @an$en ober auep in Slbfbpnitte getpeilt ber 53e=
ratpung unterftellen.
5. 23ei ber iBeratpung tonnen bie Sßräfibenten jeben
SDBllinger, jtoei Sutac^ten.
2
Stimmen auöb.fati). jtirdje üb. b.Äirdjenfr. b.@egenm.
8
�102
Töttingev,
(16)
9tebner unterbrechen, wenn eS ihnen fheint, bap er nicht
bei bet (Sache bleibe.
G. SicSifchöfeher Deputation tonnen in jebem Moment
baS SSort ergreifen, um beit Sifhßfcn, welche ben 2öort=
taut beS (Schema beanftanben, ju erwiberit.
7. „ßcpn Säter reichen hin, um ben Schluß ber Dis
*
cuffion ju beantragen, worüber bann mit einfacher TOeljr«
heit burch Slnfftehcn ober Sitzenbleiben cntfchicben wirb.
8. Sei ber Slbftimmung über bic einzelnen Shcite beS
(Schema wirb juerft über bic vorgcfchlagcnen Seränbcrungen,
bann über ben von ber Deputation vorgelcgteu Sert burch
‘ülufftehen ober Sitzenbleiben abgeftimmt, fo bajj bie einfache
■IRehrheit entfeheibet.
9. hierauf wirb über baS ganje (Schema mit 9lamenS=
aufruf abgeftimmt, wobei jeber ber Sätcr mit placet ober
non placet antwortet. Cb auch I^cr
blojjc Mehrheit
ber Äopßahl entfeheiben folie, ift nicht angegeben. (FS
fcpcint aber nach ber ülualogic bejaht werben ¿u muffen,
benn baS ganje (Schema ift ja hoch nur wieber ein Stücf ober
ein Chcil von einem gröpern ©anjen, unb eS liegt burchauS
fein ©runb vor, mit bem gröpern Stücf anberS ¿u verfahren
als mit bem fleinern. SBürbe baS Sßrincip ber fdßtedßthinigen Tíeprpcit h^r verlaffen, fo würben Wopl gerabe
bie wichtigem, tiefer einfhncibenben, Schemate verloren gehen.
2ftan ficht nun wohl, bafj einige parlamentarifche
formen in biefe ©efchäftborbnung Iwibergenommen finb.
Slber wenn in politifhen Serfammlungcn gewiffe ben pi<w
gegebenen ähnliche (Einrichtungen beftepen, fo folien fie ge=
wohnlich ¿um Schutze ber ÜRinberheit gegen ÜJíajorifirung
�(17)
103
bie neue @e[d)aftgorbnung.
bienen, Wäljrcnb fie I)ier umgeteljrt gu bem 3wccfe gegeben
ju fein fdjeinen, bic 9)iel;rt)tit nodj mächtiger unb nnwiber=
Widj ju machen, wie fidj bie3 befonberö in bem ifyr ein=
geräumten 3ied)te ¿eigt, bie ©iScuffion, fobalb es iljr gefällt,
abjufcfntcibcn unb alfo ber ^cinber^eit bad SSort §u ent=
Sieben; bied Wirb um fo peinlicher wirten, als befanntli^
and) bie DJtbglicbteit, fiel) in gebrutften ©utadrten ober 3luf=
tlärungen ben übrigen Wiitgliebcrn bed (Foncild mitjutljeilen,
Weber für einzelne, nodj für ganje ©ruppen von Vifdjöfen
gegeben ift.
3n Politiken Vcrfammlungen tonnen Vcfdjlüffe gefaxt,
felbft ©efe^e gegeben werben burep einfache Wfjrljeit, ba
feine ber folgeubcn Parlamente ober Kammern burdj bie
Vefcblüffc unb ©efe^e ber frühem gebunben ift. $ebe tarnt
gu jeber .Seit eine Satzung ihrer Vorgängerinnen äitbern
ober abrogiren. 5lber bie bogmatifdjen Vefdjlüffe eines
©oncilS follen, wenn cS wirflid) ein bfumcnifcheS ift, für
alle $eiten unantaftbar unb unwiberruflidj gelten.
VorauSfichtlid) wirb bei ben nun folgeubcn 2lbftimmungen
bic Wjrljcit bicfcS Sonetts nidjt etwa eine flüffige, aufunb abwogenbe fein, fie wirb nidjt wcdjfcln mit ben ^u
faffenben Vcfdtfüffen, fonbern fie wirb fidj, mit geringen
Schwankungen ber 3al?i, in ihrer ¿ufammenfe^ung Wcfcnt=
lid) glcid; bleiben, ©enn cd ift bekannt, bay bic ©Teilung
ber Vifdjöfe in eine Wjrhcit unb eine Vänberheit fidj .
gleich von Anfang an fdjon bei ber 2öal;t ber ©cputationen,
unb el;c nod) eine einzige Slbftimmung ftattgefunben, fdjarf
unb entfliehen l)erauSgeftcllt l;at. So mufjte eS kommen,
Weil in ber ftrage von ber päpstlichen Unfehlbarkeit fid)
2*
�104
Döllinger,
(18)
atsbatb ein burcpgrcifenber unb principictler ©egenfa^ ergab, I
unb man fofort erfannte, baff biefe §rage bie £auptan=
gelegenpeit ber Serfammlung bilbe, nnb alle anbcrn von
ipr beijerrfdjt würben. @g ftept ¿u erwarten, baff bie
Ülnpänger ber Unfeplbarfeitgtpeorie bie Sorlagcn, fowic fie
aub ben Rauben ber Deputationen pervorgepeu, auep un=
bebenfiief) votiren werben; benn für fie ift gang folge
*
rieptig 9llleg maffgebenb, wag vom romifcpcit Stuple
aubgept, unb bafür ift aubreiepenb geforgt, baff in ben
Deputationen, welchen jept über alte auf bie Serbe ffcrung
ber Scpcmate begügtietjen Anträge bie umfaffcnbfte unb in
*
appcllable (Gewalt übertragen ift, nur eine Slnficpt fiep
geltenb maepen fann. (Sin Slict auf bab ^erfonal ber
wieptigften Deputation, de fide, genügt. Sor allein finbet
fiep ba ber Utömcr (iarboni, ber fepon in ber Sorbcrcit
*
(
*Sommiffion
ungb
bag Dogma ber pdpftlicpcn Unfeplbartcit
in einer eigenen Dent'fcprift empfoplen unb in feiner (Som
*
miffion pat anncpmen taffen. Sieben ipm ber ^cfuit Steinb,
fobann bie berebten Slawen Dccpampb von SJccepeln, Spal
*
biitg von Saltimore, ißie von Ißoiticrg, Scbocpowbfi, «fpaffun
ber Slrmcnier, be ipreuv bon Sitten; von Dcutfcpcn SJiar
*
tin, Seneftrcp, ©affer von Sri,reu, ¿wei Spanier, brei
Sübanierifauer, brei Italiener, ein ^rlänbcr, enblicp Simor
Qicgnicr unb Scparpman.
Seit 1800 ^apreu pat eg in ber jtirepe alb ©runb
*
gegolten, baff Decrete über beit ©tauben unb bie ßepre
nur mit einer, wenigfteng moralifepen, Stimmencinpcllig
*
feit votirt werben foUten. Diefcr ©runbfap ftept mit bem
ganzen Spftem ber tatpolifepeu Svircpc im engften 3u=
�(19)
bie neue ©cfdjäftöorbnung.
105
fammeuhaitg. ES ift fein IBeifpicl eines Oognta Mannt,
welches bürd; eine einfache Stimmenmehrheit unter bem
SBiberfpruche einer Wuberheit befchloffen unb barauf hin
cingcführt worben wäre.
Um bieS flar 311 machen, mufi ich mir Dtaurn für
eine furje theologifche, aber hoffentlich allgemein i?erftänb=
liehe, Erörterung erbitten.
Sie Kirche Ij^t ein ihr 13011 Slufang an übergebenes
Oepofitum geoffenbartcr Sehre 311 bewahren unb ju ver=
walten. * Sie empfängt feine neuen Offenbarungen, unb
)
fie macht feine neuen ElaubenSartifel. Unb wie mit ber
Kirche felbft, fo ift cS auch mit bem allgemeinen Eoncil.*
)
**
*') Sie ©ijeologie bat fidj in ber Gnttvicfluiig tiefer fragen an=
gefcbloffen an bie allgemein als claffifdj unb völlig correct angenom
mene Sdjrift beö SSincentiuö von Serins, baS Gommonitorium, baS
fdjon um baö 3aljr 434 erfdjien. Stuf biefe bejiefye id) mid) baber
in bem folgenben.
**) So fagt ber Sifdjof gif t) er von Dtodjefter, ber für ben ißrimat
bes? Zapfte« fein geben opferte, in feiner Streitfdjrift gegen i'utber
(Opera, ed. Wirceburg. 1597, p. 592) mit Berufung auf ben gleiten
Slubfprud) be¡3 ©uns ScotuS: In eorum (beS Goncils mit bem Zapfte)
arbitrio non est situm, ut quiequam tale vel non tale faciant, sed
spiritu potius veritatis edocti, id quod revera prídem de substantia
fidei fuerat jam declarant, esse de substantia fidei. Hub ber 9Jii=
norit ©a ven port, Svstema fidei, p. 140: secundum receptam,
tam veterum, quam modernorum doctorum sententiam ecclesia non
potest agere ultra revelationes antiquas, nihil potest hodie decla
ran de fide, quod non habet talem identitatem cum prius revelatis.------------ Unde semper docet Scotus: Quod illae con
clusiones solum possunt infallibiliter declarari et determinan per
ecclesiam, quae sunt necessario inclusae in articulis cre
dit is. Si igitur per accidens conjunguntur, vel si solum proba-
�106
S? cUinger,
(20)
Das ©oncil ift bie IRepräfcntatioii, bie 3ufammciifaffung
bcr gangen Äircbe; bic Sifcpöfc auf bcmfclbcn finb bie
©efanbten unb ©efcpäftSträger aller Äircpcn bcr fat^oii=
fepen SSelt; fic paben im tarnen bcr ©efammtpeit 311
erklären, waS biefe ©efammtpeit bcr ©laubigen über eine
rcligiöfe §ragc bentt unb glaubt, was fic als Ucbcrlicferung
empfangen pat. Die finb alfo als tßrocuratoren angufepen,
Welcpe bic ipnen gegebene ©ollmacpt burepanS niept überfepreiten bürfen.
)
*
Späten fie cS, fo würbe bic Jtircfjc,
bereu Übertreter fie finb, bic von ipnen aufgcftellte Sepre
unb Definition niefjt bestätigen, viclinepr als etwas iprem
gläubigen Dewu^tfein $rembcS jurüefweifeu.
Die ÜSifepöfe auf bem (Soncil finb alfo vor allem
3engen, fie fagen aus unb conftatiren, was fie unb ipre
©emeinben als ©laubcnSlepre empfangen unb bisper be=
' fannt paben; fie finb aber auep Dlicptcr, nur bafj ipre
biliter sequuntur ex articulis, fidem non attingent per quascumque
(leterminationes, quia Concilia non possunt identificare, quae sunt
ex objecto diversa, nec necessario inferre ea, quae solum appa
renter, seu probabiliter sunt inclusa in articulis creditis.
•) Concilium non est ipsamet ecclesia, sed ipsam tantum
repraesentat ; — — id est episcopi illi qui concilio adsunt, legati
mittuntur ab omnibus omnium gentium catholicarum ecclesiis, qui,
ex nomine totius universitatis, déclarent, quid ipsa universitas
sentiat et quid traditum acceperit. Itaque ejusmodi legati omnium
ecclesiarum sunt veluti procuratore«, quibus nefas esset procura
tionem sibi crcditam tantillum excedere. Unde constat, quod si
quingenti episcopi, ut videre est in exemplis Ariminensis, et Constantinopolitanae contra imagines coactae synodi, suam de fide
communi declaranda procurationem tantillum excederent, universa
ecclesia, cujus sunt tantummodo procuratores et simplex reprae-
�(21)
bie neue (ScfdjäftSorbnung.
107
richterliche ©cwalt über ben ©tauben nicht über ben 23e=
reich ihrcö ^cugenthumS ijinau^efyeit barf, vielmehr burefj
biefeS forttvährenb bebingt unb umfehrieben ift 91(3 (Ritter
haben fie baS ©efefc (bie ©laubcnSlchre) nicht erftgu machen,
fonbern nur gn interpretiren unb anjuwcitbeii. Sie flehen
unter bem öffentlichen (Rechte ber Äirche, an irelchcrrt fie
nichts ju äitbcrn vermögen. Sie üben ihr (Richtcramt,
crftenS: inbem fie bie von ihnen abgetegten $cugniffe
unter einanber prüfen unb vergleichen unb bereu Tragweite
erwägen; jweitenS, inbem fie nach gewiffenhafter Prüfung:
ob an einer Sehre bie brei unentbehrlichen (öebingungen ber
Univcrfalität ber (perpetuität unb beS ©onfenfuS (ubique,
semper, ab ómnibus) ¿utreffen; ob alfo bie Sehre als
bie allgemeine Sehre ber ganzen Äirche, als wirtlicher (öe=
ftanbthcil beS göttlichen ©epofitumS, allen gegeigt unb ihr
(Betenntnifj jebein (griffen aufcrlegt Werben fönne.* $hre
)
sentatio, definitionem factam ab illis ratam non haberet, imo re
pudiarci. Oeuvres de Fénélon, Versailles 1820, II, 361.
*) ©o ber ^efuit 23 a g o t in feiner Institutio Theologica de
vera religione. Paris 1645, p. 395: Universitas sine duabus aliis,
nimirum antiquitate et consensione stare non potest. Quod autem
triplici illa probatione confirmatur, est haud dubie ecclesiasticum
et catholicum. Quod si universitatis nota deficit et nova aliqua
quaestio exoritur, novaque contagio ecclesiam commaculare incipit,
tunc hac universitate praesentium ecclesiarum deficiente recurrendem est ad antiquitatem. Notai enim Vincent, posse aliquam
haereseos contagionem occupare multas ecclesias sicut constat de
Ariana ; adeo ut aliquando plures ecclesiae et episcopi diversarum
nationum Ariani quam Catholici reperirentur. Et quantumvis
doc rina aliqua latissime pateat, sitamen novam esse constat, haud
dubie erronea est, nec enim est apostolica, nec per successionem
�108
©ötttnger,
(22)
Prüfung I;at fid) bemnacf; fowol)l über bie Vergangenheit als
bie Gegenwart 311 erftrecfen. <5o ift toon bcm SImte ber
Vifcßöfc auf Goncilien jebe SöiUtür, jebcS blofj fubjective
Gutbünten auSgefcljtoffen. GS würbe ba frevelhaft unb
verberblich fein, benn ba bie itirc^c feine neuen Dffenbarungen
empfangt, feine neuen Glaubenöartifcl macht, fo bann unb
barf auch ein Goncil bie Subftan^ beS Glaubens nicht
aitbern, nichts bavon Wegnchmen unb nichts hin8uFll9en‘
Gin Goncilium macht alfo bogmatifchc Decrete nur über
Dinge, welche fchon in ber Kirche, als burch Schrift unb
Drabition bezeugt, allgemein geglaubt würben, ober welche
)
*
als eoibente unb flarc Folgerungen in beit bereits geglaubten
unb gelehrten Grunbfätjen enthalten finb. SBenit aber
et traditionem ad nos usque pervenit. Deinde, ut notat idem Vincentius, antiquitas non potest jam seduci. Verum enimvero quia
et ipse error antiquus esse potest: idcirco cum consulitur vetustas,
in ea quaerenda est consensio.
*) So S^incentiuS: Hoc semper nec quidquam dliud Conciliorum decretis catholica perfecit ecclesia, nisi ut quod a majoribus sola traditione susceperat, hoc deinde posteris per scripturae
chirographum consignaret. Commonit. cap. 32. ©er ©ribentirtifdje
©Ijeologe 23 eg a, ap. Davenport p.9: Concilia generalia hoc tantum
habent, ut veritates jam alias, vel in seipsis, vel in suis principiò
a Deo, ecclesiae vel SS. Patribus revelatas vel per scripturas vel
traditionem prophetarum et apostolorum turn declarent, turn confirment et sua autoritate claras et apertas et absque ulla ambigu.tate ab omnibus Catholicis tenendas tradant. Addit: et ad hoc
dico: praesentia Spiritus sancii illustrantur, primo ut infallibiles
declarent veritates ecclesiae revelatas, et secundo, ut ad terminando
dubia in ecclesia suborta, extirpandosque errores et abusus infab
libiliter etiam ex revelatis colligant populo Christiano credenda et
usurpanda in fide et moribus.
�(23)
bie neue Oefdiäftborbnung.
109
eine Meinung Ba^unbcrte lang ftetS auf Sßiberfpritd)
gefloßen unb mit allen tl)eoiogifd)en SBaffen beftritten
Worben, alfo ftetS minbeftens unfid)er gewefen ift, fo tarnt
fie nie, and; burd; ein ©oncilium nidjt, sur ©ewif^eit,
baö Ijeifjt jur ©ignitat einer göttlich geoffenbarten £efyre
erhoben werben, ©aljer ber gewöbnlid)c 9luf ber SSäter auf
ben ©oncilien nad) ber Einnahme unb 3)erfüitbigung eines
bogmatifd)cn ©ecretS: haec fides Patrum.
Soll alfo j. 33. att bie Stelle ber früher geglaubten
unb gelehrten Srrtijumsfrciljeit ber gaitjen ftirdje bie Uit=
fehlbarfeit eines ©injigen gefeilt werben, fo ift baS feine
©ntwidlung, feine ©rplication beó vorher implicit @eglaub=
ten, feine mit logifdjer ^olgeridjtigteit fid) ergebenbe ©on=
fequenj, fonbern einfach baS gerabe ©cgcntljeii ber früheren
fiebre, bie bamit auf ben Jiopf gcftellt würbe, ©erabe wie
es im politifd)en ßebeit feine fyortbiibung ober ©ntwicflung,
fonbern einfad) ein Umfturj, eine Revolution wäre, wenn
ein bisher freies ©emeinwefen b^id) unter baS 3od)
eines abfolut I)errfd)enben Wlonard)cn gebracht würbe.
©ie Beit, in welcher ein ofumenifdjeó ©oncit über ben
©laubeit ber (griffen beräth, ift alfo fletó eine $eit ber
lebhafteren ©rweefung beS religiöfen SßewufjtfeinS, eine „ßeit
ber abjulegenben Beugniffe unb ber offenen ©rflarungen
für alle treuen Söhne ber Jtird)e, ©eiftlicfw wie Saien,
gewefen. Rian glaubte, wie bie ©efdjidjte ber Ytirc^e be=
weist, allgemein, bafj man gerabe burd; folcfje Äunbgebungen bent ©oitcil feine Rufgabe erleichtere, unb nicf)t bie
33äter baburd) ftöre ober hemme. Beugnifj ablegeu, 2Dünfd;e
�110
SöHinger,
(24)
auófpredfcn, auf bie 23cbürfniffe ber 5tir(f)c fyinwcifen, tann
unb barf jcbcr, aucf) ber £aie.
)
*
@anj bcfonbcrS wenn cS fid) um bie (Sinfüíjrung
eines neuen £)ogma íjanbelt, welkes etwa, von einer Seite
fycr gcforbcrt, bcm SSewujjtfcin ber (Staubigen fremb ift
unb ifjneit ais cinc Neuerung crfcfjciut, bann ift ber fidj
cr^cbenbe ißroteft ber ßaicn ein ebenfo gerechter als not^=
wenbiger, unb unvermciblidjcS 3eu9u^ ^cr ^Inlfäuglitfjteit
an ben ifyncu überlieferten (Stauben, uub fie erfüllen bamit
cine lßflid;t gegen bie J^ircfje2luf bcm (íoncil fclbft aber beweist bcr SBibcrfprudj
ben cinc Slnjaljl bcr ¡Sifdwfc gegen eine als Dogma ¿u
vertunbcnbe Meinung ergebt, bafj in ben von ifyncn rcpra=
fentirtcn Xíjciífirdjen biefe Meinung nidft für waljr, nicfjt
für göttlid) geoffenbart gehalten worben ift, unb aud) je|t
nidjt bafür gehalten wirb. ¡Damit ift aber fetjon cnt=
fdfieben baf$ biefer Veljre ober Meinung bie brei wefent=
licken ©rforberniffe bcr Univcrfalität, bcr ißetpetuitat unb
*) (So fagt ber Carbinol dieginalb Sßole, einer ber ißräfibeitten
beé Xribentinifcfjen Concité, in feinem 23ud>e De Concilio, 1562,
fol. 11: Patet quidem locus omnibus et singulis exponendi, si quid
vel sibi vel ecclesiae opus esse censeant, sed decernendi non om
nibus patet, verum iis tantum, quibus rectionem animarum ipse
unicus pastor et rector dedit. — ¡papft DHfotauö I. bemerft, baf?
bie Äaifer an ben Concilien tlfeiigenommen haben, roenn oom G5lau=
ben getjanbett loorben fei. Ubinam legistis, imperatores anteces
sores vestros synodalibus conventibus interfuisse? nisi forsitan in
quibus de fide tractatum est, quae universitatis est, quae omnium
communis est, quae non solum ad clericos, verum etiam ad Laicos
et ad omnes omnino pertinet Christianos. -¡Diefe Stelle fanb auch
in (Sratianö Secret Aufnahme.
�(25)
bie neue (^efcf)äftöorbnung.
111
beg (Sonfcnfng abgeben, baß fic alfo auch nicht ber ganzen
Mrebe alb göttliche ^Offenbarung aufgebrungen werben barf.
©arum fyat man eg in ber Äirdje ftctg für notl^
wenbig eraclßet baff, fobalb eine nur einigermaßen beträcht
liche Slnjahl von Sifchöfen einem von ber Mehrheit etwa
vorgcfchlagencn ober beabsichtigten ©ecret wiberfpracb, biefeg
©ecret beifeite gelegt warb, bie ©efinition unterblieb, ©ie
wahrhafte Äatholicität einer Sehre foll evibent unb un=
Zweifelhaft fein, fie ift eg aber nicht, fobalb bag ^eugniß
wenn auch einer Wnbcrzahl ben löewcig liefert, baß ganje
3l6thcilungcn ber ätirebe biefe Sehre nicht glauben unb nicht
betennen.
©arum war bei jebem (Soncil bie Hauptfrage: „Sinb
bieOlaubengbecrete von allen -Dlitgliebcrn genehmigt worben?"
Sogleich auf bem crften allgemeinen Goncil 311 Dlicaa, wo
unter 318 IBifcböfen julcßt nur ¿wei fiep ber Unterfchrift
weigerten. $u (Sbatcebon zögerte man fo lange mit ben
©ntfeheibungen, ließ fiep immer wicber auf neue (5rörter=
ungen ein, big eiiblid; alle 23cbcnfcn, welche befonberg bie
illvrifchcn unb bie paläftinenfifchen Sifcböfe gegen bag
Schreiben Seo’g anfänglich hc9tcn, gehoben waren. 9iod)
ehe Ä'aifer Jarcian bie Sßnobe entließ, brang er auf eine
(ntlärung: ob wirtlich alíe SBifcfwfc (eg waren über 600)
ber (Slaubcngbefinition guftimmten, wag beim auch alle
bcrcitwilligft bejahten, unb worauf ^oapft Seo felbft (Sott
banfte baß fein Schreiben „nach allen 3rüCifeIR unb ®c=
benten bod) cnblicß burcf) bie unwibcrlegliche 3uf^nnnun9
beg gefammten Gpiffopatg" beftätigt worben fei. So ver=
fieberten and) auf bem felgten allgemeinen Goncil bie
�112
S?óliin<jer,
(26)
iöifc^öfc auf bie Jyrage beb Äaiferb: baß bie bogmatifc^e
(Sntfd)eibuug unter Zuftimmung aller aufgcftcllt worben
fei. Sabfelbe gefchal) auf bem fiebenten im Zaljre 787.
Unb wicberum mclbcte Ä'arl ber ©roße von bem (Sondi
ju ^ranffurt 794 ben fpanifd)cn 53ifd)öfen: alleb fei gefdjel)en,quatenusSancta omnium unanimitas decornerete.
3n Srient gab ^ßapft Sßiub IV ben Legaten bic 2Bei=
fungi nicl)tb entfcljeiben ju laffen wab nid)t allen Tätern
genehm fei. (Siner ber bort bcfiitblicfycn Sinologen, ^la^ba
bc dlnbraba, berichtet: mehrmals Ijabe man ein Secret
Söocbcn, SDÌonate lang uneiitfcbicben gclaffcn, weil einige
wenige 23ifd)öfe wiberftrebten ober IBcbentcn äußerten; erft
bann, wenn enblid) nach laugen unb forgfältigen 2?eratt)=
ungen (Sinftimmigfeit ber Später erhielt worben, ljabe man
bab Secret publicirt. $ai)Va führt mehrere 23cifpiele ba=
von an.
)
*
Hub Soffnct bemerft über bic 33orfc()rift ^ius’
IV : bieß fei eine treffliche dìegei um bab Söaljre vom
Zweifelhaften 311 fd)eibcn.
idlle Sheologen machen cb jur 53cbingung ber Detu=
mcuicität eineb (Soncilb baß völlige À reib eit auf bem=
felbcit hctrfdje. Freiheit beb diebenb, Freiheit beb Stimmens,
diiemaub, fagt Sonimeli), barf jurüefgewiefen werben ber
♦) Defensio fidei Tridentinae, f. 17 : Cum quindecim fere aut
viginti dubitare se ajebant, ne vero quiequam praeter Conciliorum
vetustum morem concluderetur, horum paucorum dubitatio plurimoruni impetum retardavit, atque effecit, ut res in aliam sessionem
dilata, omnium fere calculis tandem definiretur. 9Jian vergi. bort
baö Weitere. ‘Ulan fielet, bafe ju Orient bie Uebeineugung l^evrfc^te,
es muffe alleò in ber QBeife ber alten doncilien bel;anbelt unb ent=
fdjieben — menigliene bie mefentlidie {\orm berfelben bcibetjalten werben.
�(27)
bie neue $c|d)äftöorbmin3.
113
gehört werben will. ^id;t bloß phVÍWr $wang würbe
bie 23efd)lüffe eines ßoncils fraftloS unb wertlos machen.
£)ie Freiheit, biefe LebcnSluft eines wahren (Solicits, wirt»
and; burdj bie gar mannigfaltigen formen in benen mo=
ralifSer^wang cintritt, ober bcrWnfd; fidj willig fiiedjtcn
lä£t (3. 25. burd) bie bcrfdjiebcnen Strten ber Simonie),
jerftört, unb bie Legitimität beS (Soncils baburd) aufgehoben.
£ouruelp nennt als bie auf Spnoben wirffamen unb bie
conciliarifdje Freiheit aufhebenben LeibenfSaften fynrdjt,
Stellengier, ®clbgci¿ unb äpabfudjt. *
)
2llS ber grofje Slbfall 311 Seleucia unb Bimini gleis
zeitig ftattfanb, als au fed)Shunbert 23ifchöfc baS gemcin=
fame Wenntnif) bcrläugiieteii unb Preisgaben, ba war es
„©eifteSfSwädje unb Sd)cu vor einer mühfeligen dicife"
(partim imbecillitate ingenii, partim taedio peregrinationis evicti, Sulp. Sever. 2, 43), was fic überwanb.
©ic blofic £l)atfad)e einer wenn and) noch fo ¿al)l=
reifen, bifdjöflidjcn 23erfannulling ift alfo noch lange fein
beweis ber wirtlichen Dcfumcnicität eines (Soncils; ober,
Wie bie Theologen, 3. 23. Sournclp, fid) auSbrüdcn, cS
fanu wohl öfumenifd) ber ^Berufung nad) fein, ob es biejs
aber and) bem Verlauf unb 2luSgang nach fei, baruber
fann baS (Soncil felbft nidjt eutfcpciben, faun nidjt fetber
fid; 3eugnifz geben; ba muff erft bie bod) and) nod) über
jebem (Soncil ftepcube Autorität, ober baS 3eugnifj ber
gaumen Ä'ircpc, als cntfcfjeibeiib unb beftätigenb pinjutreten.
Sie (Soncilien als fold;c haben feine SScrheifgung — aueb
J De ecclesia I, 384.
�114
Töüingcr,
(28)
in bcn gewöhnlich angeführten SSorten be§ äperrn von ben
„jwei ober brei" femmt eben alles auf baS „in feinem
tarnen Sßerfammeltfein" an, unb bieff enthält, wie alle
Geologen annehmen, mehrere. Skbingnngen, bie 3. 5).
Stournelt) aufführt.
)
*
?(ber bie Äirchc hat
2?erhei§=
ungen, unb fie liutfz erft fiel) überzeugen, ober bie @ewif^
beit befi^cn, baf) V^Vfifchcr ober moralifefter 3wang, fvurebt,
ßeibenfehafteu, SJerführungötünftc — Singe wie fie ¿u
Diimini unb noch gar oft gewirtt h^n — nicht auf bem
(Soncil übermächtig geworben finb, baf) alfo bie wahre
Freiheit bort gcljerrfcht bube. $n biefem (Sinn fagt 23of=
fuet von einem ötumenif^en (Soncit: ber 23ifcböfc auf bemfclben müßten fo viele unb aus fo verfeiuebenen Säubern,
unb bie 3iiftimmung ber übrigen fo evibent fein,
*) Quaeres: quibus conditionibus promisit Christus se conciliis adfuturum? Resp. Ista generali: Si in nomine suo congre
gata fuerint; hoc est servata suft'ragiorum liberiate; invocato coelesti auxilio; adhibita humana industria et diligentia in conquirenda
ventate.------- Deus scilicet, qui omnia suaviter disponit ac mo
derato, via supernaturali aperta et manifesta non adest conciliis,
sed occulta Spiritus subministratione. (Deus) permittit, episcopos
omnibus humanae infirmitatis periculis subjacere et aliquando
succumbere: ncque enim unquam promisit, se a conciliis ejusmodi
pericula certo semper pro pulsaturum; sed hoc unum, se’iis semper
adfuturum, qui in suo nomine congrcgarentur. Congregari autem
in suo nomine censentur, quoties eas observant leges et condi
tions, quas voluit observari. Tournely, praelectiones theologicae deDeo et divinis attributis, I, 165. Journet») fiitjrt benfelben
(Bebauten in feinen praelectiones theologicae de ecclesia Christi,
I, 384 nod) weiter aus: (Deus) episcopos permittit omnibus hu
manae infirmitatis periculis obnoxios esse, metus scilicet, ambitionis, avaritiae, cupiditatis etc.
�(29)
bie neue ©efcbâftêorbnung.
115
baff man tlar fclje, e§ fei nidjtä aiibcreö ba gefdjeljeu,
afe baff bie Slufidft bet ganjeu SSelt jufammengetrageu
)
*
worben.
(Sollte fid; alfo geigen, baff auf bern Goucil feineoweg«
„bie fXufidjt bei ganzen tatljolifcfjcn SBelt jufammengetragen"
worben, baff vielmehr TMjrijeitebcfdüiiffc gefafft worben
feien welche mit bent ©tauben eines beträchtlichen Sfjeilö
ber Äirchc im SSibevfprud) fielen, bann würben gewifc in
ber tatlfolifdjcn SSclt bie fragen aufgeworfen werben:
£>aben nufere SSifdwfe richtig Bcuguiff gegeben bon bem
(Glauben ihrer ©iocefen? unb wenn nicht, finb fie waljr=
I;aft frei gewefen? über wie fommt es baff il;r 3cu9niB
nicht beamtet worben ift? bafc fie majorifirt worben finb?
3?on ben Antworten bie auf biefe fragen erteilt werben,
Werben bann bie ferneren Greigniffe in ber 5bird;e bebingt
♦) Et que les autres consentent si évidemment à leur assem
blée, qu’il sera clair, qu’on n’y ait fait qu’apporter le sentiment
de toute la terre. (Histoire des variations, 1. 15, n. 1OOO.) Unb
barum forbert ber WÜ ©elafiu« ju einer bene gesta synodus nidfct
nur, baß fie nad) Sdfrift unb îrabition unb nad) ben firdflidjen
«Regeln ißre Gntfdjeibungen gefaßt habe, fonbern and), baß fie von
ber ganzen ^irdje angenommen fei : quam cuncta recepit ecclesia
(Epist. 13 bei £'abbé ConcilIV, 1200 unb 1203). Unb «Rico te be^
merft gegen bie GaWiniften: Ils ont une marque évidente que le
Concile, qui se dit Universel doit être reçu pour tel, dans l’accep
tation qu’en fait l’Église. (Prétendus Réformés convaincus de
schisme. 2,7. p. 289.) ©ieftirdje gibt ben Goncilien Beugniß (nicht
etfl Autorität), fotvie fie burd) ihren biblifdjen Ganoit ben einjelnen
æüdjern ber Sibel Beugniß gibt, roäfyrenb natürlich bie innere Au
torität berfelben nicht von ber itirdje ausfließt. Sie ift auch batestis,
non autor fidei.
�116
SDöUinger, bic neue @ef<$äft$orbnung.
(30)
fein. Unb barum ift au cf) in ber ganzen Äirdjc bic bollftc
fßublicität ftetö als ju einem (Soncit gehörig gewährt worben; benn cS liegt ber gefammten djriftlidjen SBelt ijodjlicf»
baran nidjt nur ju wiffen bafj etwas bort befdjloffen wirb,
fonbernaudj ¿u wiffen wie eS befdjloffen wirb. 2ln biefem
Hßic hängt gulefct atieS, wie bie benfwürbigen ^a^re 359,
449, 754 u. f. w. beweifen. Stuf baS ßoncil »on Orient
hätte man fid) be^üglidj beS jwangSweife auf erlegten <Sdjwei=
genS nidjt berufen follen; benn erftenS würbe bort blofc
eine ^Dialjnung gegeben, unb ¿weitend betraf bie <5rinner=
ung nur bie 23etanntmadjung oon (Entwürfen, welche, was
heutzutage bei bem <5tanb ber ißreffe nidjt meljr möglich
wäre, bamals in ber $erne mit wirtlichen ^ecreten oer=
wedjfelt würben.
�
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Victorian Blogging
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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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Einige worte uber die unjehlbarfeitsadresse und geschaftsordnung des concils und ihre theologische bedeutung zwei gutachtung von J. V. Dollinger
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Place of publication: Munchen
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Rudolph Oldenbourg
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1870
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Conway Tracts
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Text
1 f
z
THE
Essence
of
Religion
BY
LUDWIG FEUERBACH
["From
the
German.'
“No one has demonstrated and explained the purely human
origin of the idea of God better than Ludwig Feuerbach.”
—Buchner.
“ I confess that to Feuerbach I owe a debt of inestimable grati
tude. Feeling about in uncertainty for the ground, and finding
everywhere shifting sands, Feuerbach cast a sudden blaze in the
darkness and disclosed to me the way.”
—Rev, S. Baring-Gould.
ONE SHILLING.
^foiibou:
PROGRESSIVE PUBLISHING COMPANY,
28 Stonecutter Street, E.C.
1890.
��national secular society
THE
ESSENCE OF RELIGION
GOD THE IMAGE OF MAN.
MAN’S DEPENDENCE UPON NATURE
THE LAST AND ONLY SOURCE OF RELIGION.
BY
LUDWIG FEUERBACH
(Author of “ The Essence of Christianity,” <£•<?.)
TRANSLATED BY
ALEXANDER LOOS.
^onboix:
PROGRESSIVE PUBLISHING COMPANY,
28 Stonecutter Street, E.C.
1890.
�LONDON:
PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY G. W. EOOTE,
28 STONECUTTER STREET, E.C.
�LUDWIG
FEUERBACH.
A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.
---------- o------ —
Ludwig Feuerbach was the fourth of the five sons of
th celebrated German criminalist Anselm von Feuer
bach, and born July 28, 1804, at Landshut in Bavaria.
The vicissitudes of his simple life do not present any
sensational features, and neither his position in life,
nor his inclination, tended to bring him prominently
before the public. His life was eminently a life of
thought, and his writings are his real biography.
What Feuerbach was at any time of his life, he was
with his whole soul. In his youth, as a pupil of the
Gymnasium at Anspach, he was a pious Christian—
pious with all the energy of his character. In the
fervor of his piety, he devoted himself from free
choice to the study of theology at the University of
Heidelberg, but without finding there any satisfactory
nourishment for the restless cravings of his aspiring
mind. He therefore left Heidelberg in 1824 for Berlin,
whence he wrote to his father as follows : “ I have
abandoned theology, not, however, wantonly or reck
lessly or from dislike, but because it does not satisfy
me, because it does not give me what I indispensably
need. I want to press Nature to my heart, from whose
depth the cowardly theologian shrinks back ; I want
to embrace man, but man in his entirety.” Feuerbach
�iv.
LUDWIG FEUERBACH.
could not resist the power with which Hegel then
attracted the young students; but he possessed too
independent a mind to swear upon the master’s word,
and gradually not only emancipated himself from
Hegel’s philosophy, but determined to throw off specu
lative philosophy altogether, and to exclusively devote
himself to the only true science, that of Nature. But
the death of King Max the First of Bavaria, whose
liberal patronage had enabled Anselm von Feuerbach
to give to each of his five talented sons a liberal educa
tion, frustrated this intention, and prevented Ludwig
Feuerbach from continuing his studies. He accordingly
settled in 1828 as a private tutor at the University of
Erlangen and lectured on Logic and Metaphysics, but
he soon realised that the prevailing scholasticism of
a royal university was not a congenial atmosphere for
his independent mind, and throwing up all official
connection with licensed institutions and systems, he
retired into the rural solitude of Bruckberg, a small
village near Anspach, where Nature and Science
absorbed all the fervor of his enthusiasm and inspired
him, during a residence of twenty-five years, with the
most important of his literary creations—a residence that
was interrupted only by a short visit at Heidelberg in
1848, whither he had been invited by the student
youth to give a course of lectures before a promiscuous
audience on “ The Essence of Religion.” The feelings
with which he hailed this self-emancipation from the
thraldom of office and scholastic influences can best be
realised from the words in which he gave vent to his
exultation, when in 1838 he had been united in blissful
wedlock to the sister-in-law of the friend who had
secured for him the asylum at Bruckberg: “ Now I
can do homage to my genius ; now I can devote myself
independently, freely, regardlessly to the development
of my own being ! ”
�LUDWIG FEUERBACH.
V.
Among his writings which have been published in a
uniform edition comprising ten volumes, the following
deserve especially to be mentioned : Thoughts on
Death and Immortality (1830); History of Modern
Philosophy from Bacon of Verulam to Spinoza (1833) ;
Representation, Development and Criticism of
Leibnitz's Philosophy (1837) ; Pierre Bayle (1838) ;
Essence of Christianity (1841, second edition 1843,
third edition 1848 — translated by George Eliot);
Essence of Religion (1845). This last-named work
which is here for the first time presented to the
English public in translation, forms the principal
basis for the thirty lectures on “ The Essence of
Religion,” which Ludwig Feuerbach, as before stated,
held in the winter of 1848-1849 at Heidelberg before
a promiscuous audience, and in which he endeavored
to fill a gap left in his Essence of Christianity, by
enlarging the argument of the latter, according to
which “ all theology is anthropology ” by the addition
of “ and physiology,” so that his doctrine and conception
of religion is embraced in the two words Nature and
Man. The last principal work of Ludwig Feuerbach
is Theogony according to the sources of Classic, Hebrew
and Christian antiquity, which forms the ninth
volume of his works; the tenth volume (1866)
consisting of a promiscuous collection of essays on
“ Deity, liberty, and immortality from the stand-point
of anthropology.”
Afterwards Feuerbach transferred his residence from
Bruckberg to Rechenberg near Nuremberg, where he
lived exclusively to his family and a small circle of
intimate friends. Solely devoted as he had been to
the service of science, he had not hoarded up any
riches and in consequence suffered toward the evening
of his life from severe and annoying deprivations. A
due sense of gratitude on the part of his contemporaries
�vi.
LUDWIG FEUERBACH.
in Europe and America, secured the success of a
national subscription, intended to relieve him and
his family from want and cares for the rest of his life.
But his health, undermined by severe mental labor
and deprivation, failed more and more rapidly and
disabled him even from fully realizing the enjoyment
of a nation’s grateful recognition, when a repeated
stroke of apoplexy overshadowed his existence with
the gloom of partial unconsciousness, until, on the 12th
of Sept., 1872, he died at Rechenberg.
In trying to briefly point out, in conclusion, the sub
stance of Ludwig Feuerbach’s writings in general and
of the subsequent argument in particular, we do not
know how to do this better or more strikingly, than in
his own words in which he speaks of his life-work as
follows :
“ My business was, and above everything is, to
illumine the dark regions of religion with the torch of
reason, that man at last may no longer be a sport to
the hostile powers that hitherto and now avail them
selves of the mystery of religion to oppose mankind.
My aim has been to prove that the powers before
which man crouches are creatures of his own limited,
ignorant, uncultured, and timorous mind, to prove
that in special the being whom man sets over against
himself as a separate supernatural existence is his own
being. The purpose of my writing is to make men
an#iropologians instead of ^eologians ; man-lovers
instead of God-lovers ; students of this world instead
of candidates of the next; self-reliant citizens of the
earth instead of subservient and wily ministers of a
celestial and terrestrial monarchy. My object is
therefore anything but negative, destructive, it is
positive ; I deny in order to affirm. I deny the
illusions of theology and religion that I may afinmthe
substantial being of man.”
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION
GOD THE IMAGE OF MAN
man’s dependence upon nature
the last and
ONLY SOURCE OF RELIGION.
-------- «-------1. That being which is different from and inde
pendent of man, or, which is the same thing, of God,
as represented in the Essence of Christianity,—the
being without human nature, without human qualities
and without human individuality is in reality nothing
but Nature.1
2. The feeling of dependence in man is the source
of religion ; but the object of this dependence, viz.,
that upon which man is and feels himself dependent,
is originally nothing but Nature. Nature is the first
original object of religion, as is sufficiently proved by
the history of all religions and nations.
3. The assertion that religion is innate with and
natural to man, is false, if religion is identified with
Theism ; but it is perfectly true, if religion is con
sidered to be nothing but that feeling of dependence
by which man is more or less conscious that he does
not and cannot exist without another being, different
from himself, and that his existence does not originate
in himself. Religion, thus understood, is as essential
1 Nature, according to my conception, is nothing but a general
word for denoting those beings, things, and objects which man
distinguishes from himself and his productions, and which he
embraces under the common name of “ Nature,” but by no means
a general being, abstracted and separated from the .real objects
and then personsified into a mystical existence.
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
to man as light to the eye, as air to the lungs, as food
to the stomach. Religion is the manifestation of man’s
conception of himself. But above all man is a being
who does not exist without light, without air, without
water, without earth, without food,—he is, in short, a
being dependent on Nature. This dependence in the
animal, and in man as far as he moves within the
sphere of the brute, is only an unconscious and
unreflected one ; but by its elevation into consciousness
and imagination, by its consideration and profession,
it becomes religion. Thus all life depends on the
change of seasons; but man alone celebrates this
change by dramatic representations and festival acts.
But such festivals, which imply and represent nothing
but the change of the seasons, or of the phases of the
moon, are the oldest, the first, and the real confessions
of human religion.
4. Man, as well as any individual nation or tribe
considered in its particularity, does not depend on
nature or earth in general, but on a particular locality,
not on water generally, but on some particular water,
stream, or fountain. Thus the Egyptian is no Egyptian
out of Egypt; the Indian is no Indian out of India.
For this very reason those ancient nations which were
so firmly attached to their native soil, and not yet
attained to the conception of their true nature as mem
bers of mankind, but which clung to their individuality
and particularity as nations and tribes, were fully jus
tified in worshiping the mountains, trees, animals,
rivers and fountains of their respective countries as
divine beings ; for their whole individuality and
existence were exclusively based upon the particularity
of their country and its nature—just as he who recog
nises the universe as his home, and himself as a part
of it, transfers the universal character of his being into
his conception of God.
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
9
5. It is a fantastic notion that man should have
been enabled only by “ Providence,” through the
assistance of “ superhuman ” beings, such as gods,
spirits, genii and angels, to elevate himself above the
state of the animal. Of course man has become what
he is not through himself alone ; he needed for this
the assistance of other beings. But these were no
supernatural creatures of imagination, but real, natural
beings—no beings standing above but below himself ;
for in general everything that aids man in his con
scious and voluntary actions, commonly and pre
eminently called humaD, every good gift and talent,
does not come from above, but from below ; not from
on high, but from the very depths of Nature. Such
assistant beings, such tutelary genii of man, are
especially the animals. Only through them man raised
himself above them ; only by their protection and
assistance, the seed of human perfection could grow.
Thus we read in the book of Zendavesta, and even in
its very oldest and most genuine part, Vendidad:
“ Through the intellect of the dog is the world upheld.
If he did not protect the world, thieves and wolves
would rob all property.” This importance of the
animals to man, particularly in times of incipient
civilisation, fully justifies the religious adoration with
which they are looked upon. The animals were
necessary and indispensable to man; on them his
human existence depended—but on what his life and
existence depends, that is his God. If the Christian
no longer adores Nature as God, it is only because in
his belief his existence does not depend on Nature,
but on the will of a being different from Nature ; but
still he considers and adores this being as a divine, i.e.
supreme being, only because he deems it to be the
author and preserver of his existence and life. Thus
the worship of God depends only on the self-adoration
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
of man, and is nothing but the manifestation of the
latter : for suppose I should despise myself and my
life—and man originally and normally does not make
any distinction between himself and his life—how
should I praise and worship that upon which such
pitiful and contemptible life depends? The value
which I consciously attribute to the source of life
reflects therefore only the value which I unconsciously
attribute to life and myself. The higher therefore the
value of life, the higher also the value and dignity of
those who give life, viz., of the gods. How could the
gods possibly be resplendent in gold and silver, unless
man knew the value and the use of gold and silver ?
What a difference between the fulness and love of life
among the Greeks, and the desolation and contempt of
life among the Indians—but at the same time what
a difference between the Greek and Indian mythology,
between the Olympian father of the gods and of man
and the huge Indian opossum or the rattlesnake—the
ancestor of the Indians !
6. The Christian enjoys life just as much as the
heathen, but he sends his thankoflferings for the
enjoyments of life upward to the Father in Heaven ;
he accuses the heathen of idolatry for the very reason
that they confine their adoration to the creature and
do not rise to the first cause as the only true cause of
all benefits. But do I owe my existence to Adam, the
first man ? Do I revere him as my parent ? Why
shall I not stop at the creature ? Am I myself not a
creature ? Is not the very nearest cause which is
equally defined and individual with myself, the last
cause for me, who myself am not from afar, as I
myself am a defined and individual being ? Does not
my individuality, inseparable and undistinguishable
as it is from myself and my existence, depend on the
individuality of my parents ? Do I not, if I go further
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
11
back, at last lose all traces of my existence ? Is there
not a necessary limit to my thus going back in search
of the first cause ? Is not the beginning of my
existence absolutely individual ? Am I begotten and
conceived in the same year, in the same hour, with the
same disposition, in short under the same internal and
external conditions as my brother ? Is not therefore
my origin just as individually my own as my life
without contradiction is my own life ? Shall I there
fore extend my filial love and veneration back to
Adam? No, I am fully entitled to stop with my
religious reverence at those things which are nearest
to me, viz., my parents, as the cause of my existence.
7. The uninterrupted series of the finite causes or
objects, so-called, which was defined by the Atheists of
old as an infinite and bv the Theists as a finite one,
exists only in the thoughts and the imagination of man,
like time, in which one moment follows another
without interruption or distinction. In reality the
tedious monotony of this causal series is interrupted
and destroyed by the difference and individuality of
the objects, which individuality causes each by itself
to appear new, independent, single, final, and absolute.
Certainly water, which in the conception of natural
religion is a divine being, is on the one hand a
compound, depending on hydrogen and oxygen, but
at the same time it is something new, to be compared
to itself only, and original, wherein the qualities of its
two constituent elements, as such, have disappeared
and are destroyed. Certainly the moonlight, which the
heathen, in his religious simplicity, adored as an inde
pendent light, is derived from the immediate light of
the sun, but at the same time, different from the latter,
the peculiar light of the moon, changed and modified
by the moon’s resistance, and therefore a light which
could not exist without the moon, and whose particu
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
larity has its source only in her. Certainly the dog,
whom the Persian addresses in his prayers as a
beneficial and therefore divine being on acconnt of his
watchfulness, his readiness to oblige and his faithful
ness, is a creature of Nature, which is not what he is
through himself ; but still it is only the dog himself,
this particular and no other being, which possesses
those qualities that call for my veneration. Shall I
now in recognition of these qualities look up to the
first and general cause, and turn my back on the dog ?
But the general cause is without distinction just as
much the cause of the friendly dog as of the hostile
wolf, whose existence I am obliged to destroy, in spite
of the general cause, if I will sustain the better right
of my own existence.
8. The Divine Being which is revealed in Nature, is
nothing but Nature herself, revealing and representing
herself with irresistible power as a Divine Being.
The ancient Mexicans adored among their many gods
also a god (or rather a goddess) of the salt. This god
of the salt may reveal to us in a striking exemplification
the God of Nature in general. The salt (rock-salt)
represents in its economical, medicinal and other
effects, the usefulness and beneficence of Nature, so
highly praised by the Theists ; in its effect on the eye,
in its colors, its brilliancy and transparency, her
beauty; in its crystalline structure and form, her
harmony and regularity; in its composition of
antagonistic elements, the combination of the opposite
elements of Nature into one whole—a combination
which by the Theists was always considered as an
unobjectionable proof for the existence of a ruler of
Nature, different from her, because in their ignorance
of Nature they did not know that antagonistic elements
and things are most apt to attract one another and
combine into a new whole. But what now is the god
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
13
of the salt ? That god whose domain, existence, mani
festation, effects and qualities are contained in the salt ?
Nothing but the salt itself which appears to man on
account of its qualities and effects as a divine, i.e., as
a beneficent, magnificent, praiseworthy and admirable
being. Homer expressively calls the salt divine.
Thus, as the god of the salt is only the impression and
expression of the deity or divinity of the salt, so also
is the God of the world or of Nature in general, only
the impression and expression of Nature’s divinity.
9. The belief that in Nature another being is mani
fested, distinct from Nature herself, or that Nature is
filled and governed by a different from herself, is in
reality identical with the belief that spirits, demons,
devils, etc., manifested themselves through man, at
least in a certain state, and that they possess him ; it is
in very truth the belief, that Nature is possessed by a
strange, spirtual being. And indeed Nature, viewed
in the light of such a belief, is really possessed by a
spirit, but this spirit of man, his imagination, his soul,
which transfers itself involuntarily into Nature and
makes her a symbol and mirror of his being.
10. Nature is not only the first and original object
but also the lasting source, the continuous, although
hidden background of religion. The belief that God,
even when he is imagined as a supernatural being,
different from Nature, is an object existing outside of
man, an objective being, as the philosophers call it ;
this belief has its only source in the fact, that the
objective being, which really exists outside of man,
viz., the world or Nature, is originally God. The
existence of Nature is not, as Theism imagines, based
upon the existence of God, but vice versa, the existence
of God, or rather the belief in his existence, is only
based upon the existence of Nature. You are obliged
to imagine God as an existing being, only because you
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
are obliged by Nature herself to pre-suppose the
existence of Nature as the cause and condition of your
existence and consciousness, and the very first idea
connected with the thought of God is nothing but the
very idea that he is the existence preceding your own
and presupposed to it. Or the belief that God exists
absolutely outside of man’s soul and reason, no matter
whether man exists or not, whether he contemplates
him or not, whether he desires him or not—this belief
or rather its object, does not reflect anything to your
imagination but Nature, whose existence is not based
upon the existence of man, much less upon the action
of the human intellect and imagination. If, therefore,
the theologians, particularly the Rationalists, find the
honor of God pre-eminently in his having an existence
independent of man’s thoughts, they may consider
that the honor of such an existence likewise must be
attributed to the Gods of blinded heathenism, to the
stars, stones and animals, and that in this respect the
existence of their god does not differ from the
existence of the Egyptian Apis.
Those qualites which imply and express the difference
between the divine being and the human being or at
least the human individual, are originally and im
plicitly only qualities of Nature. God is the most
powerful or rather the almighty being, z.e., he can do
what man is not able to do, what infinitely surpasses
his powers, and what therefore inspires him with the
humiliating feeling of his limitedness, weakness and
nullity. “ Canst thou,” says God to Job, “bind the
sweet influences of Pleiades or loose the bands of
Orion ? Canst thou send lightnings, that they may go
unto thee and say here we are ? Hast thou given the
horse strength ? Does the hawk fly by thy wisdom ?
Hast thou an arm like God, or canst thou thunder with
a voice like him?” No, that man cannot do, with the
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
15
thunder the human voice cannot be compared. But
■what power is manifest in the power of the thunder,
in the horse’s strength, in the flight of the hawk, in
he restless course of the Pleiades? The power of
N ature.
God is an eternal being. But in the Bible itself we
read: “ One generation passeth away and another
generation cometh : but the earth abideth forever.”
In the books of Zendavesta, sun and moon are expres
sively called “ immortal,” on account of their duration
And a Peruvian Inca said to a Dominican monk, “ You
adore a God who died on the cross, but I worship the
Sun, which never dies.”
God is the all-kind being, “ for he maketh the sun to
rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on
the just and on the unjustbut that being which
does not distinguish between good and evil, between
just and unjust, which distributes the enjoyments of
life not according to moral merits ; which in general
imp resses man as a kind being, because its effects, such
as for instance the refreshing sunlight and rain-water
are the sources of the most beneficial sensations : that
being is Nature.
God is an all-embracing, universal and unchangeable
being ; but it is also one and the same sun which
shines for all men and beings on the earth ; it is one
and the same sky which embraces them all ; one and
the same earth which bears them all. “ That there is
one God,” says Ambrosius, “ is proved by common
Nature ; for there is only one world.” “ Just as the sun
the sky, the moon, the earth and the sea are common
to all,” says Plutarch, “although they are differently
called by each one, so exists also one spirit, who rules
the universe, but he has different names and is wor
shipped in different ways.”
God “ dwelleth not in temples made with hands,”
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
but Nature neither. Who can enclose the light, the
sky, the sea, within human limits ? The ancient
Persians and Germans worshipped only Nature, but
they had no temples. The worshipper of Nature finds
the artificial, well-measured halls of a temple or of a
church too narrow, too sultry ; he feels at his ease only
under the lofty, boundless sky which appears to the
contemplation of his senses.
God is that being which cannot be defined with
human measure, a great, immeasurable, infinite being ;
but he is such a being only because his work, the
universe, is great, immeasurable and infinite, or at
least appears to be so. The work praises its master :
the magnificence of the creator has its origin only in
the magnificence of his product. “ How great is the
sun, but how much greater is he who made it ! ”
God is a superterrestrial, superhuman, supreme
being, but even this supreme being is in its origin and
basis nothing but the highest being in space, optically
considered : the sky with its brilliant phenomena. All
religions of some imagination transfer their gods into
the region of the clouds, into the ether of the sun,
moon and stars : all gods are lost at last in the blue
vapor of heaven. Even the spiritual God of Christianity
has his seat, his basis above in heaven.
God is a mysterious, inconceivable being, but only
because Nature is to man, especially to religious man,
a mysterious inconceivable being. “ Dost thou know,”
says God to Job, “ the balancings of the clouds ? Hast
thou entered into the springs of the sea ? Hast thou
perceived the breadth of the earth ? Hast thou seen
the treasures of the hail ? ”
Finally, God is that being which is independent of
the human will, unmoved by human wants and
passions, always equal to himself, ruling according to
unchangeable laws, establishing his institutions un
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
changeable for all time. But this being again is
nothing but Nature, which remains the same in all
changes, never exhibiting the vacillations of an
arbitrary, wilful ruler, but subject in all her mani
festations to unalterable laws : inexorable, regardless
Nature.2
12. Although God, as the author of Nature, is
imagined and represented as a being different from
Nature, still what is implied and expressed by this
being, its real contents, is nothing but Nature. “Ye
shall know them by their fruits,” we read in the Bible,
and the apostle Paul points expressively to the world
as to the work wherein God’s existence and being can
be understood, for what one produces, that contains
his being and shows what he is able to do. What we
have in Nature, that we have in God, only imagined as
the author or cause of Nature—therefore no moral and
spiritual, but only a natural, physical being. A
worship founded only upon God as the author of
Nature, without attributing to him any other qualities,
derived from man, and without imagining him at the
same time as a political and moral, i.e. human lawgiver
— such worship would be a mere worship of Nature.
Ic is true that the author of Nature is thought to be
endowed with intellect and will; but what his will
desires, what his intellect thinks, is just that which
es no will nor intellect, but only mechanical,
2 All those qualities which originally are derived only from the
contemplation of Nature, become in later times abstract, meta
physical qualities, just as Nature herself becomes an abstraction
or creation of human reason. On this later standpoint, where
man forgets the origin of God in Nature, when God no longer is
an object of the senses, but an imaginary being, we must say : God
without human qualities, who is to be distinguished from the
properly human God, is nothing but the essence of reason. So
much as regards the relation between this work and my former
ones, Luther and The Essence of Christianity.
B
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
physical, chemical, vegetable and animal forces and
impulses.
13. As little as the formation of the child in the
womb, the pulsations of the heart, digestion and other
organic functions are effects of the intellect and
will, so little is Nature in general the effect or
production of a spiritual being, i.e, of a being that
wills and knows or thinks. If Nature was originally
a product of mind, and therefore a manifestation
of mind, then also the natural phenomena of the
present time would be spiritual effects and
manifestations.
A supernatural commencement
necessarily requires a supernatural continuation. For
man thinks intellect and will to be the cause of
Nature only where the effects defy his own will, and
surpass his intellect, where he explains things only
through human analogies and reasons, where he knows
nothing of the natural causes, and therefore derives
also the special and present phenomena from God, or—
as for instance the movements of the stars which he
cannot understand—from subordinate spirits. But if
now-a-days the fulcrum of the earth and of the stars
is no longer the almighty word of God, and the motive
of their movement no spiritual or angelic but a
mechanical one : then the first cause of this movement
is also necessarily a mechanical, or, in general, a natural
one. To derive Nature from intellect and will, or in
general from the mind, is to reckon without the host,
is to bring forth the savior of the world from the virgin
without the co-operation of a man, through the Holy
Ghost—is to change water into wine—is to appease
storms with words, to transfer mountains with words,
to restore sight to the blind with words. What weak
ness and narrow-mindedness does it betray to do away
with the secondary causes of superstition, such as
miracles, devils, spirits, etc., in explaining the pheno
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
19
mena of Nature, but to leave untouched the first cause
of superstition!
14. Several of the ancient ecclesiastical writers assert,
that the Son of God is not a product of God’s will,
but of God’s nature ; that the product of Nature is
earlier than the product of the will, and that, therefore,
the act of begetting, as an act of Nature, precedes the
act of creation as an act of will. Thus the acknowledg
ment of Nature and her omnipotent laws prevails even
within the sphere of the belief in the supernatural
God, although in the plainest contradiction of his own
will and being. The act of begetting is presupposed
to the act of the will ; the activity of Nature is con
sidered as preceding the activity of thought and will.
This is perfectly true. Nature must necessarily exist
before anything exists which distinguishes itself from
Nature, and which places Nature, as an object of the
act of thinking and willing, in opposition to itself.
The true way of philosophy leads from the want of
intelligence to intellect; but the direct way into the
madhouse of theology, goes from the intellect to the
want of intellect. To base the mind not upon Nature,
but, vice versa, Nature upon the mind, is the same as
to place the head, not upon the abdomen, but the latter
upon the former. Every higher degree of development
presupposes the lower one, not vice versa3, for the
simple reason, that the higher one must have something
below it, in order to be the higher one. And the
higher a being stands and the greater its value or
dignity is, the more it presupposes. For this very
reason not the first being, but the latest, the last, the
most depending, the most needful, the most compli
cated being is the highest one, just as in the history of
3 This may be true in a iogical sense, but never as far as the
real genesis is concerned.
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
the earth’s formation, not the oldest and first works,
such as the slate and granite, but the latest and most
recent products, such as the basalts and the dense lavas,
are the heaviest and weightiest ones. A being which
has the honor of presupposing nothing, has also the
honor of being nothing. But it is true that the Chris
tians understand well the art of making something out
of nothing.
15. “ All things come from and depend upon God,”
so the Christian says in harmony with his godly faith
“ but,” he adds immediately with his ungodly intellect,
“ only indirectly.” God is only the first cause after
which comes the endless host of subordinate gods, the
regiment of intermediate causes. But the intermediate
causes, so-called, are the only real and effective ones,
the only objective and sensible causes. A God who
no longer casts down man with the arrows of Apollo,
who no longer arouses the soul with Jove’s thunder
and lightning, who.no longer threatens the sinner with
comets and other fiery phenomena, who no longer
with his own high hand attracts the iron to the load
stone, produces ebb and tide, and protects the
continent against the overbearing power of the waters
which always threaten another deluge—in short, a God
driven from the empire of the intermediate causes is
only a cause by name, a harmless and very modest
creature of imagination—a mere hypothesis for the
purpose of solving a theoretical problem, for explain
ing the commencement of Nature or rather of organic
life. For the assumption of a being different from
Nature, with the purpose of explaining her existence,
has its origin only in the impossibility—although this
is only a relative and subjective one—of explaining
organic and particularly human life from Nature,
inasmuch as the Theist makes his inability to explain
life through Nature, an inability of Nature to produce
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
21
life out of herself, and thus extends the limits of his
intellect to limits of Nature.
16. Creation and preservation are inseparable. If,
therefore, a being different from Nature—a God—is
our creator, he is also our preserver, and not the power
of the air, of heat, of the water, or of bread, but the
power of God sustains and preserves us. “ In him we
live and move and have our being.” “Not bread,’’
says Luther, “ but the word of God nourishes also the
body naturally, as it creates and preserves all things.”
“ Because it exists, he (God) nourishes by it and under
it, so that we do not see it, and think that the bread
does it. But where it does not exist, he nourishes
without the bread, through his word only, as he does it
by the bread.” “In fine, all creatures are God’s masks
and mummeries which he permits to assist him in all
kind of work that he otherwise can, and really does
perform without their co-operation.” But if, instead
of Nature, God is our preserver, Nature is a mere
disguise of the Deity, and, therefore, a superfluous and
imaginary being, just as vice versa God is a superfluous
and imaginary being if Nature preserves us. But now
it is manifest and undeniable that we owe our preserva
tion only to the peculiar effects, qualities, and powers
of natural beings, therefore we are not only entitled,
but compelled, to conclude that we owe also our origin
to Nature. We are placed right in the midst of Nature,
and should our beginning, our origin, lie outside of
Nature ? We live within Nature, with Nature, by
Nature, and should we still not be of her ? What a
contradiction I
17. The earth has not always been in its present
state ; on the contrary, it has come to its actual condi
tion through a series of developments and revolutions,
and geology has discovered that in the different stages
of its development several species of plants and animals
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
existed, which no longer exist nor even have existed
for ages. Thus, for instance, there exist no longer any
Trilobites nor any Encinites or Ammonites or
Pterodactyles or Ichthyosauri, or Plesiosauri, or
Megatheria or Dinotheria, etc.
And why not?
Apparently because the condition of their existence no
longer exists. But if the end of any life coincides
with the end of its conditions, then also the beginning,
the origin of such life coincides with the origin
of its conditions.
Even now-a-days where plants,
at least those of higher organisations, come to
life only by organic procreation, they can—in
a very remarkable, yet unexplained manner—be seen
to appear in numberless multitudes as soon as the
peculiar conditions of their life are given. The origin
of organic life cannot, therefore, be thought of as an
isolated act, as an act after the origin of the conditions
of life, but rather as the act by which and the moment
in which the temperature, the air, the water, the earth
in general, received such qualities, and oxygen, hydro
gen, carbon, nitrogen entered into such combinations
as were necessary for the existence of organic life—
this moment must also be considered as the moment
when these elements combined for the formation of
organic bodies. If, therefore, the earth, by virtue of its
own nature, has in the course of time developed and
cultivated itself to such a degree that it adopted a
character agreeable to the existence of man and suitable
to man’s nature, or so to say, a human character : then
it could produce man also by its own power.
18. The power of Nature is not unlimited like the
power of God, i.e., the power of human imagination ;
she cannot do everything at all times and under all
circumstances—her productions and effects on the
contrary are dependent on conditions. If therefore,
Nature now-a-days cannot or does not produce any
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
23
organic bodies by generatio cequivoca, this is no proof
that she could not do it in former times. The present
character of the earth is that of stability ; the time of
revolutions is gone by, the earth has done raging. The
volcanos only are some single turbulent heads which
have no influence on the masses, and which therefore
do not disturb the existing order of things. Even the
grandest volcanic event within the memory of man,
viz., the rising of Jorullo in Mexico, was nothing but
a local rebellion. But as man manifests only in extra
ordinary times extraordinary powers, or as he can do
only in times of the highest exaltation and emotion
what at other times is impossible for him, and as the
plant only at certain epochs, such as the period of
germinating, blooming and impregnation produces
heat and consumes carbon and hydrogen, thus ex
hibiting an animal function, which is directly in con
tradiction to its ordinary vegetable functions ; so also
the earth only in the time of its geological revolutions,
when all its powers and elements were in a state of
highest fermentation, ebullition and tension, developed
its power of producing animals. We know Nature
only in its present state ; how, then, could we co nclude
that what does not happen now by Nature, might not
happen at all—even at entirely different times, under
entirely different conditions and relations ?4
19. The Christians have not been able to express
with sufficient strength their astonishment that the
4 It is self-evident that I do not intend to finally dispose in
these few words of the great problem of the origin of organic life ;
but they are sufficient for my argument, as I give here only the
indirect proof that life cannot have any other source but Nature.
As regards the direct proofs of natural science, we are still far
from the end, but in comparison with former times—especially in
consequence of the lately proved identity of organic and inorganic
phenomena—at least far enough to be able to be convinced of the
natural origin of life, although the manner of this origin is yet
unknown to us, or even if it never should be revealed to us.
�24
THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
heath en adored created beings as divine ones, but they
might rather have admired them on that account, for
such adoration was based on a perfectly true contem
plation of Nature. To be produced, to come into life,
is nothing else but to be individualised. All individual
beings are produced, but the general fundamental
elements or beings of Nature which have no individu
ality are not produced. Matter is not produced. But
an individual being is of a higher, more divine quality
than that without individuality. It is true that birth
is disgraceful and death painful, but he who does not
wish to begin and to end may resign the rank of a
living being. Eternity excludes life, and life excludes
eternity. Certainly does the individual presuppose
another being which produces it; but the latter does
not stand above, it stands below its product. True,
the producing being is the cause of existence and in
that respect the first being ; still it is at the same time
the mere means and material ; the basis of another
being’s existence, and therefore a subordinate being.
The child consumes the mother, disposes of her
strength and of her substance to his own advantage,
paints his cheeks with her blood. And the child is
the mother’s pride ; she places it above herself, sub
ordinating her existence and welfare to that of the
child ; even the animal mother sacrifices her own life
for that of her young ones. The deepest disgrace of
any being is death, but the source of death is the act
of begetting. To beget is nothing but to throw one’s
self away, to make one’s self common, to be lost among
the multitude, - to sacrifice one’s singleness and ex
clusiveness to other beings. Nothing is more full of
contradiction, more perverse and void of sense, than to
consider the natural being as produced by a supreme,
perfectual being. According to such a process, and in
consistency with the creature’s being only an image of
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
25
the creator, also the human children ought not to
originate in the disgraceful, lowly placed organ of the
womb, but in the highest organisation, the head.
20. The ancient Greeks derived all springs, wells,
streams, lakes and oceans from Oceanos ; and the
ancient Persians made all mountains of the earth
originate in the mountain Albordy. Is the derivation
of all beings from one perfect being anything different
or better ? No, it is based upon the same manner of
thinking. As Albordy is a mountain like all those
which have their origin in it, so also the divine being,
as the source of those derived from it, is like them, not
different from them as to species ; but as the Albordy
is distinguished from all other mountains by
preserving their qualities pre-eminently, i.e. in a
degree exaggerated by imagination to the utmost, up to
heaven, beyond the sun, moon and stars, so also the
divine being is distinguished from all other beings.
Unity is unproductive ; only dualism, contrast,
difference is productive. That which produces the
mountains is not only different from them, but some
thing manifold in itself. And those elements which
produce water, are not only different from the water,
but also from themselves, nay, even antagonistic to
one another. Just as genius, wit, acumen and
judgment are produced and developed only by
contrasts and conflicts, so also life was produced only
by the conflict of different, nay, of antagonistic
elements, forces and beings.
21. “ How should he who made the ear not hear ?
How should he who made the eye not see ?” This
biblical or theistical derivation of the being endowed
with the senses of hearing and seeing from another
being endowed with the same senses, or to use an
expression of the modern, philosophic language, the
derivation of the spiritual and subjective being from
�26
THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
another spiritual and subjective being, is based upon
the same foundation, and expresses the same as the
biblical explanation of the rain from heavenly masses
of water collected beyond or in the clouds, or the
Persian derivation of the mountains from the
original mountain, Albordy, or the Grecian explanation
of fountains and rivers from Oceanos. Water from
water, but from an immensely great and all-embracing
water ; mountain from mountain, but from an infinite
all-embracing mountain ; so spirit from spirit, life
from life, eye from eye—but from an infinite,
all-embracing eye, life and spirit.
22. When children inquire about the origin of babes,
we give them the explanation that the nurse takes
them from the well where they swim like fishes. The
explanation which theology gives us of the origin of
organic or natural beings in general is not much
different. God is the deep or beautiful well of
imagination in which all realities, all perfections, all
forces are contained, in which all things swim already
made like little fishes. Theology is the nurse who
takes them from this well, but the chief person,
Nature, the mother who brings forth the children with
pangs, who bears them during nine months under her
heart, is left entirely out of consideration in such an
explanation, which originally was only childlike, but
now-a-days is childish. Certainly such an explanation
is more beautiful, more pleasant to the heart, easier,
more intelligible and conceivable to the children of
God than the natural way, which only by degrees and
through numberless obstacles rises from darkness to
light. But also the explanation which our pious
forefathers gave of hailstorms, epidemics among cattle,
drought and thunderstorms, by tracing them to the
agency of weather-makers, sorcerers, and witches, is
far more practical, easier, and, to uneducated men even
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
27
now-a-days much more intelligible than the explanation
of these phenomena from natural causes.
23. “ The origin of life is inexplicable and incon
ceivable.” Be it so ; but this incomprehensibility does
not justify us in drawing from the superstitious conse
quences which theology draws from the deficiencies
of human knowledge, nor in going beyond the sphere
of natural causes : for we can only say, “ we cannot
explain life from these natural phenomena and causes
which are known to us, or as far as they are known to
us ”—but we cannot say, “ life cannot be explained at
all from Nature,” without pretending to have exhausted
already the ocean of Nature even to the last drop.
This incomprehensibility does not justify us in explain
ing the inexplicable by the supposition of imagined
beings, and in deceiving and deluding ourselves and
others by an explanation which explains nothing. It
does not justify us in changingan ignorance of natural
material causes into a non-existence of such causes,
and in deifying, personifying, representing our ignor
ance in a being which is to destroy such ignorance,
and which yet does not express anything but the
nature of such ignorance, the deficiency of positive,
material reasons of explanation. For what else is the
immaterial, incorporeal, non-natural, extra-mundane
being to whom we thus try to trace back all life, but
the precise expression of the intellectual absence of
material, corporeal, natural, cosmical causes ? But
instead of being so honest and modest as to say
frankly : “We do not know any reason, we do not
know how to explain it, we have no data nor materials,”
you change these deficiencies, these negations, these
vacancies of your head by the activity of your
imagination into positive beings, into immaterial
beings, «.e., into beings which are not material nor
natural, because you do not know of any material or
�28
THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
natural causes. While ignorance, however, is contented
with immaterial, incorporeal, unnatural beings, her
inseparable companion, wanton imagination, which
always and exclusively indulges in the intercourse
with beings of the highest perfection, immediately
elevates these poor creatures of ignorance to the rank
of supermaterial, supernatural beings.
24. The idea that Nature or the universe in general
has a real beginning, and that consequently at some
time there was no Nature, no universe, is a narrow idea,
which seems acceptable to man only as long as he has
a narrow, limited conception of the world. It is an
imagination without sense and foundation—this
imagination that at some time nothing real existed, for
the universe is the totality of all reality. All qualities
or definitions of God which make him an objective,
real being are only qualities abstracted from Nature,
which presuppose and define Nature, and which there
fore would not exist if Nature did not exist. It is true,
if we abstract from Nature ; if in our thoughts or our
imagination we destroy her existence, i.e., if we shut
our eyes and extinguish all images of natural things
reflected by our senses, and conceive Nature not with
our senses (not in concrete as the philosophers say),
there is left a being, a totality of qualities such as
infinity, power, unity, necessity, eternity ; but this
being which is left after deducting all qualities and
phenomena reflected by our senses is in truth nothing
but the abstract essence of Nature, or Nature “ in
abstract," in thought. And such derivation of Nature
or the universe from God is therefore in this respect
nothing but the derivation of the real essence of
Nature, as it appears to our senses, from her abstract,
imagined essence, which exists only in our idea—a
derivation which appears to be reasonable because in
the act of thinking we are accustomed to consider the
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
29
abstract and general as that which is nearer to thought,
and which therefore must be presupposed to the
individual, the real, the concrete, as that which is
higher and earlier in thought,, although in reality just
the reverse takes place, inasmuch as Nature exists
before God, i.e., the concrete before the abstract, that
which we conceive with our senses before that which
is thought. In reality, where everything passes on
naturally, the copy follows the original, the image the
thing which it represents, the thought its object—but
on the supernatural, miraculous ground of theology,
the original follows the copy, the thing its own like
ness. “ It is strange,” says St. Augustine, “ but never
theless true, that this world could not exist if it was
not known to God.” That means : the world is known
and thought before it exists ; nay, it exists only because
it was thought of—the existence is a consequence of
the knowledge or of the act of thinking, the original a
consequence of the copy, the object a consequence of
its likeness.
25. If we reduce the world or Nature to a totality of
abstract qualities, to a metaphysical, i.e., to a merely
imagined object, and consider this abstract world as the
real world, then it is a logical necessity to consider it as
finite. The world is not given to us through the act of
thinking, not at least through the metaphysical and
hyperphysical thinking which abstracts from the real
World and founds its true and highest existence upon
such abstraction—the world is given to us through life,
by perception, by the senses. For an abstract being
which only thinks there exists no light, because it has
no eyes, no warmth, because it has no feeling, in
general no world because it has no organ for its
perceptions ; for such a being there exists in reality
nothing. The world, therefore, exists for us only
because we are no logical or metaphysical beings,
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
because we are other beings, because we are more
than mere logicians and metaphysicians. • But just
this plus appears to the metaphysical thinker, as a
minus, this negation of the art of thinking as an abso
lute negation. Nature to him is nothing but the
opposite of mind. This merely negative and abstract
definition he makes her positive definition, her essence.
Consequently it is a contradiction to consider as a
positive being that being, or rather that nonentity
which is only the negation of the act of thinking,
which is an imagined thing, but according to its nature
an object of the senses, that is antagonistic to the act
of thinking and to the mind. The being which exists
in thought is for the thinker the true essence, therefore
it is self-evident to him that a being which does not
exist in thought cannot be a true, eternal, original
essence. It implies already a contradiction for the
mind to think only of its opposite ; it is only in
harmony with itself when it thinks only itself (on the
standpoint of metaphysical speculation), or at least
(on the standpoint of theism) when it thinks an essence
which expresses nothing but the nature of the act of
thinking, which is given only by thought, and which
therefore in itself is nothing but an imagined being.
Thus Nature disappears into nothing. But still she
exists, though according to the thinker she neither can
nor should be. How then does the metaphysician
explain her existence ? By a self-privation, a self
negation, a self-denial of the mind which apparently
is a voluntary one, but which in very truth is
contradictory to, and only enforced upon his inner
nature. But if Nature on the standpoint of abstract
thinking disappears into nothing, on the other hand on
the standpoint of the real observation and contempla
tion of the world, that creative mind disappears into
nothing. On this standpoint all deductions of the
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
31
world from. God, of Nature from the mind, of physics
from metaphysics, of the real from the abstract, are
proved to be nothing but logical plays.
26. Nature is the first and fundamental object of
religion, but she is such an object even where she is
the direct and immediate object of religious adoration,
as e.g. in the natural religions so-called, not as such, as
Nature, i.e., in the manner and in the sense in which
we regard her from the standpoint of theism or of
philos ophy and of the natural sciences. Nature is to
man originally, i.e., where he regards her with a
religious eye, rather an object of his own qualities, a
per sonal, living, feeling being. Man originally does
not distinguish himself from Nature, nor consequently
Nature from himself, therefore the sensations which
any object in Nature excites in him appear to him
im mediately as qualities of the object. The beneficial,
go od sensations and effects are caused by good and
benevolent Nature ; the bad, painful sensations, such
as heat, cold, hunger, pain, disease, by an evil being,
or at 1 east by Nature in a state of evil disposition, of
mal evolence, of wrath. Thus man involuntarily and
unc onsciously, i.e., necessarily—although this necessity
is only a relative and historical one—transforms the
essence of Nature into a feeling, i.e., a subjective, a
human being.
No wonder that he then also
expressively, knowingly and willingly transforms her
into an object of religion, of prayer, i.e., an object
which can be influenced by the feelings of man, his
prayers, his services. Really, man has made Nature
already subservient and subdued her to himself by
assimilating her to his feelings and subduing her to his
passions. Besides, uneducated natural man does not
only presuppose human motives, impulsesand passions
in Nature, he sees even real men in natural bodies.
Thus the Indians on the Orinoco thi nk the sun, the moon
�32
THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
and the stars, to be men, “those up there,” they say “are
men like unto us ; ” the Patagonians think the stars to
be “ former Indians ; ” the Greenlanders think the
sun, moon and stars, to be their ancestors, who at a
particular occasion were translated into heaven. Thus
also the ancient Mexicans believed that the sun and
the moon which they adored as gods had been men in
former times. Behold thus' the assertion made in my
“ Essence of Christianity ” that man in religion is in
relation to an intercourse with himself only, and that
his God in reality reflects only his own essence—this
assertion is confirmed even by the most uncultivated,
primary manifestations of religion ; where man adores
things the most distant from and most unlike to him
self, such as stars, stones, trees, nay, even the claws of
crabs, and snail shells; for he adores them only
because he transfers himself into them, because he
believes them to be such beings, or at least to be
inhabited by such beings as himself. Religion there
fore exhibits the remarkable contradiction, which
however is easily understood, nay, even necessary,
that, while on one hand (from the standpoint of theism
or anthropologism) she worships the human essence as
a divine one, because it appears to her as different
from man, as an essence not human—on the other
hand (from the materialistic standpoint) she adores
vice versa the essence which is not human as a divine
one, because it appears to her as a human one.
27. The mutability of Nature, especially in those
phenomena which most of all cause man to feel his
dependence on her, is the principal reason why she
appears to man as a human, arbitrary being, and why
she is religiously adored by him. If the sun stood
always in the sky, he would never have kindled the
fire of religious passion in man. Only when he dis
appeared from man’s eye and inflicted upon him the
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
33
terrors of night, and when again he re-appeared, man
fell down on his knees before him, overcome by joy at
his unexpected return. Thus the ancient Apalachites
in Florida greeted the sun with hymns at his rising
and setting, and prayed to him at the same time that
he might return and bless them with his light. If the
earth always produced fruits, where would there be a
motive for religious celebrations of the time of sowing
and harvesting ? Only in consequence of her now
opening, now closing her womb, her fruits appear to
be her voluntary gifts which oblige man to be grateful.
The changes in Nature make man uncertain, humble,
religious. It is uncertain, whether the weather to
morrow will be favorable to my undertakings ; it is
uncertain whether I shall harvest what I sow, and
therefore I cannot depend upon the gifts of Nature as
upon a tribute due, or an infallible consequence. But
where mathematical certainty is at an end, there
theology commences, even now-a-days, in weak minds.
Religion is the conception of the necessary—or of the
accidental—as of something arbitrary, or voluntary.
The opposite sentiment, that of irreligion and ungod
liness, on the other hand, is represented by the Cyclops
of Euripides, when he says : “ Earth must produce
grass for feeding my flock, whether she be willing to
do so or not.”
28. The feeling of dependence upon Nature in com
bination with the imagination of her as of an arbitrarily
acting, personal being, is the motive of the sacrifice,
the most essential act of natural religion. The depend
ence upon Nature is particularly sensible to me by my
want of her. The want is the feeling and expression of
my nothingness without Nature ; but inseparable from
want is enjoyment, the opposite feeling, the feeling of
my self-existence, of my independence in distinction
from Nature. Want, therefore, is pious, humble, relic
�34:
THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
gious—but enjoyment is haughty, ungodly, void of
respect, frivolous. And such frivolity, or at least want
of respect in enjoyment, is a practical necessity for
man, a necessity upon which his existence is founded
—but a necessity which is in direct contradiction to
his theoretical respect for Nature as for an egotistic,
sensible being, which suffers as little as man that any
thing be taken from her. The appropriation or the
use of Nature appears therefore to man, as if it were
an encroachment upon her right, as an appropriation
of another one’s property, as an outrage. In order
now to propitiate his conscience as well as the
object of his imaginary offence ; in order to sho w that
his robbery has its origin in want, not in arrogan ce, he
diminishes his enjoyment and returns to the object a
part of its plundered property. Thus the Greeks
believed that if a tree were cut down, its soul, the
Dryad, lamented and cried to Fate for revenge against
the trespasser. Thus no Roman ventured to cut down
a tree on his ground without sacrificing a farrow for
the propitiation of the god or goddess of this grove.
Thus the Ostiaks, after having slain a bear, suspend its
skin on a tree, pay to it all sorts of reverences, and
apologise as well as they can to the bear for having
killed him. “ They believe in this manner politely to
avert the damage which the spirit of the animal possibly
could inflict upon them.” Thus North American tribes
by similar ceremonies propitiate the departed souls of
slain beasts. Thus the Phillippines asked the plains
and mountains for their permission, if they wished to
cross them, and deemed it a crime to cut down any
old tree. And the Brahmin hardly dares to drink water
or to tread upon the ground with his feet, because each
step, each draught of water causes pain and death to
sentient beings, plants as well as animals, and he must
therefore do penance “ in order to atone for the death
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
35
of creatures which he possibly, although unconsciously,
might destroy by day or night.”5
29. The sacrifice makes perceptible to the senses
the whole essence of religion. Its source is the feeling
of dependence, fear, doubt, the uncertainty of success,
of future events, the scruples of conscience on account
of a sin committed ; but the result, the purpose of the
sacrifice, is self-consciousness, courage, enjoyment, the
certainty of success, liberty and happiness. As a ser
vant of Nature I observe the sacrifice ; as her master
I depart from it. Therefore, although the feeling of
dependence upon Nature is the source and motive of
religion : its very purpose and end is the destruction
of such feeling, the independence from Nature. Or,
although the divinity of Nature is the basis, the
foundation of religion generally and of Christian reli
gion in particular, still its end is the divinity of man.
30. Religion has for its presupposition the contra
diction between will and ability, desire and satisfaction,
intention and success, imagination and reality, thought
and existence. In his desire, in his imagination, man
is unlimited, free, almighty—God ; but in his ability,
in reality, he is bound, dependent, limited—man ; man
in the sense of a finite being, in contradistinction from
God. “ Man proposes, God disposes,” as the saying is.
“ Man plans and Jove accomplishes it differently.”
The thought, the will is mine ; but what I think and
will is not mine, is outside of me, does not depend on
me. The destruction of such a contradiction is the
tendency, the purpose of religion ; and that being in
which it is destroyed, and wherein that which I wish
5 Under this head we may also mention the many rules of
etiquette which the ancient religions lay upon man in his inter
course with Nature,in order not to pollute or to violate her. Thus,
e.g., no worshipper of Ormuzd was permitted to tread barefoot on
the ground, because earth was sacred; no Greek was allowed to
ford a river with unwashed hands.
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
and imagine as possible, which, however, my limited
power proves to be impossible for me, is possible, nay
even real—that being is the divine being.
31. That which is dependent from the will and the
knowledge of man is the original, proper, characteristic
cause of religion—the cause of God. “ I have planted,”
says Paul, “ Apollos watered, but God gave the increase.
So then neither is he that planteth anything, neither
he that watereth, but God that giveth the increase.”
And Luther says: “ We must praise and thank God
that he suffers grain to grow, and acknowledge that it
is not our work, but his blessing and his gift, if grain
and wine and all sorts of fruit grow which we eat and
drink to satisfy our wants.” And Hesiod says, that
the industrious husbandmen will richly harvest if
Jove grants a good end. The tilling of the soil then,
the sowing and watering of the seed, depends on me,
but not the success. This is in God’s hand, therefore
it is said : “ God’s blessing is the main thing.” But
what is God ? Originally nothing but Nature, or the
essence of Nature ; but Nature as an object of prayer,
as an exorable and consequently willing being. Jove
is the cause or the essence of meterorological
phenomena ; but this does not yet constitute his divine,
his religious character ; also he who is not religious
assumes a cause of the rain, of the thunderstorm, of
the snow. He is God only, because and in so far as
these phenomena depend on his good will. That
which is independent of man’s will is, therefore, by
religion, made dependent upon God’s will as far as the
object itself is concerned (objectively); but subjectively
(as far as man is concerned) it is made dependent on
prayer, for what depends on will is an object of
prayer and can be changed. “Even the gods are
pliable. A mortal can change their minds by incense
and humble vows, by libations and perfume.”
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
37
32. The only or at least the 'principal object of
religion is an object of human purposes and wants, at
least where man has once risen beyond the unlimited
arbitrariness, helplessness and accidentalness of
Fetishism proper. For this very reason those
natural beings which are most necessary and
indispensable to man enjoyed also the most general
and the highest religious adoration. But whatever is
an object of human wants and purposes, is for the same
reason an object of human wishes. I need rain and
sunshine for the successful growth of my seeds.
In times of continuous drought I therefore wish for
rain ; in times of continuous rain I wish for sunshine.
This wish is a desire whose gratification is not within
my power ; a will, but without the might to prevail,
although not absolutely so, yet at least at a given time,
under certain circumstances and conditions, and such
as man wishes it on the stand point of religion. But
just what my body, my power in general, is unable to
do, is within the power of my wish. What I ask and
wish for, that I enchant and inspire by my wishes.6
While under the influence of an affect—and religion
roots only in affect, in feeling—man places his
essence without himself; he treats as living what is
without life, as arbitrary what has no will ; he
animates the object with his sighs, for he cannot
possibly in a state of affect address himself to an
insensible being. Feeling does not confine itself
within the limits prescribed by intellect; it gushes
over man; his breast is too narrow for it; it must
communicate itself to the outer world and by so doing
make the insensible essence of Nature a sympathetic
one. Nature enchanted by human feeling, Nature agree
* The expression for to wish is in the ancient German language
the same as that for to " enchant.”
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
ing with and assimilated to man’s feeling, i.e., N ature
herself endowed with feeling, is Nature such as she is
an object of religion, a divine being. The wish is the
origin, the very essence of religion the essence of the
gods is nothing but the essence of the wish.7 The gods
are superhuman and supernatural beings ; but are not
wishes also of a superhuman and supernatural nature ?
e.g., am I in my wish, in my imagination still a man if I
wish to be an immortal being, free from the fetters of
the earthly body ? No ! He who has no wishes has no
gods either. Why did the Greeks lay such a stress
upon the immortality and happiness of the gods ?
Because they themselves did not wish to be mortal
and unhappy. Where no lamentations about man’s
mortality and misery are heard, no hymns are heard in
honor of the immortal and happy gods. Only the
water of tears shed within the human heart evaporates
in the sky of imagination into the cloudy image of the
divine being. From the universal stream, Ocean os,
Homer derives the gods ; but this stream abounding
with gods is in reality only an efflux of human feelings.
33. The irreligious manifestations of religion are
best adapted to disclose in a popular manner the origin
and essence of religion. Thus it is an irreligious
manifestation of religion and therefore most severely
criticised already by the pious heathen, that as a gene
7 The gods are blissful beings. The blessin g is the result, the
fruit, the end of an action which is independent fiom, but desired
by me. “ To bless,” says Luther, “ means to wish something good.”
“If we bless, we do nothing else but to wish something good, but we
cannot g ve what we wish; but God’s blessing sounds fulfilment and
soon proves its effect.” That means: men are desiring beings;
the gods are those beings which fulfil th desire. Thus even in
common fife the wor.l God. so frequently used, is nothing but the
expression of a wish. “ May God grant you childrenI” That
means: I wish you children, with the only difference that the
latter expression contains the wish as a subjective, not religious
one, while the former implies it as an objective religious one.
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
39
ral thing man takes recourse to religion, that he applies
to God and thinks of him, only in times of misfortune ;
but this very fact reveals to us the source of religion.
In times of misfortune or distress, no matter whether
it be his own or another one’s, man realises the painful
experience of his inability to do what he wishes—he
finds his hands tied. But the palsy of the motory
nerves is not at the same time also the palsy of the
sensory nerves ; the fetters of my physical power are
not also at the same time the fetters of my will, of my
heart. On the contrary, the more my hands are tied,
the more boundless are my wishes, the more ardent is
my desire for redemption, the more energetic my strife
after freedom, my will not to be limited. The power
of the human heart or will which by the influence of
distress has been exaggerated and over-excited to a
superhuman one, is the power of the gods for whom
there is no necessity nor limit. The gods are able to
do what man desires, i.e., they obey the laws of the
human heart. What man is only in regard, to his soul,
the gods are also physically ; what he can do only
within his will, his imagination, his heart, i.e., mentally,
as e.g., to be in the twinkling of an eye at a distant
place, that the gods are able to do physically. The
gods are the embodied, realised wishes of man—the
natural limits of man’s heart and will destroyed—
creatures of the unlimited will, creatures whose
physical powers are equal to those of the will. The
irreligious manifestation of this supernatural power of
religion is the practice of witchcraft among uncivilised
nations, where in a palpable manner the mere wilj
of man appears as God, commanding over Nature.
But when the God of Israel at Joshua’s command
bids the sun stand still or suffers it to rain in com
pliance with Elijah’s prayer, and when the God
of the Christians for the sake of proving his divinity,
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the essence of religion.
essence9 of Nature, or at least what appears to them
as such. Upon the standpoint of natural religion man
declares his loves to a statue, to a corpse ; no wonder
therefore, that in order to make himself heard he
resorts to the most desperate, most insane means ; no
wonder that he divests himself of his humanity in
order to render Nature humane, that he even sheds the
blood of man in order to inspire her with human
feelings.
Thus the northern Germans believed
expressly that “sanguinary sacrifices were apt to
bestow human language and feel ings to wooden idols
and to endow with the gifts of language and divination
the stones which they adored in the houses devoted to
gory sacrifices.” But in vain are all attempts to imbue
her with life ; Nature does not respond to man’s
lamentations and questions ; she throws him inexorably
back upon himself.
36. As the limits which man imagines or at least
such as he imagines them on the standpoint of
religion (as e.g. the limit which is the cause that he
does not know the future, or does not live forever, or
does not enjoy happiness without interruption and
molestation, or has no body withou t weight, or cannot
fly like the gods, or cannot thunde r like Jove, or cannot
add anything to his size nor make himself invisible at
will, or cannot, like the angels, live without sensual
wants and impulses, or in short cannot do what he
wills and desires)—as all these limits are such only in
his imagination and mind, while in reality they are
no limits, because they have their necessary foundation
in the essence, in the nature of things ; so also is that
being which is free from such limits, the unlimited
divine being, only a creature of imagination, of
reflection, and of a mental disposition which is
9 Under this head we may also consider the adoration of per
nicious animals.
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
43
governed by imagination Whatever therefore may
be the object of religion, be it even only a snail shell
or pebble, it is such an object only in its quality as a
creature of the heart, of reflection, of imagination.
This justifies the assertion that men d o not adore the
stones, the trees, the animals, the rivers themselves,
but the gods within them, their manitous, their spirits.
But these spirits of natural objects are nothing but
their reflected images or they as reflected objects, as
creatures of imagination in distinction from them as
real, sensual objects, just as the spirits of the dead are
nothing but the imagined images of the dead which
live in our remembrance—beings that once really
existed, as imagined beings, which however by
religious man, i.e., by him who does not discriminate
between the object and its idea, are considered to be
real, self-existing beings. Man’s pious, involuntary
self-deception upon the standpoint of religion is
therefore within the natural religion an apparent, selfevident truth ; for here man gives to his religious
object eyes and ears which he knows and sees to be
artificial eyes and ears of stone or wood, and yet
believes to be real eyes and ears. Thus religious man
has his eyes only in order not to see, to be stone blind,
and his reason only in order not to reason, to be block
headed. Natural religion is the manifest contradiction
between idea and reality, between imagination and
truth. What in reality is a dead stone or log, is in the
conception of natural religion a living individual;
apparently, no God, but something entirely different,
yet invisibly, according to belief, a God. For this
reason, natural religion is always in danger of being
most bitterly undeceived, as it requires only a blow
with an axe in order to satisfy her, e.g., that no blood
flows from adored trees, and that therefore no living,
divine beiug dwells within them. But how does
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
religion escape these strong contradictions aud dis
appointments to which she is exposed by adoring
Nature ? Only by making her object an invisible, not
sensual one, by making it a being that exists only in
faith, reflection, imagination—in short, within the
mind, which therefore itself is a spiritual being.
37. As soon as man from a merely physical being
becomes a political one, or in general a being dis
tinguishing himself from Nature, and concentrating
himself within himself, his God is also changed from
a merely physical being into a political one, different
from Nature. That which leads man to a distinction
of his essence from Nature, and in consequence to a
God distinguished from Nature, is therefore only his
association with other men to a commonwealth, wherein
the objects of his consciousness and of his feeling of
dependence are powers distinguished from those of
Nature and existing only in thought or imagination ;
political, moral, abstract powers, such as the power of
law, of public opinion,1 of honor, of virtue—while his
physical existence is subordinated to his human,
political or moral existence, and where the power of
Nature, the power over death and life, is degraded to
an attribute and instrument of political or moral power.
Jove is the God of lightning and thunder; but he
possesses these terrible weapons only in order to crush
those who disobey his commandments, the perjurer,
the perpetrators of violence. Jove is father of the
kings—“ from Jove are the kings.”
With lightning and thunder, therefore, Jove sustains
the power and dignity of the Kings.2 “ The King,”
1 Hesiod expressly says; also pheme (i.e., fame, rumor, public
opinion) is a deity.
* The original kings, however, are well to be distinguished from
the legitimate ones, so-called. The latter, except in some extra
ordinary instances, are ordinary individuals, insignificant in
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
45
we read in the law-book of Menu, “ burns eyes and
hearts like the sun, therefore no human creature upon
earth is able even to look upon him. He is fire and
air, he is sun and moon, he is the God of criminal laws.
Fire burns only a single one who by carelessness may
have approached too near to it, but a King’s fire when
he is in wrath burns a whole family with all their
cattle and property ... In his courage dwelleth con
quest and death in his wrath.” In a similar manner
the God of the Israelites commands amid lightning
and thunder his people to walk in all ways which he
has commanded them “ in order that they may prosper
and live long in the land.” Thus the power of Nature
as such and the feeling of dependence on her disappears
before political or moral power ! Whilst the slave of
Nature is so blinded by the brilliancy of the sun, that
he like the Katchinian Tartar daily prays to him ; “4o
not kill me,” the political slave on the other hand is so
much blinded by the splendor of royal dignity, that he
prostrates himself before it as before a divine power,
because it commands over death and life. The titles
of the Roman Emperors, even still among the Chris
tians were : “ Your divinity,” “ Your eternity.” Nay,
even now-a-days among Christians “Holiness” and
“ Majesty,” the titles and attributes of Deity, are titles
and attributes of kings. It is true the Christians try
to justify this political idolatry with the notion that
the king is nothing but God’s representative upon earth,
themselves, while the former were extraordinary, dis tinguished,
historical individuals. The deification of distinguished men,
especially after their death, forms therefore the most natural
transition from the properly naturalistic religions to the mytho
logical and anthropological ones, although it may also take place
at the same time with natural adoration. The worshipping of
distinguished men, however, is by no means confined to fabulous
times. Thus the Swedes deified their king Erich at the time of
Christianity and sacrificed unto him after his death.
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
God himself being the King of kings. But such a
justification is only a self-deception. Not considering
that the king’s power is a very sensible, direct, and
sensual one which represents itself, while that of the
King of kings is only an indirect and reflected one—
God is defined and regarded as the world’s ruler, as a
royal or political being in general, only where the
royal being occupies, influences and rules man so as to
be considered by him as the supreme being. “ Brahma,”
says Menu, “formed in the beginning of time for
his service the genius of punishment with a body of
pure light as his own son, nay even as the author of
criminal justice, as the protector of all things created.
Fear of punishment enables this universe to enjoy its
happiness.” Thus man makes even the punishment of
his criminal code divine, world-governing powers, the
criminal code itself the code of Nature. No wonder
that he makes Nature to sympathise most warmly with
his political sufferings and passions, nay, that he even
makes the preservation of the world dependent on the
preservation of a royal throne or of the Holy See.
What is important to him naturally is also of import
ance for all other beings ; what dims his eye, that also
dims the brilliancy of the sun ; what agitates his heart,
that also moves heaven and earth—his being to him is
the universal being, the world’s being, the being of
beings.
38. Why has the East not a living, progressive history
such as the West ? Because in the East to man Nature
is not concealed by man, nor the brilliancy of the
stars and precious stones by the brilliancy of the eye,
nor the meteorological lightning and thunder by the
rhetorical “ lighting and thunder,” nor the course of
the sun by the course of daily events, nor the change
of the year’s seasons by the change of fashion. It is
true, the eastern man prostrates himself into the dust
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
47
before the magnificence of royal, polical power and
dignity, but this magnificence itself is only a reflex of
the sun and the moon ; the king is an object of his
adoration not as an earthly and human, but as a
heavenly and divine being. But man disappears by
the side of a God ; only where the earth is depopulated
of gods, where the gods ascend into heaven and change
fr om real beings to imagined ones ; only there men
have space and room for themselves, only there they
can show themselves without any restraint as men and
put themselves forward as such. The eastern man
bears the same relation to the western man as the
husbandman to the inhabitants of the city. The
former depends on Nature, the latter on man ; the
former is led by the barometer, the latter by the state
of the stock-market ; the former by the ever equal
constellations of the zodiac, the latter by the ever
fluctuating signs of honor, fashion and public opinion.
Only the inhabitants of cities, therefore, make up
history, only human “ vanity ” is the principle of
history, only he who can sacrifice Nature’s power to
that of opinion, his life to his name, his physical
existence to his existence in the mouth and in the
remembrance of generations to come—he only is
capable of historical deeds.
39. According to Athenseus, the Greek writer of
comic plays, Anaxandrides addresses the Egyptians as
follows : “ I am not fit for your society ; our manners
and laws do not agree,—you adore the ox which I
sacrifice to the gods ; the eel to you is a great god, but
to me a great dainty ; you shun pork, I enjoy it with a
relish ; you revere the dog, I beat him if he snaps a
morsel from me ; you are startled if something is the
matter with the cat, I am glad of it and strip off her
skin ; you give a great deal of importance to the shrewmouse, I none.” This address perfectly characterises
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
the contrast between the bound and the unbound, z'.e.,
between the religious and irreligious, free, human con
sideration of Nature. There Nature is an object of
adoration, here of enjoyment; there man exists for
Nature’s sake, here Nature for man’s sake ; there she
is the end, here the means ; there she stands above,
here below man.8 For this very reason man is there
eccentric, out of himself, out of the sphere of his des
tination, which points him only to himself ; here, on
the other hand, he is considerate, sober within himself,
self-conscious. There man degrades himself con
sistently even to coition with animals (according to
Herodotus), in order to prove his religious humility
before Nature ; but here he rises in the full conscious
ness of his power and dignity up to amalgamation with
the gods as a striking proof that even in the heavenly
god’s courses no other than human blood, and that the
peculiar ethereal blood of the gods, is only a poetical
imagination which does not hold good in reality and
practice.
40. As the world, as Nature appears to man, so she
is, i.e. for him, according to his imagination ; his sen
sations and imaginations are to him directly and
unconsciously the measure of truth and reality ; and
Nature appears to him just as he is himself. As soon
as man perceives that in spite of sun and moon, heaven
and earth, fire and water, plants and animals, man’s
life requires the application and even the just applica
tion of his own powers ; as soon as he perceives that
“the mortals unjustly complain of the gods, and that
they themselves, in spite of faith, through imprudence,3
3 I range here the Greeks with the Israelites, while in my
Essence of Christianity I contrast them with each other. This is
by no means a logical contradiction, for things which, when com
pared with one another are different, coincide in co nparison with
a third thing. Besides, enjoyment of Nature includes also her
aesthetic, theoretical enjoyment.
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
produce their misery,” that the consequences of vice
and folly are disease, unhappiness and death, but those
of virtue and wisdom, health, life and happiness, and
that, therefore, those powers which influence man’s
destiny are intellect and will ; as soon, therefore, as
man, no more like the savage, is a being governed by
the habits of momentary impressions and effects, but
becomes a being which decides himself by principles,
rules of wisdom, laws of reason—i.e., a thinking,
intelligent being—then also Nature, the world, appears
and is to him a being dependent on, and influenced by,
intellect and will.
41. When man with his will and intellect rises above
Nature and becomes a supernaturalist, then also God
becomes a supernatural being. When man established
himself as a ruler “ over the fishes in the sea, and over
the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all
the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth
over the earth,” then the Government of Nature is to
him the highest idea, the highest being ; the object of
his adoration, of his religion therefore, the creator of
Nature, for creation is a necessary consequence, or
rather presupposition, of Government. If the Lord of
Nature is not also her author, then she is independent
of him as to her origin and existence, his power is
limited and deficient;—for if he had been able to
create her, why should he not have created her ?—his
government is only an usurped one, no inherent, legal
one. Only what I produce and make is entirely within
my power. Only from authorship the right of
property is to be derived. Mine is the child, because I
am his father. Therefore, only in creation government
is acknowledged, realised, exhausted. The gods of the
heathen were also already masters of Nature, it is true,
but no creators of hers, therefore they were only
constitutional, limited, not absolute monarchs of
D
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
Nature, i.e. the heathen were not yet absolute,
unconditional, radical supernaturalists.
42. The Theists have declared the doctrine of the
unity of God a revealed doctrine of supernatural origin,
without considering that the source of Monotheism is
in man, that the source of God’s unity is the unity of
the human conscience and mind. The world is spread
before my eyes in endless multitude and diversity, but
still all these numberless and various objects : sun,
moon and stars, heaven and earth, the near and the
distant, the present and the absent, are embraced by
my mind, my head. This being of the human mind
or conscience, so wonderful and supernatural for
religious, i.e. uneducated man, this being which is not
restrained by any limits of time or space, which is not
limited to any particular species of things, and which
embraces all things and beings without being himself
an object or visible being—this being is, by Monotheism,
placed at the head of the world, and made its cause
God speaks, God thinks the world and it is, he says
that it is not, he thinks and wills it not, and it does
not exist, i.e. I can in my imagination cause at will all
things and consequently also the world itself to come
and to disappear, to originate and to pass away. That
God has also created the world from nothing, and, if
he will, thrusts it again into nothing, is nothing but
the personification of the human power of abstraction
and imagination, which enables me at will to imagine
the world as existing or not existing, and to affirm or
deny its existence. This subjective or imagined
non-existence of the world, is by Monotheism made
its objective, real non-existence. Polytheism and
natural religion in general make the real objects
imagined ones. Monotheism, on the other hand,
makes imagined objects and thoughts real objects, or
rather the essence of intellect, will and imagination
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
51
the most real, absolute, supreme being. The power of
God, says a theologian, extends as far as the imaginative
power of man, but where is the limit of this power ?
What is impossible to imagination ? I can imagine
everything that is, as not existing, and everything
that does not exist as real ; thus I can imagine “ this ”
world as not existing, and on the other hand, number
less other worlds as existing. What is imagined as
real is possible. But God is the being to whom
nothing is impossible, he is the creator of numberless
worlds, as far as his power is concerned, the possibility
of all possibilities, of everything that can be imagined ;
i.e. in reality, he is nothing but the realisation or
personification of human imagination, intellect and
reflection, thought or imagined as real, nay, as the
most real, as the absolute being.
43. Theism, properly so-called, or Monotheism,
arises only where man refers Nature only to himself,
because she suffers herself to be used without will
and consciousness, not only to his necessary, organic
functions, but also to his arbitrary, conscious purposes
and enjoyments, and where he makes this relation her
essence, consequently making himself the purpose, the
centre and unity of Nature.4 Where Nature has her
end outside of herself, she necessarily has also her
cause and beginning without herself ; where she exists
only for another being, she necessarily exists also by
another being, and that by a being whose intention or
end at the time of her creation was man, as that being
who was to enjoy and to use Nature for his good.
4 An ecclesiastical writer expressively calls man “ the tie of all
things” (syndesmon hapantori), because God in him wished to
embrace the universe into a unity, and because, therefore, in him
all things as in their end are combined, and result in his advantage.
And certainly man, as Nature's individualised essence, is her con
clusion, but not in the anti-natural and supernatural sense o:
teleology and theology.
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
The beginning of Nature coincides therefore with God
only where her end coincides with man, or in other
words, the doctrine that God is the creator of the
world has its source and sense in the doctrine that man
is the end of creation. If you feel ashamed of the
belief that the world is created, made for man, then
you must feel ashamed of the belief that it is created,
made at all. Where it is written : “ In the beginning
God created the heaven and the earth,” there it is also
written : “ God made two great lights. He made the
stars also, and set them in the firmament of the heaven,
to give light upon the earth, and to rule over the day
and the night.” If you declare the belief in man as
the end of Nature to be human pride, then you must
also declare the belief in the creator of Nature to be
human pride. That light only which shines on
account of man is the light of theology, that light only
which exists exclusively on account of the seeing being,
presupposes also a seeing being as its cause.
44. The spiritual being which man places above
Nature and pre-supposes as her founder and creator, is
nothing but the spiritual essence of man himself,
which, however, appears to him as another one,
different from and incomparable to himself, because
he makes it the cause of Nature, the cause of effects
which man’s mind, will, and intellect cannot produce,
and because he consequently combines with that
spiritual essence of man the essence of Nature, which
is different.® It is the divine spirit who makes the
grass grow, who forms the child in the womb, who
holds and moves the sun in his course, who piles up
6 This union, or the amalgamation of the "moral’’ and
“physical ” of the human and not human being, produces a third,
which is neither Nature nor man, but which participates of both,
like an amphibial, and which, for this very mystery of its nature,
is the idol of mysticism and speculation.
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
53
the mountains, commands the winds, encloses the sea
within its limits. What is the human mind compared
with this spirit! How small, how limited, how vain !
If, therefore, the rationalist rejects God’s incarnation,
the union of the divine and human nature, he does so
particularly because the idea of God in his head hides
only the idea of Nature, especially of Nature such as
she was disclosed to the human eye by the telescope
of astronomy. How should—thus, he exclaims, pro
voked—how should that great, infinite, universal
being, which has its adequate representation and effect
only in the great, infinite universe, descend for man’s
sake upon the earth, which certainly disappears into
nothing before the immeasurable greatness and fulness
of the universe ? What unworthy, mean, “ human ”
imagination ! To concentrate God upon earth, to
plunge God into man, is about the same as to try to
condense the ocean into one drop, to reduce the ring
of Saturn into a finger-ring. Truly it is a rather
narrow idea to think the universal being as limited
only to earth or man, and to believe that Nature exists
only on his account, that the sun shines only on account
of the human eye. You do not see, however, short
sighted rationalist, that it is not the idea of God, but
the idea of Nature, which within yourself objects to
a union of God and man, and shows it to be a non
sensical contradiction ; you do not see that the centre
of union, tertium comparationis, between God and
man is not that being to which you directly or indi
rectly attribute the power and effects of Nature, but
rather that being which sees and hears because you
see and hear ; which possesses consciousness, intellect,
and will because you possess these faculties, or, in
other words, that being which you distinguish from
Nature because you distinguish yourself from her.
What, then, can you really object if this being finally
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
appears as a real man before your eyes ? How can
you reject the consequences if you adhere to the pre
mises ? How can you deny the son if you acknow
ledge the father ? If the God-man to you is a creature
of human imagination and self-deification, then you
must acknowledge also the creator of Nature to be a
creature of human imagination and self-exaltation over
Nature. If you wish for a being without any anthro
pomorphism, without any human additions, be they
additions of the intellect, or the heart, or of imagina
tion, then be courageous and consistent enough to give
up God altogether, and to appeal only to pure, naked,
godless Nature as to the last basis of your existence.
As long as you admit a difference, so long you incar
nate in God your own difference, so long you incor
porate your own essence and nature in the universal
and primary being ; for as you do not have nor know
in distinction from human nature any other being
than Nature, so, on the other hand, you neither have
nor know any other being in distinction from Nature
than the human one.
45. The conception of man’s essence as an objective
being different from man, or, in short, the personifica
tion of the human essence, has for its pre-supposition
the incarnation of the objective being which is dif
ferent from man, i.e., the conception of Nature as of a
human being.6 Will and intellect therefore appear to
man as the primary powers or causes of Nature only
because the unintentional effects of Nature appear to
him in the light of his intellect as intentional ones, as
ends and purposes ; Nature herself consequently as an
6 Viewed from this standpoint the creator of Nature istherefore
nothing but the essence of Nature, which, by means of abstracting
from Nature, has been distinguished and abstracted from Nature,
and such as she is an object of the senses and by the power of
imagination has been changed into a human or man-like being,
and thus popularised, anthropomorphised, personified.
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
55
intelligent being (or at least as a mere thing of intel
lect). As everything is seen by the sun—the God of
the sun, “ Helios,” hears and sees everything—
because man sees everything in the sunlight, so every
thing in itself has been thought, because man thinks
it; a work of intellect, because for him an object of
his intellect. Because he measures the stars and their
distances, they are measured; because he applies
mathematics in order to understand Nature and her
laws, they have also been applied to her production;
because he sees the end of a certain motion, the result
of a certain development, the function of a certain
organ, this end, function, or result is in itself a fore
seen one ; because he can imagine the opposite of the
position or direction of a heavenly body, nay even
numberless other directions, while at the same time
he perceives that if this direction were changed, also
a series of fruitful, benevolent consequences would be
made impossible, so that he considers this series of
consequences as the motive of that very direction :
therefore such direction has really and originally been
selected with admirable wisdom, and only with regard
to its benevolent consequences, from the multitude of
other directions which also exist only in man’s head.
Thus the principle of thinking is to man, directly
and without discrimination, the principle of existence ;
the thing thought, the thing existing ; the idea of the
object, its essence (the a posteriori the a^rzon). Man
thinks Nature otherwise than she really is; no wonder
that he also pre-supposes as her cause and the cause of
her existence another being than herself, a being
which exists only in his mind—nay, which is even
only the essence of his own mind. Man reverses the
natural order of things ; he founds the world in the
very sense of the word upon its head, he makes the
apex of the pyramid its basis—the first thing in or for
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
the head, the reason, why something is, the first thing
in reality, the cause through which it exists. The
motive of a thing precedes in the mind the thing
itself. This is the reason why to man the essence of
reason or intellect, the essence of thinking not only
logically but also physically, is the first, the primary
being.
46. The mystery of teleology is based upon the con
tradiction between the necessity of Nature and the
arbitrary will of man, between Nature such as she
really is and such as man imagines her. If the
earth were placed somewhere else, if e.g. it were
placed where Mercury now is, everything would
perish in consequence of insupportable heat. How
wisely, therefore, is the earth placed just where
it appears best according to its quality. But in
what does this wisdom consist ? Only in the con
tradiction, in the contrast to human folly, which arbi
trarily in thought places the earth somewhere else than
where it is in reality. If you first tear asunder what
in Nature is inseparable, as for instance, the astronomi
cal place of a heavenly body from its physical quality,
then certainly the unity in Nature must afterwards
appear to you as expediency, necessity of plan, the real
and necessary place of a planet which agrees with its
nature in contrast to the unfit one which you have thought
of and chosen as the reasonable one which has been
justly chosen and wisely selected. “ If the snow had
a black color, or if such color prevailed in the arctic
regions, all the arctic countries of the earth would be
a gloomy desert, unfit for organic life. Thus the
arrangement of the colors of bodies offers one of the
most beautiful proofs for the wise arrangement of the
world.” Certainly, if man did not change white into
black, if human folly had not disposed arbitrarily of
Nature, no divine wisdom would rule over Nature.
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47. “ Who has told the bird that it has only to raise
its tail if it wants to fly downward, or to depress it, if
it wants to ascend ? He must be perfectly blind who,
in observing the flight of birds, does not perceive any
higher wisdom that has thought in their stead.” Cer
tainly he must be blind, not for Nature, but for man,
who makes his nature the original of Nature, the
power of intellect the original power, who makes
the birds’ flight dependent upon the insight into the
mechanical laws of flying, and who elevates his ideas
abstracted from Nature into laws which the birds apply
to their flight, just as the rider applies the rules of the
art of riding, or the swimmer the rules of the art of
swimming ; with the only difference that to the birds
the application of the art of flying is created with them.
But the flight of birds is founded on no art. Art is
only where also the opposite of art is to be found,
where an organ performs a function which is not
directly and necessarily connected with it, which does
not exhaust its essence, and is only a particular function
by the side of many other real or possible functions of
the same organ. But the bird cannot fly otherwise
than it does, nor is it at liberty not to fly ; it must fly.
The animal always knows how to do only that which it
is able to do, and for this very reason it can do this
one thing so perfectly, so masterly, so unsurpassably,
because it does not know anything else, because its
power is exhausted in this one function, because this
one function is identical with its nature. If we there
fore are unable to explain the actions and functions of
the animals, especially those of the lower ones, which
are endowed with certain artistic impulses, without
presupposition of an intellect which has thought in
their stead, this is only because we think that the
objects of their activity are objects to them in the same
manner as they are objects to our consciousness and
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
intellect. As soon as we consider the works of the
animals as work of art, as arbitrary works, we must
necessarily also consider the intellect as their cause,
for a work of art presupposes choice, intention, in
tellect, and consequently, as we know by experience
that animals do not think themselves, another beingas thinking in their behalf.7 “Do you know how
to advise the spider how it is to carry and to fasten
the threads from one tree to another, from one house
top to another, from a height this side of the water to
another one on the other side ?” Certainly not ; but
do you indeed believe that there is any advice needed
in this instance, that the spider is in the same condition
in which you would be, if you were to solve this
problem theoretically, that for it, as well as for you,
there is any difference between “ this side ” and “ that
side ?” Between the spider and the object to which it
fastens the threads of its net, there is as necessary a
connection as between your bone and muscle ; for the
object without it is for it nothing but the support of
its thread of life, as the support of its fangs. The
spider does not see what you see ; all the separations,
differences and distances which, or at least such as
7 Thus, generally, in all syllogisms from Nature to a God, the
antecedent, the presupposition is a human one; no wonder therefore
that their result is a human being or being similar to man. If the
world, is a machine there must necessarily be an architect. If the
natural beings are as indifferent toward one another as the human
individuals which can be employed and united only by means of
higher power for any arbitrary purpose of state, as for instance
war, there must naturally also be a ruler, a governor, a chief
general of nature—a captain of the cloud—if she shall not' be
dissolved into nothing. Thus man first makes Nature un
consciously a human work, i.e., he makes his essence her funda
mental essence, but as he afterwards or at th t same time perceives
the difference between the works of Nature and those of human
art, his own essence appears to him as another, but analogous,
similar one. All arguments for God’s existence have therefore
cnly a logical or rather anthropological signification, since also
the logical forms are forms of human nature.
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your intellectual eye perceives them, do not at all
exist for it. What therefore to you is an insolvable
theoretical problem, that is done by the spider without
any intellect, and consequently without all those
difficulties which exist only for your intellect. “ Who
has told the vine-fretters that they find their food
in the fall of the year in greater abundance at the
branch and at the bud than at the leaf ? Who has
shown them the way to the bud and to the branch ?
For the vine-fretter which was born upon the leaf, the
bud is not only a distant but an entirely unknown
province. I adore the creator of the vine-fretter and
of the cochineal and remain silent.” Certainly you
must be silent if you make the vine-fretters and
cochineals preachers of Theism, if you endow them
with your thoughts, for only to the vine-fretter viewed
from the standpoint of man is the bud a distant and
unknown province, but not to the vine-fretter itself, to
which the leaf and the bud are objects not as such, but
only as matter which can be assimilated and is chemi
cally related to it. It is therefore only the reflex of
your eye which shows you Nature as the work of an
eye, which obliges you to derive the threads the spider
draws from its hind part, from the head of a thinking
being. Nature is for you only a spectacle, a delight of
the eye ; therefore you think that what delights your
eye, also rules and moves Nature. Thus you make the
heavenly light in which she appears to you, the
heavenly being which has created her ; the rays of the
eye the lever of Nature ; the optic nerve the motory
nerve of the universe. To derive Nature from a wise
creator is to produce children with a look ; to satisfy
hunger with the perfume of food ; to move rocks by
the harmony of sounds. If the Greenlander derives
the shark’s origin from human urine because it smells
to man like it, this zoological genesis has the same
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
foundation as as the cosmological genesis of the Theist,
when he derives Nature from intellect, because she
makes upon man the impression of intellect, and
intention. Certainly the manifestation of Nature for
us is reason, but the cause of such manifestation is as
little reason as the cause of light is light.
48. Why does Nature produce monsters ? Because
the result of a formation to her is not the object of a
pre-existing purpose. Why supernumerary limbs ?
Because she does not number. Why does she place at
the left hand side what generally lies on the right
hand side, and vice versa ? Because she does not know
what is right or left. Monsters are therefore popular
arguments, which for this very reason have been
insisted on already by the Atheists of old, and even by
such Theists as emancipated Nature from the guardian
ship of theology, in order to prove that the productions
of Nature are unforeseen, unintentional, involuntary
ones ; for all reasons which are adduced for the sake
of explaining monsters, even those of the most modern
naturalists, according to which they are only
consequences of diseases of the foetus, would be
done away with, if with the creative or pro
ductive power of Nature at the same time will,
intellect, forethought and consciousness were connected.
But although Nature does not see, she is not therefore
blind; although she does not live (in the sense of
human, that is subjective, sensible life) she is not dead;
and although she does not produce according to
purposes, still her productions are not accidental ones ;
for where man defines Nature as dead and blind, and
her productions as accidental ones, he defines her only
so in contrast to himself, and declares her to be deficient
because she does not possess what he possesses. Nature
works and produces everywhere only in and with conconnection—a connection which is reason for man, for
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wherever he perceives connection, he finds sense,
material for thinking, “ sufficient reason;” system—
only from and with necessity. But also the necessity
of Nature is no human, i.e., no logical, metaphysical or
mathematical, in general no abstracted one ; for natural
beings are no creatures of thought, no logical or mathe
matical figures, but real sensual individual beings ; it is
a sensual necessity and therefore eccentric, exceptional,
irregular, which in consequence of these anomalies of
human imagination, appears even as freedom, or at
least as a product of free will. Nature generally can be
understood only through herself ; she is that being
whose idea depends on no other being ; she alone
admits of a discrimination between what a thing is in
itself and what it is for our conception ; she alone
cannot be measured with any human measure, although
we compare and designate her manifestations with
analogous human manifestations in order to make them
intelligible for us, and although in general we apply,
and are obliged to apply to her, human expressions and
ideas, such as order, purpose, in accordance with the
nature of our language, which is founded only upon
the subjective appearance of things.
49. The religious admiration of divine wisdom in
Nature is only an incident of enthusiasm ; it refers only
to the means, but is extinguished in reflecting on the
purposes of Nature. How wonderful is the spider’s web,
how wonderful the funnel of the ant-lion in the sand !
But what is the purpose of these wise arrangements ?
Nothing but nourishment—a purpose which man in
regard to himself degrades to a mere means. “Others,”
said Socrates—but these others are animals and brutish
men —“ others live in order to eat, but I eat in order to
live.” How magnificent is the flower, how admirable
its structure ! But what is the purpose of this structure,
of this magnificence ? Only to magnify and protect the
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
genitals which man in himself either hides from shame,
or even mutilates from religious zeal. “ The creator of
the vine-fretters and of the cochineals ” whom the
naturalist, the man of theory adores and admires, who
has only natural life for his purpose, is therefore not
the God and creator in the sense of religion. No ! only
the creator of man, and that of man such as he dis
tinguishes himself from Nature, and rises above Nature,
the creator in whom man has the consciousness of
himself, in whom he finds represented the qualities
which constitute his nature in distinction from external
Nature, and that in such a manner as he imagines them
in religion, is the God and creator such as he is an
object of religion.
“ The water,” says Luther, “ which is used in baptism
and poured over the child is also water not of the creator
but of God the Savior.” Natural water I have in common
with animals and plants, but not the water of baptism ;
the former amalgamates me with the other natural
beings, the latter distinguishes me from them. But
the object of religion is not natural water, but the
water of baptism ; consequently not the creator or
author of natural, but of baptismal water, is an object
of religion. The creator of natural water is neces
sarily himself a natural, and therefore no religious,
i.e., supernatural being. Water is a visible being,
whose qualities and effects therefore do not lead us to
a supernatural cause; but the baptismal water is no
object for the corporeal eye ; it is a spiritual, invisible,
supersensuous being, i.e, one that exists and works
only for faith, in thought, in imagination—a being
which therefore requires also for its cause a spiritual
being that exists only in faith and imagination.
Natural water cleanses me only of my physical, but
baptismal water of my moral impurities and diseases ;
the former only quenches my thirst for this temporal,
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
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transient life, but the latter satisfies my desire for life
eternal; the former has only limited, defined, finite
effects, but the latter infinite, all-powerful effects
which surpass the nature of water, and which there
fore represent and show the nature of the divine
being, which is bound by no limit of Nature, the un
limited essence of man’s power to believe and to
imagine, bound to no limit of experience and reason.
But is not also the creator of baptismal water the
creator of natural water ? In what relation therefore
does the former stand to the latter ? In the very same
as baptismal to natural watei’ ; the former cannot exist
if the latter does not exist; this one is the condition,
the means of that one. Thus the creator of Nature is
only the condition for the creator of man. How can
he who does not hold the natural water [in his hand
combine with it supernatural effects ? How can he
who does not rule over temporal life give life eternal ?
How can he whom the elements of Nature do not
obey, restore my body turned to dust ? But who is
the master and ruler of Nature unless it be he who
had power and strength to produce her from naught
by his mere will? He, therefore, who declares the
union of the supernatural essence of baptism with
natural water a contradiction, without sense, may
also declare the union of the supernatural essence of
the creator with Nature such a contradiction ; for
between the effects of baptismal and common water
is just as much or as little connection as between the
supernatural creator and natural Nature. The creator
comes from the same source from which the super
natural, wonderful water of baptism gushes forth.
In the baptismal water we see only the essence of the
creator, of God, in a sensible illustration. How,
therefore, can you reject the miracle of baptism and
other miracles if you admit the essence of the creator,
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
i.e., the essence of the miracle ? Or, in other words,,
how can you reject the small miracle if you admit the
great miracle of creation ? But it is in the world of
theology as in the political world : the small thievesare hanged, the great ones are suffered to escape.
50. That providence which is manifested in the
order, conformity to purpose and lawfulness of Nature,
is not the providence of religion. The latter is based
upon liberty, the former upon necessity ; the latter isunlimited and unconditional, the former limited,
depending on a thousand different conditions; thelatter is a special and individual one, the former isextended only over the whole, the species, while the
individual is left to chance. A Theistic naturalist
says : “ Many (or rather all those in whose conception.
God was more than the mathematical, imagined origin
of Nature) have imagined the preservation of the
world, and especially of mankind, as direct and special,
as if God ruled the actions of all creatures, and led
them according to his pleasure. But, after the con
sideration of the natural laws, we are unable to admit
such a special government and superintendence over
the actions of men and other creatures. . . . We learn
this from the little care which Nature takes of single
individuals.8 Thousands of them are sacrificed
without hesitation or repentance in the plenty of
» Nature however “ cares” just as little for the species or genus.
The latter is preserved because it is nothing but the totality of
tl e individuals which by coition propagate and multiply them
selves. While sin le individuals are exposed to accidental,
destructive influences, others escape them. The plurality is thus
preserved. But still, or rather from the same reasons which
cause the single ii dividual to perish, even species die away. Thus
the Dronte has disappeared, thus the Irish gigantic deer, thus
even nowadays many animal species disappear in consequence of
man’s persecution and of the evermore extending civilisation
from regions where they once or even a short time ago still
existed in great numbers, as, e.g. the seal from some inlands; and
in time will disappear entirely from the earth.
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
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Nature. . . . Even with regard to man we make the
same experience. Not one half of the human race
reach the second year of their age, but die almost
without having known that they ever lived. We
learn this very thing also from the misfortunes and
mishaps of all men, the good as well as the bad, which
cannot well be made to agree with the special pre
servation or co-operation of the creator.”
But a government, a providence which is no special
one, does not answer to the purpose, the essence, the
idea of providence; for providence is to destroy acci
dent, but just that is upheld by a merely general
providence, which therefore is no better than no pro
vidence at all. Thus, e.g., it is a “ law of divine order
in nature,” i.e., a consequence of natural causes, that
according to the number of years also the death of
man occurs in a definite ratio ; that, for instance, in
the first year one child dies out of from three to four
children, in the fifth year one out of twenty-five, in
the seventh one out of fifty, in the tenth one out of
one hundred ; but still it is accidental, not regulated
by this law, depending on other accidental causes, that
just this one child dies, while those three or four
others survive. Thus marriage is an “ institution of
God,” a law of natural providence, in order to multiply
the human race, and consequently a duty for me.
But whether I am to marry just this one, whether she
is not perhaps in consequence of an accidental
organic deficiency unfit or unproductive, that I am
not told. But just because natural providence, which
in reality is nothing but Nature herself, does not come
to my assistance when I come to apply the law to the
special, single case, but leaves me to myself just in
the critical moment of decision, in the pressure of
necessity; I appeal from her to a higher court, to the
supernatural providence of the gods whose eye shines
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
upon me just where Nature’s light is extinguished ;
whose rule begins just where that of natural provi
dence is at an end. The gods know and tell me, they
decide what Nature leaves in the darkness of igno
rance and gives up to accident. The region of what
commonly, as well as philosophically, is called acci
dental, “ positive,” individual, not to be foreseen, not
to be speculated upon, is the region of the gods, the
region of religious providence. And oracles and
prayer are the religious means by which man makes
the accidental, obscure, uncertain, an object of cer
tainty, or at least of hope.9
51. The gods, says Epicurus, exist in the intervals
of the universe. Very well ; they exist only in the
void space, in the abyss which is between the world
of imagination and the world of reality, between the
law and its application, between the action and its
result, between the present and the future. The gods
are imagined beings, beings of imagination which
therefore owe also their existence, strictly speaking,
not to the present, but only to the future and the
past. Those gods who owe their existence to the
past are those who no longer exist, the dead ones,
those beings which live only in mind and imagina
tion, whose worship among some nations constitutes
the whole religion, and with most of them an important
essential part of religion. But far more mightily than
by the past, is the mind influenced by the future ; the
former leaves behind only the quiet perception of re
membrance, while the latter stands before us with the
terrors of hell or the happiness of heaven. The gods
which rise from the tombs are therefore themselves
only shades of gods; the true living gods, the
rulers over rain, and sunshine, lighting and
9 Compare in regard to this matter the expresions of Socrates
in Xenophon’s writings as to oracles.
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thunder, life and death, heaven and hell, owe their
existence likewise only to the powers of fear and
hope, which rule over life and death, and which
illuminate the dark abyss of the future with beings of
the imagination. The present is exceedingly prosaic,
ready made, determined, never to be changed, final,
exclusive ; in the present, imagination coincides with
reality ; in it therefore there is no place for the gods ;
the present is godless. But the future is the empire of
poetry, of unlimited possibility and accident—the
future may be according to my wishes or fears ; it is
not yet subject to the stern lot of unchangeableness ; it
still hovers between existence and non-existence, high
over “ common ” reality and palpability; it still belongs
to another “ invisible ” world, which is not put in
motion by the laws of gravitation, but only by the
sensory nerves. This world is the world of the gods.
Mine is the present, but the future belongs to the gods.
I am now; this present moment, although it will
immediately be past, cannot be taken any more from
me by the gods ; things that have happened cannot be
undone even by divine power, as the ancients have
already said. But shall I exist the next moment?
Does the next moment of my life depend on my will,
or is it in any necessary connection with the present
one ? No ; a numberless multitude of accidents ; the
ground under my feet, the ceiling over my head, a flash
of lightning, a bullet, a stone, even a grape which
glides into my wind pipe instead of passing into the
aesophagus, can at any moment tear for ever
the coming moment from the present one. But
the good gods prevent this violent breach; they
fill with their external, invulnerable bodies, the pores
of the human body which are accessible to all possible
destructive influences ; they attach the coming
moment to the one that is past ; they unite the future
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
with the present; they are, and possess in uninterrupted
continuity, what men—the porous gods—are and
possess, only in intervals and with interruptions.
52. Goodness is an essential quality with the gods ;
but how can they be good if they are not almighty and
free from the laws of natural providence, z.e., from the
fetters of natural necessity, if they do not appear in the
individual instances which decide between life and
death, as masters of nature, but as friends and benefac
tors of men, and if they consequently do not work any
miracles? The gods, or rather Nature, has endowed man
with physical and mental powers in order to be able to
sustain himself. But are these natural means of sustain
ing himself always sufficient ? Do I not frequently come
into situations where I am lost without hope if no super
natural hand stops the inexorable course of natural order?
The natural order is good, but is it always good ? This
continuous rain or drought e.g., is entirely in order ; but
must not I or my family, or even a whole nation, perish
in consequence of it, unless the gods give their aid and
stop it ?1 Miracles therefore are inseparable from the
divine government and providence ; nay, they are the
only proofs, manifestations and revelations of the gods,
as of powers and beings distinguished from Nature ;
to deny the miracles is to deny the gods themselves.
By what are gods distinguished from men ? Only by
their being without limits, what the latter are in a
limited manner, and especially by their being always
what the latter are only for a certain time, for a
i The Christians pray likewise to their God for rain as the
Greeks did to Jove, and believe that they are heard with such
prayers. “ There was,” says Luther, in his table-discourses, « a
o-reat drought, as it had not rained for a long time, and the grain
?n the field began to dry up when Dr. M. L. praye I continually
and said finally with heavy sighs: 0, Lord, pray regard our
petition in behalf of thy promise........... I know that we cry to
thee and sigh desirously: why dost thou not hear us ? And the
very next night came a very fine fruitful rain.”
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moment.2 Men live—living existence is divinity,
essential quality and primary condition of the Deity—
but alas ! not for ever ; they die—but the gods are the
immortal ones who always live ; men are also happy,
but not without interruption as the gods ; men are
also good but not always, and just this constitutes
according to Socrates the difference between Deity and
and humanity, that the former is always good ; accord
ing to Aristotle, men also enjoy the divine happiness
of thinking, but their mental activity is interrupted by
other functions and actions. Thus the gods and men
have the same qualities and rules of life, only that the
former possess them without, the latter with limitations
and exceptions. As the life to come is nothing but the
continuation of this life uninterrupted by death, so the
divine being is nothing but the continuation of the
human being uninterrupted by Nature in general—the
uninterrupted, unlimited nature of man. But how are
miracles distinguished from the effects of Nature?
Just as the gods are distinguished from men. The
miracle makes an effect or a quality of Nature which
in a given case is not good, a good or at least a harmless
one ; it causes that I do not sink and drown in the
water, if I have the misfortune of falling into it; that
fire does not burn me ; that a stone, falling upon my
head, does not kill me—in short, it makes that essence
which now is beneficent, then destructive, now
philanthropic, then misanthropic, an essence always
good. The gods and miracles owe their existence only
to the exceptions of the rule. The Deity is the
destruction of the deficiencies and weaknesses in man
which are the very causes of the exceptions; the miracle
is the destruction of the deficiencies and limits in
Nature. The natural beings are defined and con
2 It is true the omission of the limits has increase and change
for its consequences; but it does not destroy the essential identity.
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
sequently limited beings. This limit of theirs is in
some abnormal cases the cause of their injuriousness
to man ; but in the sense of religion it is not a
necessary one, but an arbitrary one, made by God and
therefore to be destroyed if necessity, i.e., the welfare of
man requires it. To deny the miracles under the pre
text that they are not becoming to God’s dignity and
wisdom in virtue of which he has fixed and deter
mined everything from the beginning in the best
manner, is to sacrifice man to Nature, religion to
intellect, is to preach Atheism in the name of God. A
God who fulfills only such prayers and wishes of men
as can be fulfilled also without him, the fulfilment of
which is within the limits and conditions of natural
causes, who therefore helps only as long as art and
Nature help, but who ceases helping as soon as the
materia medica is at an end—such a god is nothing but
the personified necessity of Nature hidden behind the
name of God.
53. The belief in God is either the belief in Nature
(the objective being) as a human (subjective) being, or
the belief in the human essence as the essence of nature.
The former is the natural religion, polytheism ;3 the
latter, spiritual or human religion, monotheism. The
polytheist sacrifices himself to Nature, he gives to the
human eye and heart the power and government over
Nature ; the polytheist makes the human being depend
ent on Nature, the monotheist makes Nature dependent
on the human being ; the former says : if Nature does
not exist, I do not exist; but the latter says vice versa:
if I do not exist, the world, Nature does not exist. The
first principle of religion is : I am nothing compared
with Nature, everything compared with me is God ;
3 The definition of polytheism generally and without further
explanation as natural religion, holds good only relatively and
comparatively.
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everything inspires me with the feeling of dependence ;
everything can bring me, although only accidentally,
fortune and misfortune, welfare and destruction (but
man originally does not distinguish between cause and
accidental motive) ; therefore everything is a motive
of religion. Religion on the standpoint of such noncritical feeling of dependence is fetishism so-called,
the basis of polytheism. But the conclusion of religion
is : everything is nothing compared with me—all the
magnificence of the stars, the supreme gods of poly
theism disappear before the magnificence of the human
soul ; all the power of the world before the power of
the human heart; all the necessity of dead unconscious
Nature, before the necessity of the human, conscious
being ; for everything is only a means for me. But
Nature would not exist for me, if she existed by her
self, if she were not from God. If she were by herself
and therefore had the cause of her existence in herself,
she would for this very reason have also an indepen
dent essence, an original existence and essence without
any relation to myself, and independent from me.
The signification of Nature according to which she
appears to be nothing for herself, but only a means for
man, is therefore to be traced back only to creation ;
but this signification is manifested above all in those
instances where man—as, e.g., in distress, in danger of
death—comes into collision with Nature, which, how
ever, is sacrificed to man’s welfare—in the miracles.
Therefore the premiss of the miracle is creation ; the
miracle is the conclusion, the consequence, the truth of
creation. Creation is in the same relation to the miracle
as the species to the single individual; the miracle is the
act of creation in a special single case. Or, creation is
theory ; its practice and application is the miracle.
God is the cause, man the end of the world, i.e., God is
the first being in theory, but man is the first being in
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THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
practice. Nature is nothing for God—nothing but a
plaything of his power—but only in order that in an
exigency, or rather generally, she is and can do nothing
against man. In the creator man drops the limits of
his essence, of his “ soul,” in the miracle the limits of
his existence, of his body ; there he makes his invisible,
thinking and reflected essence, here his individual,
practical, visible essence, the essence of the world ;
then he legitimates the miracle; here he only performs
it. The miracle accomplishes the end of religion in a
sensual, popular way—the dominion of man over
Nature, the divinity of man becomes a palpable truth.
God works miracles, but upon man’s prayer, and
although not upon an especial prayer, still in man’s
sense, in agreement with his most secret innermost
wishes. Sarah laughed when in her old age the Lord
promised her a little son, but nevertheless even then
descendants were still her highest thought and wish.
The secret worker of miracles therefore is man, but
in the progress of time—time discloses every secret—
he will and must become the manifest, visible worker
of miracles. At first man receives miracles, finally
he works miracles himself ; at first he is the object
of God, finally God himself ; at first God only in heart,
in mind, in thought, finally, God in flesh. But thought
is bashful, sensuality without shame ; thought is silent
and reserved, sensuality speaks out openly and frankly ;
its utterances therefore are exposed to be ridiculed
if they are contradictory to reason, because here the
contradiction is a visible, undeniable one. This is the
reason why the modern rationalists are ashamed to
believe in the God in the flesh, i.e., in the sensual,
visible miracle, while they are not ashamed to believe
in the not-sensual God, i.e., in the not sensual, hidden
miracle. Still, the time will come when the prophecy
of Lichtenberg will be fulfilled, and the belief in God
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
73
in general, consequently also the belief in a rational
God will be considered as superstition just as well as
already the belief in the miraculous Christian God in
flesh is considered as superstition, and when, therefore,
instead of the church light of simple belief, and instead
of the twilight of rationalistic belief, the pure light of
Nature and reason will enlighten and warm mankind.
54. He who for his God has no other material than
that which natural science, philosophy, or natural
o bservation generally furnishes to him, who therefore
construes the idea of God from natural materials and
considers him to be nothing but the cause or the prin
ciple of the laws of astronomy, natural philosophy,
geology, mineralogy, physiology, zoology and anthro
pology, ought to be honest enough also to abstain from
using the name of God, for a natural principal, is
always a natural essence and not what constitutes the
idea of a God.4 As little as a church which has been
turned into a museum of natural curiosities, still is and
can be called a house of God, so little is a God really a
God, whose nature and efforts are only manifested in
astronomical, geological, anthropological works. God
is a religious word, a religious object and being, not a
physical, astronomical, or in general a cosmical one.
“ Dues et cultus” says Luther, in his table discourses,
“ sunt relativa.” God and worship correspond to one
4 Arbitrariness in the use of words is unbounded. But still no
words are used so arbitrarily, nor taken in such contradictory
significations as the words God and religion. Whence this
arbitrariness and confusion ? Because people from reverence or
from fear to contradict opinions sanctioned by age, retain the old
names (for only the name, the appearance, rules the world, even the
world of believers in God), although they connect entirely different
ideas with them which have been gained only in the course of
time. Thus it was in regard to the Grecian gods which in the
course of time received tbe most contradictory significations;
thus in regard to the Christian God, Atheism calling itself theism
is the religion, anti-Christianity calling itself Christianity is the
true Christianity of the present day.—Mundus vult decipi.
�74
THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
another, one cannot be without the other, for God must
ever be the God of a man or of a nation and is always
in praedicamento relationis, both being in mutual
relation to each other. God will have some who adore
and worship him ; for to have a God and adore him
correspond to each other, sunt relativa, as man and
wife in marriage—neither can be without the other.”
God therefore presupposes men who adore and worship
him; God is a being the idea or conception of whom
does not depend on Nature but on man, and that on
religious man ; an object of adoration is not without
an adoring being, i.e., God is an object whose existence
coincides with the existence of religion, whose essence
coincides with the essence of religion, and which,
therefore, does not exist apart from religion, different
and independent from it, but in whom objectively is
contained no more than what religion contains subjec
tively.5 Sound is the objective essence, the God of
the ear ; light is the objective essence, the God of the
eye ; sound exists only for the ear, light only for the
eye ; in the ear we have what we have in sound:
trembling, waving bodies, extended membranes, gela
tinous substances ; but in the eye we have organs of
light. To make God an object of natural philosophy,
astronomy or zoology, is therefore just the same thing
as making sound an object of the eye. As the tone
exists only in the ear and for it, so God exists only
in religion and for it, only in faith and for it. As
sound or tone as the object of hearing expresses only
the nature of the ear, so God as an object which is
only the object of religion and faith, expresses the
5 A being therefore which is only a philosophical principle, and
consequently only an object of philosophy, but not of religion, of
worship, of prayer, of the heart; a being that does not accomplish
any wishes, nor hear any prayers, is only a nominal God, but not
a God in reality.
�THE ESSENCE OF BELIGION.
75
nature of religion and faith. But what makes
an object a religious one ? As we have seen, onlyman’s imagination and mind. Whether you wor
ship Jehovah or Apis, the thunder or the Christ,
your shadow, like the negro on the coast of Guinea, or
your soul like the Persian of old, the flatus ventris or
your genius—in short, whether you worship a sensual
or spiritual being, it is all the same ; something is an
object of religion only in so far as it is an object of
imagination and feeling, an object of faith ; for just
because the object of religion, such as it is its object,
does not exist in reality, but rather contradicts the
latter, for this very reason it is only an object of faith.
Thus, e.g., the immortality of man, or man as an
immortal being is an object of religion, but for this
very reason only an object of faith, for reality shows
just the contrary, the mortality of man. To believe,
means to imagine that something exists which does not
exist; e.g., to imagine that a certain picture is a living
being, that this bread is flesh, wine blood, i.e., some
thing which it is not. Therefore it betrays the greatest
ignorance of religion if you hope to find God with the
telescope in the sky of astronomy, or with a magnifying
glass in a botanical garden, or with a mineralogic
hammer in the mines of geology, or with the anatomic
knife and microscope in the entrails of animals and
men. You find him only in man’s faith, imagination
and heart; for God himself is nothing but the essence
of man’s imagination and heart.
55. “ As your heart, so is your God.” As the wishes
of men, so are their gods. The Greeks had limited
gods—that means, they had limited wishes. The
Greeks did not wish to live for ever, they only wished
not to grow old and die, and they did not absolutely
wish not to die, they only wished not to die now—
unpleasant things always come too soon for man—only
�76
THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
not in the bloom of their age, only not of a violent,
painful death ;6 they did not wish to be saved in
heaven, only happy, only to live without trouble and
pain ; they did not sigh as the Christians do, because
they were subject to the necessity of Nature, to the
wants of sexual instinct, of sleep, of eating and
drinking ; they still submitted in their wishes to the
limits of human nature ; they were not yet creators
from nothing, they did not yet make wine from water,
they only purified and distilled the waters of Nature
and changed it in an organic way into the blood of the
gods ; they drew the contents of divine and blissful
life not from mere imagination, but from the materials
of the real world; they built the heaven of the gods
upon the, grounds of this earth. The Greeks did not
make the divine, i.e., the possible being, the original
and end of the real one, but they made the real being
the measure of the possible one. Even when they had
refined and spiritualised their gods by means of
philosophy, their wishes were founded upon the
ground of reality and human nature. The gods are
realised wishes ; but the highest wish, the highest
bliss of the philosopher, of the thinker as such, is to
think undisturbed. The gods of the Greek philosopher
at least of the Greek philosopher par excellence, of the
philosophical Jove, of Aristotle—are therefore un
disturbed thinkers; their happiness, their divinity,
• While therefore in the paradise of Christian phantasms man
could not die and would not die if he had not sinned, with the
Greeks man died even in the blissful age of Kronos, but as easily
as if he fell asleep. In this idea t ie natural wish of man is
realised. Man does not wish for imm irtal life : he only wishes
for a long life of physical and mental health and a painless death
agreeable to Nature. To resign the belief in immortality
requires nothing less than an inhuman Stoic re ignation it
requires nothing but to be convinced that the articles of the
Christian creed are founded only upon supernaturalistic, fantastic
wishes, and to return io the simple real nature of man.
�THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
77
consists in the uninterrupted activity of thinking.
But this activity, this happiness is itself a happiness,
real within this world, within human nature—
although here limited by interruptions—a defined,
special, and therefore, in the conception of Christians,
limited and poor happiness which is contradictory
to the essence of true happiness; for Christians
have no limited but an unlimited God, surpassing
all natural necessity, superhuman, extramundane,
transcendental, i.e., they have unlimited, transcendental
wishes which go beyond the world, beyond Nature,
beyond the essence of man—i.e., absolutely fantastic
wishes. Christians wish to be infinitely greater and
happier than the gods of the Olympus ; their wish is
a heaven in which all limits and all necessity of Nature
are destroyed, and all wishes are accomplished ;7 a
heaven in which there exists no wants, no sufferings,
no wounds, no struggles, no passions, no disturbances,
no change of day and night, light and shade, joy and
pain, as in the heaven of the Greeks. In short, the
object of their belief is no longer a limited, defined
god, a god with the determined name of Jove, or Pluto,
or Vulcan, but God without appellation, because the
object of their wishes is not a named, finite, earthly
happiness, a determined enjoyment, such as the enjoy
ment of love, or of beautiful music, or of moral liberty,
or of thinking, but an enjoyment which embraces all
enjoyments, yet which for this very reason is a trans
cendental one, surpassing all ideas and thoughts, the
enjoyment of an infinite, unlimited, unspeakable, in
describable happiness. Happiness and divinity are the
’ Luther e.g. says: “But where God is (i.e. in heaven) there
must also be all good things which even we may possibly wish
for.” Thus in the Koran, according to Savary’s translation it is
said of the inhabitants of Paradise: “ Tous lews desirs seront
comblfs,” (All their wishes will be accomplished.) Only their
wishes are of a different kind.
�78
THE ESSENCE OF RELIGION.
same thing. Happiness as an object of belief, of
imagination, generally as a theoretical object, is the
Deity, the deity as an object of the heart, of the will,8
of the wish as a practical object generally, is happiness.
Or rather, the deity is an idea, the truth and reality of
which is only happiness. As far as the desire of
happiness goes, so far, and no further, goes the idea of
the deity. He who no longer has any supernatural
wishes, has no longer any supernatural beings either.
8 The will, however, especially in the sense of the moralists,
does not constitute the specific essence of religion; because what
I can attain by my will, for that I need no gods. To make
morals the essential cause of religion is to retain the name of
religion, but to drop its essence. One can be moral without God,
but happy—in the supernaturalistic, Christian sense of the word
—one cannot be without God; for happiness in this sense lies
beyond the limits and the power of Nature and mankind, it
therefore presupposes for its realisation a supernatural being
which is and can do, what is impossible to Nature and mankind.
If Kant therefore made morals the essence of religion, he was in
the same or at least a similar relation to Christian religion as
Aristotle to the Greek religion, when the latter made theory the
essence of the gods. As little as a god who is only a speculative
being, nothing but intellect, still is a God, so little a merely moral
being or a “personified law of morals” is still a God. It is true,
Jove already is also a philosopher, when he looks smilingly down
from Olympus upon the struggles of the gods, but he is still
infinitely more; certainly also the Christian God is a moral
being but still infinitely more ; morals are only the condition of
happiness. The true idea which is at the bottom of Christian
happiness, especially in c ntrast to philosophic heathenism, is
however no other than the one, that true happiness can be found
only in the gratification of man’s whole nature, for which reason
Christianity admits also the body, the flesh, to the participation
in the divinity or what is the same thing, in the enjoyment of
happiness. But the development of this thought does not belong
here, it belongs to the Essence of Christianity.
���
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Victorian Blogging
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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The essence of religion : God the image of man. Man's dependence upon nature the last and only source of religion
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Feuerbach, Ludwig [1804-1872]
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Place of publication: London
Collation: vi, [7]-78 p. ; 19 cm.
Notes: First published in German in 1845. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Printed and published by G.W. Foote.
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Progressive Publishing Company
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1890
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N211
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Loos, Alexander (tr)
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Theology
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Natural Theology
NSS
Religions
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PDF Text
Text
GOTT-NATUE
(Theophysis)
Studien fiber monistische Religion
Von
Ernst Haeckel
Alfred Kroner Verlag in Leipzig
1914
MMR
�1
�national secular society
Gott-Nat ur
(Theophysis)
Studien uber monistische Religion
Von
Ernst Haeckel
Alfred Kroner Verlag in Leipzig
1914
�,,Was kann der Mensch im Leben mehr gewinnen,
Als daB sich Gott-Natur ihm ofienbare?
Wie sie das Feste laBt zu Geist verrinnen,
Wie sie das Geisterzeugte fest bewahre!“
Goethe.
*
�Den Lesern der
„Weitratsel“
und
„Leb enswunder“
bei Vollendung seines achtzigsten Lebensjahres
und am Abschlusse seiner
naturphilosophischen Arbeit
gewidmet von
Ernst Haeckel
am 16. Februar 1914
�„Was war ein Gott, der nur von auBen stieBe,
Im Kreis das All am Finger laufen lieBe!
Ihm ziemt’s, die Welt im Innern zu bewegen,
Natur in Sich, Sich in Natur zu hegen,
So daB, was in Ihm lebt und webt und ist,
Nie Seine Kraft, nie Seinen Geist vermiBt
Goethe.
�Inhalt
Seite
Vorwort..................................................................................
7
Religion und Philosophic....................................................... 11
Erkenntnislehre...........................................................................12
Monistische Erkenntnistheorie............................................... 13
Dualistische Erkenntnistheorie
...................................19
Ldsung des Menschen-Ratsels................................................... 21
Anthropologische Fundamente des Monismus.................... 21
Losung des Seelen-Ratsels....................................................... 27
Psychologische Fundamente des Monismus........................ 27
Losung des Substanz-Ratsels................................................... 32
Kosmologische Fundamente des Monismus........................ 32
Losung des Gottes-Ratsels....................................................... 37
Theologische Fundamente des Monismus............................37
Lebensfiihrung (Ethik)............................................................... 47
Abschied . ................................................................................... 56
Anhang.
Synoptische Tabellen.
I. Monistische und Dualistische Religion............................64
II. Hauptformen des Ontheismus....................... . . • . 65
III. Trinitat der Substanz....................................................... 66
IV. Drei Richtungen der Substanzlehre................................67
V. Kritik der Erkenntniswege............................................... 68
VI. Grundrichtungen der Naturphilosophie............................ 69
VII. Ahnenreihe des Menschen: I. Halfte................................ 70
VIII. Ahnenreihe des Menschen: II. Halfte.............................. 71
�„Ist denn so schwer das Ratsel, was Gott und der Mensch
und die Welt sei?
Nein! Doch niemand hort’s gern; darum bleibt es geheim.“
Goethe.
�Vorwort.
Am Schlusse meiner wissenschaftlichen Lebensarbeit angelangt, sehe ich mich — wider Erwarten, — veranlaBt, noch
einmal in Sachen der monistischen Naturphilosophie das Wort
zu ergreifen. Die unmittelbare Veranlassung dazu geben mir
sehr zahlreiche Briefe, welche seit fiinfzehn Jahren von wiBbegierigen Lesern der „Weltratsel“ und „Lebenswunder“ an
mich gelangt sind. In diesen „Gemeinverstandlichen Studien “
hatte ich versucht, meine allgemeinen Anschauungen uber die
hochsten Fragen der Menschheit, uber Gott und Welt, Seele
und Mensch, welche ich als Naturforscher im Laufe fiinfzigjahriger Denkarbeit gewonnen hatte, einem weiteren Kreise
Gebildeter zuganglich zu machen, DaB ich damit einem wirklichen Bediirfnis der Zeit entgegengekommen war, bewies der
ungewohnliche, mir selbst ganz unerwartete Erfolg dieser Bucher.
Die moderne monistische Philosophic ist das natiirliche
Produkt einerseits aus den beispiellosen Fortschritten der gesamten Naturerkenntnis im neunzehnten Jahrhundert, anderseits aus dem stetig wachsenden Bediirfnis der Vernunft, sich
in dem Labyrinthe der dadurch gewonnenen Tatsachen zurechtzufinden und zu einem klaren einheitlichen Weltbilde zu gelangen. Da diese Weltanschauung aber mit den hergebrachten,
durch tausendjahrige Tradition geheiligten Uberzeugungen der
Religion vielfach in Widerspruch gerat und die heftigsten Angriffe der herrschenden dualistischen Philosophie hervorrief,
entspann sich alsbald ein lebhafter „Kampf um die Weltratsel“.
Einerseits wurde dieses bescheidene „Skizzenbuch“ als vollig
�— 8
—
wertlos und irrefuhrend geschmaht, andrerseits als bahnbrechend
und aufklarend uber Gebiihr gelobt. Dabei ergaben sich so
zahlreiche Widerspriiche und MiBverstandnisse auf beiden Seiten, daB ich mich fiinf Jahre spater bewogen fand, in dem Buche
uber die „ Lebenswunder “ einen Erganzungsband der „Weltratsel“ folgen zu lassen. Im Vorwort zu diesen „Gemeinverstandlichen Studien“ liber „Biologische Philosophie “ habe ich
bereits das Wichtigste dariiber mitgeteilt und in den begleitenden 22 „Synoptischen Tabellen“ die wesentlichsten Lehrsatze
der neuen Weltanschauung ubersichtlich zusammengefaBt.
In beiden Buchern war ich bemiiht, moglichst klar und
einfach auf Grund der neuen Entwicklungslehre die wichtigsten
von jenen schwierigen Hauptfragen der monistischen Philosophie
darzustellen, deren Grundziige ich bereits 1866 in der „Generellen Morphologie der Organismen“ festgelegt und bald darauf
in der „Natiirlichen Schopfungsgeschichte“ (1868) einem groBeren Leserkreise zuganglich zu machen versucht hatte. Allein
die unermeBliche Ausdehnung des modernen Erkenntnis-Gebietes, die Unmoglichkeit, alle Seiten desselben gleichmaBig zu
durchdringen, auBerdem die Unvollkommenheit meiner person
lichen Kenntnisse und Darstellungsgabe, hinderten mich trotz
des ehrlichsten Strebens, alle Teile der gestellten Aufgabe gleich
maBig und befriedigend zu losen. So kam es, daB immer
wieder Tausende meiner wiBbegierigen Leser Anfragen uber
verschiedene, sie beunruhigende Unklarheiten und Zweifel an
mich richteten. Besonders wurde vielfach gefragt, in wieweit
die Sicherheit meiner Anschauungen wirklich begriindet und
einwandfrei sei; auch wurde getadelt, daB ich meine Hypothesen
nicht scharf genug von den feststehenden Tatsachen gesondert
habe; ferner, daB die naturwissenschaftlichen und philosophischen
Lehren die Grenzen ihrer gesonderten Gebiete iiberschritten
hatten. Namentlich betrafen diese Bedenken diejenigen Probleme, welche an den Grenzen der Philosophie und Reli
gion, der Biologie und der Physik sich vielfach kreuzen und
beriihren. Auf diese Fragen, die in zahlreichen Briefen gleicher-
�9
weise wiederkehrten, versuche ich in diesen Blattern eine gedrangte Antwort zu geben.
Was nun die gewiinschte Sicherheit der Erkenntnisse betrifft, so muB ich freilich meine freundlichen Leser bitten, stets
im Sinne zu behalten, daB dieselbe immer subjektiv bleibt.
Ich bin ein unvollkommener Mensch und daher auch bei ehrlichstem Streben nach objektiver Wahrheit immer der Moglichkeit des Irrtums ausgesetzt. Die relative Sicherheit meines hier
erneuerten „Glaubensbekenntnisses“ beruht also darauf,
daB ich sechzig Jahre hindurch die Welt und den Menschen
mit lebhaftestem Interesse durchforscht und bei dem ehrlichen
Streben nach moglichst klarer Erkenntnis der Wirklichkeit
stets im Sinne von Goethe „Gott in der Natur “ gesucht
habe; — ferner darauf, daB eine stetig wachsende Zahl von
bedeutenden Naturforschern und Philosophen zu denselben
Ergebnissen gelangt ist.
Jena am 12. Februar 1914.
�Prooemion.
„Im Namen dessen, der Sich selbst erschuf,
Von Ewigkeit in schaffendem Beruf;
In Seinem Namen, der den Glauben schafft,
Vertrauen, Liebe, Tatigkeit und Kraft;
In Jenes Namen, der, so oft genannt,
Dem Wesen nach blieb immer unbekannt:
So weit das Ohr, so weit das Auge reicht,
Du findest nur Bekanntes, das Ihm gleicht,
Und deines Geistes hochster FeuerAug
Hat schon am Gleichnis, hat am Bild genug;
Es zieht dich an, es reiBt dich heiter fort,
Und wo du wandelst, schmiickt sich Weg und Ort;
Du zahlst nicht mehr, berechnest keine Zeit,
Und jeder Schritt ist UnermeBlichkeit!“
Goethe.
(»Gott und Welt.“'
�Religion nnd Philosophie.
Die beiden groBen Gebiete unseres menschlichen Geisteslebens, welche gewohnlich als Religion und Philosophie gegeniibergestellt werden, hangen urspriinglich untrennbar zusammen.
AuBerlich zwar erscheinen beide jetzt scharf getrennt; auf
unseren modernen Universitaten steht noch heute in der Rangordnung der Fakultaten die Theologie als „Religionswissenschaft“ an erster Stelle, wahrend die Philosophie als „Weltweisheit“ die letzte Stelle einnimmt. Die Theologie soli als
„Gottesgelehrtheit“ jenen tiefsten und wichtigsten Urgrund
alles Daseins lehren, welcher unter dem vieldeutigen Begriff
„Gott“ als „hochstes Wesen“ verehrt wird. Die Philosophie
hingegen soil als umfassende „Weltweisheit“ die Fiille aller
von den einzelnen Wissenszweigen gewonnenen Erkenntnisse
in einem gemeinsamen Mittelpunkt sammeln und als „Fiirstin
der Wissenschaften “ ein einheitliches Gesamtbild der Welt
herstellen.
Vielfach wird auch der Gegensatz beider Geistesgebiete so
verstanden, daB die Religion als Glaubenslehre das hohere
Gebiet der Anschauungen umfassen soli, welches der wissenschaftlichen Behandlung verschlossen und nur der iibersinnlichen Offenbarung zuganglich sei. Die Philosophie dagegen
soil sich als universale Wissenslehre auf sicheres, durch sinnliche Erfahrung gestiitztes Wissen beschranken und von dem
schwankenden Glauben absehen. Tatsachlich ist aber dieser
Gegensatz unhaltbar, denn beide Gebiete des Denkens sind
gleicherweise unvollkommen und genotigt, die vielfachen Liicken
des erfahrungsmaBigen Erkennens durch Glaubens-Vorstellungen
auszufiillen, Im Gebiete der Religion beanspruchen dieselben
�12
als unentbehrliche „Glaubenssatze“ oder „Dogmen“ eine unbedingte und absolute Geltung, wahrend sie im Gebiete der
Philosophic als wissenschaftliche Hypothesen zwar zugelassen
werden miissen, aber immerhin nur provisorischen Wert besitzen und jederzeit in Folge fortgeschrittener Erkenntnis durch
bessere ersetzt werden konnen. Der oft betonte scharfe Gegensatz zwischen „ Glauben und Wissen“ besitzt also nicht die ihm
zugeschriebene Wichtigkeit. (Vergl. Kap. 16 der „Weltratsel“.)
Erkeimtnislehre.
Monistische (physiologische) und dualistische
(metaphysische) Erkenntnis-Theorie.
Auf dem schwierigen und dornenvollen Wege zur Erkennt
nis der Wahrheit miissen wir zunachst uns fiber dessen Ziele
und die Mittel zu ihrer Erreichung verstandigen. Wir konnen
zu einer klaren Anschauung vom wirklichen Wesen der Welt
und zum Verstandnis ihrer Ursachen nur dann gelangen, wenn
wir nicht bloB unser Objekt, die Welt, bestimmt vor Augen
haben, sondern auch unsere Fahigkeit zu ihrer Erkenntnis,
unser Subjekt, kritisch gepriift haben. Daher fordert die
moderne Philosophie mit Recht im Beginne ihrer Arbeit eine
kritische, auf Wissenschaft gegriindete „ Erkenntnis-Theorie
wahrend die altere Religion sich mit einem unkritischen, angeblich auf Offenbarung gestutzten, tatsachlich der dichtenden
Phantasie entsprungenen Glauben begniigt.
Bei der Erledigung dieser ersten Frage scheiden sich bereits
die beiden groBen Richtungen, welche die „Weltweisheit“ von
Altersher in zwei entgegengesetzte Lager fiihren, die monistische
oder naturalistische und die dualistische oder metaphysische
Erkenntnislehre. („Lebenswunder“ Kap. 1.)
Unsere monistische oder „naturwissenschaftliche“ Erkenntnistheorie betrachtet die Erkenntnis als einen physiologischen
Natur-ProzeB, dessen anatomisches Organ unser menschliches
Gehirn ist.
�13
Die herrschende dualistische oder „geisteswissenschaftliche** Erkenntnislehre hingegen erblickt in der wahren Erkenntnis einen iibernatiirlichen Vorgang, ein transszendentes
„ Wunder
Die monistische Seelenlehre, als ein Teil der
Physiologie, fordert daher zunachst eine empirische Kenntnis
und eine kritische Beurteilung unseres menschlichen Organismus
und seiner Organe, insbesondere des Gehirns, mithin eine
anthropologische Basis. Die dualistische Psychologie hin
gegen, welche die „Seele“ als ein unsterbliches und iibernatiirliches „Wesen“ betrachtet, verschmaht diese anatomisch-physiologische Kenntnis des Menschen; sie glaubt allein durch
introspektive Analyse, durch metaphysische Spekulation uber
die Erkenntnis-Tatigkeit, und durch dialektisches Spiel mit ihren
Begriffen, zur „Analysis der Wirklichkeit“ zu gelangen.
Monistische Erkenntnistheorie.
Unsere monistische und realistische Erkenntnistheorie be
trachtet als sichere Grundlage aller Wissenschaft ausschlieBlich
die Erfahrung (Empirie). Die anatomischen Organe dieser
physiologischen Tatigkeit sind zwei verschiedene Bezirke unserer
GroBhirnrinde: das Sensorium (Sinneszentrum) und das Phronema (Denkorgan). Die mikroskopischen Elementarorgane
des ersteren sind die Asthetalzellen oder inneren Sinneszellen
diejenigen des letzteren die Phronetalzellen oder Denkzellen.
Die Urquellen aller Erkenntnis sind die auBeren Sinnesorgane;
sie vermitteln direkt den Verkehr des Organismus mit der
AuBenwelt und iibertragen die hier empfangenen Eindriicke
durch die Sinnesnerven auf das innere Sinneszentrum; durch
deren Verkniipfung im Phronema (Assozion oder Assoziation)
entstehen dann die Gedanken. Urspriinglich sind alle Gedanken
und Vorstellungen a posteriori (durch Empirie) erworben. Durch
Assozion der Begriffe entstehen aber neue Erkenntnisse, die
dann scheinbar a priori (ohne vorhergehende empirische Grundlagen) auftreten. Die unbefangene physiologische Kritik dieser
natiirlichen Vorgange fiihrt zum Pantheismus.
�Exakte Erkenntniswege. Die erste Anforderung, welche
die Kritik an die Erkenntnis der Wahrheit stellt, ist moglichst
genaue oder exakte Beobachtung und Beurteilung der Tatsachenu
Im strengsten Sinne ist eine wirklich vollkommene Erkenntnis
nur in der Mathematik moglich, und in denjenigen Gebieten
der Anorgik (der anorganischen Naturwissenschaft), welche
GrbBenverhaltnisse und quantitative Beziehungen behandeln
(theoretische Physik im engeren Sinne, Astronomie, Chemie usw.).
hier ist es meistens moglich, durch Zahl und MaB eine hohe
(wenn auch nicht immer absolute) formale Genauigkeit in der
Beschreibung zu erreichen. Die Objekte der Beurteilung sind
hier meistens verhaltnismaBig einfach und in ihren charakteristischen Eigenschaften relativ gut bekannt.
Ganz anders verhalt es sich in der Biologie (der organischen Naturwissenschaft). Hier sind die Verhaltnisse der Erscheinungen meistens sehr vielseitig und verwickelt, und bieten
wegen ihrer mannigfachen qualitativen Differenzen der Untersuchung viel groBere Schwierigkeiten. Zwar ist es auch hier
vielfach moglich, die einzelnen Seiten der Erscheinungen
mit Hilfe von Zahl und MaB exakt darzustellen, das gilt aber
nicht fur das Ganze und Allgemeine. Vor allem liegt aber
der exakten Erkenntnis der Organismen der Umstand im Wege,
daB wir das Plasma oder die „lebendige Substanz“ (die materielle Basis alles Lebens, den „Lebensstoff“ im eigentlichsten
Sinne!) noch heute nur sehr wenig kennen; selbst die chemische
Natur der EiweiBkorper oder Albuminate, zu denen die millionenfach verschiedenen Plasmakorper gehoren, ist uns noch
sehr ungeniigend bekannt. Es ist daher eine gefahrliche Selbsttauschung, wenn viele Biologen ihr engeres Forschungsgebiet
noch als exakte Naturwissenschaft bezeichnen. Noch weniger
ist es zulassig, die gesamten Naturwissenschaften (zu denen doch
auch viele historische Facher gehoren) als exakte zu bezeichnen
und ihnen alle iibrigen als „Geisteswissenschaften“ gegeniiberzustellen.
Grenzen der Beobachtung. Der sicheren Genauigkeit
�15
der Erfahrung sind enge Grenzen gesetzt schon durch die Beschaffenheit unserer menschlichen Sinnesorgane (Sensilla) und
des Gehirns, in welchem die auBeren Sinneseindriicke durch
das Sensorium (die inneren „Sinnesherde“) iibersetzt und dem
benachbarten Denkorgan (Phronema) zugefiihrt werden. Im
allgemeinen besitzen unsere Sinneswerkzeuge dieselbe morphologische Zusammensetzung und die gleicbe physiologische Arbeitsweise wie die Sensillen der iibrigen Saugetiere und besonders der nachstverwandten Tierarten (speziell der Menschenaffen). Auch entwickeln sie 'sich im Keime auf dieselbe
eigentiimliche Weise; aus dieser ontogenetischen Tatsache ziehen
;wir einen sicheren SchluB auf ihre phylogenetische Entstehung
und stufenweise Entwicklung. Allein im besonderen stehen
die menschlichen Sinneswerkzeuge vielfach in bezug auf quanti
tative und qualitative Ausbildung auf einer tieferen Stufe als
bei vielen anderen Wirbeltieren. AuBerdem aber ist ihr Leistungsvermogen individuell sehr verschieden, was teils die
Folge der Anpassung (Ubung, Gewohnheit, Erziehung), teils
der Vererbung (innerhalb der Basse, des Volkes, der Familie)
ist. Eine sehr gefahrliche Grenze der Beobachtung und eine
Quelle vieler Irrtiimer ist ferner durch die folgenschweren
Sinnestauschungen gegeben. Die normalen Sinnestauschungen
(z. B. in bezug auf Licht und Farbe, Bewegung und lokalisierte
Empfindung) verfiihren zu vielen falschen Schliissen; noch vielmehr die pathologischen Sinnestauschungen, welche in Illusionen,
Halluzinationen, Wahnvorstellungen und andere Geisteskrankheiten ausarten. Deshalb ist bei alien Beobachtungen, die
moglichst exakt sein wollen, scharfste Vorsicht und Selbstkritik
geboten. Aus Mangel an solcher, wie an Erziehung des Phronema, begehen namentlich viele Naturforscher, die auf ihre
„Exaktheit“ stolz sind, die groBten Fehler. (Vgl. Weltratsel,
Kap. 16 und Lebenswunder, Kap. 13.)
Grenzen des Experimentes. Da der wissenschaftliche
Erforschungsversuch, das kunstliche „Experiment“, auch auf
Beobachtung beruht, und nur eine Frage ist, unter welchen
�16
Bedingungen irgendeine Erscheinung eintritt, so gilt dafiir
alles, was wir soeben fur die einfache direkte Beobachtung der
Naturerscheinungen angefuhrt haben. Nur ist hier in noch
hoherem Grade niichterne Selbstkritik, Vorsicht bei der Ausfiihrung und Umsicht bei der Beurteilung der Beobachtung zu
fordern. Die Philosophie des klassischen Altertums, welche
schon vor 2000 Jahren in bezug auf Denktatigkeit eine so hohe
Stufe erlangt hatte und selbst heute noch vielfach nicht iibertroffen ist, kannte die hohe Bedeutung des Experiments nicht.
Erst in den letzten drei Jahrhunderten, besonders seit Bacon und
Galilei, ist sein Wert voll erkannt und gewiirdigt worden. Die
Entwicklung der neueren „Experimental-Wissenschaften“
(Physik, Chemie, Physiologie usw.) im letzten Jahrhundert und
ihre erstaunlich fruchtbare Verwertung fiir die Technik und die
verschiedensten Kulturzwecke haben dem Experiment eine
friiher nicht geahnte Bedeutung verliehen.
Vielfach ist jedoch damit eine gefahrliche Uberschatznng
seines Wertes eingetreten, besonders durch seine Einfuhrung in
solche Wissensgebiete, in denen es nur teilweise oder gar nicht
anwendbar ist, z. B. historische Forschungen und Entwicklungslehre. Der jetzt vielgebrauchte und hochgeschatzte Begriff der
„Experimentellen Entwicklungs-Geschichte“ fiihrt vielfach irre.
Denn man kann die historischen Vorgange bei der Entwick
lung des Embryo, die nach dem Biogenetischen Grundgesetz
nur durch ihren Kausalnexus mit der phyletischen Entwicklung
der Ahnenreihe verstandlich werden, niemals durch Experimente
allein erkennen lernen; diese konnen nur den EinfluB veranderter Bedingungen auf bestimmte einzelne Vorgange feststellen, und also die Physiologie und Pathologie des Embryos
fordern. Die moderne experimentelle Entwicklungsmechanik erfreut sich aber gegenwartig, ebenso wie die Experimental Psychologie, oft deshalb groBer Beliebtheit, weil man auch ohne
geniigende allgemeine biologische Vorbildung „interessante Versuche“ anstellen und durch eine „merkwiirdige Entdeckung
einer unerklarten Tatsache“ sich Ansehen verschaffen kann.
�17
Man kann dabei der umfassenden empirischen Kenntnisse entbehren,. welche nur durch ein mehrjahriges griindliches Studium
in vergleichender Anatomie und Ontogenie, und namentlich
auch in Palaeontologie erworben werden konnen.
Vergleichende Methoden. Unter alien biologischen
Wissenschaften ist fiir unsere monistische Philosophie und
Theologie von hochster Bedeutung derjenige Zweig der Morphologie, welcher als „ Vergleichende Anatomie “ den genetischen
Zusammenhang der vielen tausend organischen Formen kennen
lehrt und ihre endlose Mannigfaltigkeit auf eine gemeinsame
[einfache Quelle zuriickfuhrt. Schon vor 130 Jahren hatte
'Goethe dazu den ersten Anfang gemacht, als er auf der Anatoffiie in Jena den Schadel des Menschen und der iibrigen Saugetiere sorgfaltig vergleichend studierte. Zu einer selbstandigen
PWissenschaft wurde die vergleichende Anatomie im Beginn des
19. Jahrhunderts durch die beiden groBen Pariser Zoologen
George Cuvier und Jean Lamarck erhoben. Ihnen ebenbiirtig
erweiterte dann in Deutschland Johannes Muller ihren Wirkungskreis, indem er die vergleichende Morphologic und Physio
logie mit der von Baer begriindeten Entwicklungsgeschichte
Rrerkniipfte.
Ihre voile Bedeutung als „ Philosophie Zoologique“ im Sinne
hmseres heutigen Monismus erhielt sie aber erst, nachdem
Rjharles Darwin (1859) die Abstammungslehre reformiert und
sein Freund Thomas Huxley (1863) sie auf den Menschen angewandt hatte. Ihre umfassendste und wirkungsvollste AusWhrung erhielt sie durch die klassische „ Vergleichende Anawmie“ von Carl Gegenbaur, dessen zahlreiche treffliche Schuler
noch heute fur ihren Ausbau erfolgreich tatig sind.
Meine eigenen wissenschaftlichen Bestrebungen haben seit
femem halben Jahrhundert das Ziel verfolgt, im Sinne dieser
groBen Meister (die zum Teil noch meine personlichen Lehrer
waren) das wundervolle Gebiet der vergleichenden Morphologie weiter auszubauen und mit Hilfe der modernen Entwicklungslehre zu einer festen Grundlage fur die gesamte
2
�18
monistische Philosophie und Religion zu gestalten. Das Programm dieser zielbewuBten Lebensarbeit habe ich 1866 in
meiner „Generellen Morphologie“ festgelegt und sie in
den vier Monographien der Radiolarien, Spongien, Medusen
und Siphoriophoren weiter ausgefiihrt. Allein das hochste mir
stets vorschwebende Ziel, darauf ein zusammenhangendes System
der monistischen Philosophie aufzubauen, habe ich zu meinem
Bedauern niemals ausfiihren konnen. Ich hoffe jedoch, daB
bald befahigtere und vom Gluck begiinstigtere Nachfolger
dieses herrliche Ziel erreichen werden. Der sicherste Weg
dazu bleibt stets die genetische und vergleichende Methode,
die kritische Verbindung von „ Beobachtung und Reflexion “,
von Empirie und Spekulation.
Historische Methoden. Im Gegensatze zu den sogenannten „exakten“ Naturwissenschaften befinden sich die Geschichtswissenschaften im engeren Sinne; sie behandeln
Erscheinungen, welche nicht unmittelbar der Beobachtung und
dem Experiment der Gegenwart zuganglich sind, sondern der
Vergangenheit angehdren. Ihre Quellen beruhen daher groBtenteils auf Uberlieferung oder Tradition; sie sind mithin dem
Zweifel, der Skepsis ausgesetzt. Soweit sich die Geschichte auf
menschliche Verhaltnisse bezieht (Urgeschichte, Volkergeschichte,
Staatengeschichte usw.), ist diese Uberlieferung um so unsicherer,
je weiter sie in der Zeit zuriickgeht; ihre Urkunden werden
um so sparlicher und unvollstandiger, je weiter sie sich im
Dunkel der Urzeit verlieren. Hier existiert keine scharfe Grenze
zwischen Tradition, Sage, Mythus und Dichtung.
Anders verhalt sich diejenige Geschichte, welche auBermenschliche: Verhaltnisse betrifft, die Stammesgeschichte der
Organismen (Phylogenie), die Geschichte der Erde (Geologie),
die Geschichte der anorganischen Gebilde, des Himmels (Astro
nomic usw.). Hier erlangen die Zeugnisse, welche sich auf reale
Beobachtungen einzelner Zustande stiitzen, durch kritische
Vergleichung und Synthese einen so hohen Grad von Wahrscheinlichkeit, daB die wissenschaftliche Hypothese fur den
�19
kritisch denkenden Naturphilosophen den Wert einer historischen Tatsache gewinnt. Das gilt ganz besonders fur die
Palaontologie und die darauf gestiitzte Stammesgeschichte, na[ mentlich diejenige des Menschen.
Introspektive Methoden. Fur die Erkenntnistheorie der
meisten Philosophen ist in erster Linie die Selbstbeobachtung die wichtigste Quelle, die Spekulation uber die verwickelten Vorgange des Seelenlebens, welche in unserem Innern stattfinden. Soweit es sich dabei um Erscheinungen des BewuBtseins handelt, ist dieser Weg der Erkenntnis durchaus berechtigt;
denn die subjektive „innere Anschauung“ unseres Selbst,
welche die Physiologie mit einer Spiegelung vergleicht, ist
hier uberhaupt der einzig mogliche Weg. Ich habe meine monistischen Ansichten uber dieses „Psychologische Zentral-Mysterium“ im 10. Kapitel der „Weltratsel“ und im 14. Kapitel der
„Lebenswunder“ eingehend dargelegt; dort ist gezeigt, daB diesea
schwierigste Problem der Seelenkunde, ebenso wie alle anderen
psychischen Phanomene, auf physikalische und chemische Prozesse im Phronema, in den Phronetalzellen der Grofihirnrinde
zuriickzufuhren sind. Auch hier liefert uns die vergleichende
und genetische Betrachtung den Schlussel zur objektiven
Losung des Weltratsels, die auf bloB subjektivem Wege ungeniigend bleibt. Das ist um so mehr zu bedenken, als gerade
auf diesem dunkeln Gebiete die Irrwege des Aberglaubens, die
spiritistischen und okkultistischen Verirrungen, sich mit groBem
Erfolge geltend machen und die dualistische Erkenntnistheorie
fordern, zu ungunsten unserer monistischen Philosophie und
vernunftgemaBen Religion.
Dualistische Erkenntnistheorie.
Die herrschende Erkenntnistheorie der Schulphilosophie ist
noch heute, ebenso wie seit zweitausend Jahren, dualistisch und
metaphysisch; im Einklang mit der Theologie behauptet sie, daB
nur ein Teil der Wissenschaft auf Erfahrung (durch die Tatigkeit der Sinnesorgane und des Gehirns) beruhe, der andere,
2*
�20
hohere Teil hingegen auf Offenbarung („Revelation oder Apocalypsis44). Dieser iibernatiirliche (supranaturalistische oder trans*
szendente) ProzeB iibersteigt unsere Vernunftfahigkeit und ist
nur direkt durch „gdttliche Inspiration4* oder durch „Intuition
des Geistes44 moglich; sie wird auch oft als „Inneres Erleben
Gottes44 gepriesen. Die Annahme einer solchen Inspiration
notigt uns zu der Vorstellung, daB die hbheren Gedanken
a priori entstanden und unmittelbar auf gottliche, iibernatiirliche
Eingebung zuriickzufiihren sind. Somit fiihrte die dualistische
Erkenntnistheorie zum Glauben an einen „personlichen Gott45,
zum Ontheismus.
Der prinzipielle Gegensatz der beiden Erkenntniswege, der
monistischen Erfahrung und der dualistischen Offenbarung
gipfelt in der Wertschatzung der Vernunft. Unsere empirische
und monistische Erkenntnislehre, wie sie heute im ganzen Ge
biete der Naturwissenschaften allein gilt, erkennt als Richtschnur ausschlieBlich die „reine Vernunft44 an. Hingegen
behauptet die dualistische Weltanschauung, wie sie noch heute
in den sogenannten „Geisteswissenschaften“ maBgebend ist, in
der Theologie und Schulphilosophie, daB daneben noch die
Forderungen des Gemiites, die Anspriiche der „praktischett
Vernunft44 gelten miissen. Beide stehen in unlosbarem Widerspruch, wie die beriihmten „Antinomien von Immanuel Kant44
zeigen (vgl. die fiinfte Tabelle unten im Anhang, S. 68, und
Kapitel 1 der „Weltratsel44).
Das Gemiit hat mit der Erkenntnis der Wahrheit gar nichts
zu tun. Die Vorstellungen vom Ubernatiirlichen und Transszendenten, die Erzahlungen von Wundern und Geisterspuk
welche hier die Erkenntnis der Wahrheit verdecken, gehoren
dem Gebiete der Dichtung an, nicht der Wissenschaft.
tere legt iiberall den kritischen MaBstab der reinen Vernunft
in der Realwelt an, wahrend die Dichtung sich mit den
Phantasiebildern der Idealwelt begniigt. Die unklaren Vor->
stellungen uber diese zwei Welten, wie sie z. B. in der neuesten
Mode-Philosophie Bergson) — mit schonen Reden, aber sehr
�21
geringer Sachkenntnis! —) erfolgreich vertritt, der Glaube an
eine „hbhere ideale Welt liber der realen Natur “ fiihren direkt
hinuber zu dem Geisterspuk der niederen Naturvolker und dem
Wunderglauben der ontheistischen Religionen.
Die reine Vernunft, deren Begriff durch Kants Kritik
(1781) in den Vordergrund der Erkenntnistheorie gestellt worden
ist, gilt in unserer monistischen Naturphilosophie nur noch in
dem Sinne, daB wir darunter die „voraussetzungslose Erkenntnis“, frei von allem Dogma, unbefangen von alien GlaubensSatzen verstehen. Kant selbst hat spater betont, daB „die
Wahrheit nur in der Erfahrung zu finden ist“ (vgl. Kap. 14
tmd 19 der „Lebenswunder“).
Losung des Menschen-Ratseis.
(Anthropologische Fundamente des Monismus.)
Die Frage vom Wesen des Menschen und seiner Stellung
in der Natur wird von Vielen mit Recht als 'die nachstliegende
und wichtigste Aufgabe der^Wissenschaft betrachtet; sie ist seit
fiinfzig Jahren endgiiltig gelost. Seiner ganzen Organisation
nach gehort der Mensch zum Stamm der Wirbeltiere (Vertebrata) und zwar zu dessen hochststehender Klasse, zu den
Saugetieren (Mammalia). In dieser Klasse wird wieder als
nochst entwickelte Gruppe die Ordnung der Herrentiere
(Primates) betrachtet, zu welcher die Halbaffen (Prosimiae), die
Affen (Simiae) und die Menschen (Homines) gehoren. Die unbefangene vergleichende Anatomie lehrt unzweideutig, daB der
Mensch in alien Beziehungen des groberen und feineren Korperbaues den Affen naher steht als alien iibrigen Tieren. Dasselbe zeigt uns die vergleichende Physiologie in bezug auf alle
Lebenserscheinungen und die vergleichende Ontogenie hinsichtlich der embryonalen Entwicklung.
Die monistische Anthropologie, gestiitzt auf das Biogenetische Grundgesetz, erblickt in der wunderbaren Formenreihe, welche der Mensch wahrend seiner individuellen Ent
�22
wicklung aus der Eizelle durchlauft, eine gedrangte und gekiirzte Wiederholung der Formenreihe, welche seine tierischen
Ahnen wahrend ihrer phyletischen Umbildung im Laufe vieler
Jahrmillionen durchlaufen haben. Die handgreiflichen Beweise
fiir diese historische Transformation liefern uns die versteinerten
Oberreste der ausgestorbenen Wirbeltiere, welche in Sedimentgebirgen der Erde begraben liegen. Die festgestellte historische
Reihenfolge, in welcher die einzelnen Klassen und Ordnungen der
Wirbeltiere nacheinander in denselben auftreten, entspricht vollkommen der Stufenleiter der historischen Entwicklung, welche
wir aus den Ergebnissen der vergleichenden Anatomie und
Ontogenie erschlieBen. Da eine andere Deutung derselben als
eine phylogenetische nicht moglich, auch gar nicht ernstlich
versucht worden ist, so erblicken wir darin den sichersten direkten Beweis fiir die Abstammung des Menschen von einer
langen Reihe ausgestorbener Wirbeltiere, zunachst Herrentiere.
Die viel umstrittene Primaten-Abstammung des Menschen
ist demnach heute keine unsichere Hypothese mehr, sondern
eine unumstoBliche historische Tatsache (vgl. unten Tab. 8).
Die dualistische Anthropologie, welche auch heute noch
in weitesten Kreisen herrschend ist, hat gegeniiber diesen hand
greiflichen „Zeugnissen fiir die Stellung des Menschen in der
Natur“ einen schweren Stand; sie sucht deren Beweiskraft mit
alien Mitteln zu leugnen oder durch falsche Deutung zu entwerten. Die spezifisch christliche Menschenkunde erblickt im
Menschen das „EbenbildGottes“; sie muB daher die verhaBte
„Affen-Abstammungu entweder direkt bestreiten oder durch das
Mysterium des „Siindenfalles“ erklaren. Die verzweifelten Anstrengungen, welche in dieser Richtung sowohl die rechtglaubige
Theologie als auch die dualistische, mit ihr verbiindete Metaphysik seit einem halben Jahrhundert gemacht hat, sind ganzlich erfolglos geblieben; sie haben nur dazu gefiihrt, unsere
Gegenstellung zu befestigen. Wir durfen daher jetzt das groBe
Menschenproblem fur definitiv gelost erklaren. Bei der
fundamentalen Bedeutung dieser wissenschaftlichen Erkenntnis
�23
ist es zweckmaBig, deren wichtigste Fundamente hier nochmals
auf ihre empirische Sicherheit zu priifen.
Anatomische Fundamente (Wl. Kap. 2). Die erste und
unmittelbarste Grundlage der monistischen Menschenkunde bildet die vergleichende Anatomie oder Morphologie. Im Anfange
des 19. Jahrhunderts begriindet, hat sich diese philosophische
Wissenschaft in dessen Verlaufe zu bewunderungswiirdiger Hohe
entwickelt. Kein sachkundiger Zoologe zweifelt mehr daran,
daB der ganze Organismus des Menschen in den allgemeinen
Grundziigen mit demjenigen aller iibrigen Wirbeltiere (Vertebrata) ubereinstimmt, und in alien besonderen Eigentiimlichkeiten mit demjenigen der hochst entwickelten Klasse, der
Saugetiere (Mammalia). Unter diesen letzteren zeichnet sich
wieder die vornehmste Ordnung, die der Herrentiere (Primates)
vor den iibrigen Saugetieren durch viele und wichtige Merkmale des Korperbaues aus; die Halbaffen (Prosimiae) stellen
die altere und niedere, die Affen (Simiae) die jiingere und
hohere Stufe der Primatengruppe dar. Unter den echten Affen
fiihrt wieder eine zusammenhangende Kette von den niederen
Westaffen zu den hoheren Ostaffen hinauf, und unter diesen
bilden die schwanzlosen Menschenaffen den direkten morphologischen Ubergang zum Menschen. Diese nahe „Morphologische Verwandtschaft“ gilt ebenso fur die groberen anatomischen Verhaltnisse aller einzelnen Organe, wie fur die feineren
histologischen Verhaltnisse ihrer Gewebe und der mikroskopischen Zellen, welche diese zusammensetzen. Das sind sichere
Tatsachen von hochster Bedeutung.
Physiologische Fundamente (Wl. Kap. 3). Die Lebenstatigkeiten des menschlichen Organismus, die physiologischen
Funktionen seiner Organe, sind beim Menschen wie bei alien
anderen Tieren, an die anatomische und histologische Beschaffenheit seiner Organe gebunden und durch deren physikalische
und chemische Eigenschaften bedingt. Da deren charakteristische Grundziige bei alien Wirbeltieren im wesentlichen iibereinstimmen und von denjenigen aller iibrigen Tiere verschieden
�24
sind, so ergibt sich ohne weiteres, daB auch in dieser Hinsicht
der Mensch keine Ausnahme von den Wirbeltieren bildet.
Ebenso sind es wieder die Saugetiere, deren besondere physiologische Eigentiimlichkeiten er teilt, und unter diesen wiederum
die Affen. Namentlich gilt das von der eigentiimlichen Form
des Blutkreislaufs und der Atmung, sowie von der Ernahrung
des Jungen durch die Milch der Mutter. Da diese hohere Form
der „Brutpflegew nicht nur andere Organe beeinfluBt, sondern
auch fiir die hohere Seelentatigkeit der Saugetiere von hoher
Bedeutung ist (Mutterliebe, Familienleben, soziale und moralische
Verhaltnisse), so ist besonderes Gewicht auf diese nahe „Physiologische Verwandtschaft“ zu legen. Das sind sichere
Tatsachen.
Ontogenetische Fundamente (Wl. Kap. 4,8). Die Existenz
jeder einzelnen menschlichen Person, ebenso wie diejenige jedes
anderen, geschlechtlich erzeugten Wirbeltieres, beginnt mit dem
Momente der Befruchtung, mit dem Augenblicke, in welchem
die Eizelle der Mutter mit der Spermazelle des Vaters zusammentrifft. Beide Geschlechtszellen, gegenseitig angezogen durch eine
chemische Sinnestatigkeit (— „ErotischerChemotropismus“—),
verschmelzen dann zur Bildung einer neuen kugeligen Zelle,
der Stammzelle (Cytula). Aus dieser entstehen weiterhin durch
wiederholte Teilung oder „Furchung“ zahlreiche Zellen, die
„Furchungszellen“ (Blastomeren). Diese ordnen sich in zwei
Zellenschichten, die beiden „Primaren Keimblatter“, aus welchen
sechs „Primitivorgane“ hervorgehen. Die Art und Weise, auf
welche alle spateren Organe aus letzteren in hochst eigentiimlicher Weise sich entwickeln, ist fur alle Wirbeltiere charakteristisch; sie erfolgt beim Menschen genau so wie bei den Menschenaffen. Insbesondere ist auch die Bildung der Eihiillen und der
Plazenta (des Mutterkuchens) in beiden ganz iibereinstimmend.
Somit liefert die Keimesgeschichte (Ontogenie) vollgiiltige Beweise fur die nahe „Embryologische Verwandtschaft“ des
Menschen und der Saugetiere; und diese werden zu den schwerwiegendsten Argumenten der monistischen Philosophie, wenn
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�25
wir sie nach dem Biogenetischen Grundgesetze deuten. Wenn
unsere Anthropogenie dieselbe fur die vielbestrittene „Abstammung des Menschen vom Affen “ benutzt, so stiitzt sie sich dabei auf unbestreitbare sichere Tatsachen.
Palaontologische Fundamente. Unter alien realen und
beweiskraftigen Urkunden unserer Stammesgeschichte konnen
die Tatsachen der Palaontologie in gewisser Beziehung als die
wichtigsten angesehen werden. Denn die Versteinerungen, die
wir millionenfach in den sedimentaren Gestein-Schichten unserer
Erde angehauft finden, sind die handgreiflichen Uberreste der
ausgestorbenen Vorfahren der jetzt lebenden Organismen, also
auch des Menschen. Aber diese Erkenntnis ist erst sehr spat,
erst in der zweiten Halfte des 19. Jahrhunderts gewonnen worden, nachdem Darwin durch seine Reform der Deszendenztheorie
uns den Schlussel zum Verstandnis der Phylogenie geschenkt
hatte. Vorher bekiimmerten sich um die „Petrefaktenu fast
nur die Geologen, die in den „Leitfossilien“ wertvoile Anhaltspunkte fur die Altersbestimmung und historische Ordnung der
iibereinanderliegenden Sedimentgesteine erblickten. Die Natur
und die Beziehungen der ausgestorbenen Tiere und Pflanzen,
von deren Organisation uns die unvollstandigen fossilen Uber
reste nur unvollkommene Kunde geben, war ihnen hochst gleichgiiltig und erweckte nur das Interesse der Kuriositat. So wurde
die „Petrefaktologie“ als „anorganische Naturkunde“ mit
der Geologie verkniipft. Hingegen gehort die eigentliche
moderne „Palaontologie“, d. h. die wissenschaftliche Erkennt
nis der Organisation der ausgestorbenen Lebewesen, sowie ihrer
Verwandtschafts-Beziehungen zur gegenwartigen Fauna und Flora,
in das Bereich der Biologie. Leider haben die meisten Zoologen und Botaniker auch heute noch, wie friiher, an diesen
hochst wichtigen Tatsachen ein sehr geringes Interesse; das gilt
namentlich von jenen einseitigen „Empirischen Embryologen“
und Vertretern der „Experimentellen Entwicklungsmechanik“,
welche lediglich in der genauesten Erforschung der Keimesgeschichte, ohne kausale Beziehung zur Stammesgeschichte, ihre
�26
einzige Aufgabe erblicken. Sie bestreiten den „ Fundamen
tal en Kausalnexus zwischen Ontogenie und Phylogenie", der
in unserm „Biogenetischen Grundgesetz“ seinen einfachsten
Ausdruck findet. Viele Irrtiimer dieser modernen (sich exakt
nennenden) Embryographie und Entwicklungs-Physiologie wiirden vermieden werden, wenn sie die historische Reihenfolge der
ausgestorbenen Formen und ihre phyletischen Beziehungen zu
den lebenden Nachkommen beriicksichtigten; sichere Tatsachen von hochster Bedeutung.
Unsere Ahnenreihe. Progonotaxis hominis.
Unter diesem Titel veroffentlichte ich 1908 „Kritische Studien uber Phyletische Anthropologic" (Festschrift zur 350jahrigen Jubelfeier der Thiiringer Universitat Jena und der damit
verbundenen Ubergabe des Phyletischen Museums, am 30. Juli
1908; mit 6 Tafeln). Diese kurze Studie (60 Seiten) enthalt
eine zusammengedrangte kritische Ubersicht und Revision der
phylogenetischen Untersuchungen, welche ich 1866 in der Generellen Morphologie (Kap. 27, 28) begonnen hatte. Die erfreulichen Fortschritte, welche diese historischen Forschungen uber
die Abstammung des Menschen in den 48 seitdem verflossenen
Jahren gemacht haben, sind ersichtlich aus einer Vergleichung
der zahlreichen inzwischen erschienenen Arbeiten, und besonders
der ersten Auflage der Anthropogenie (1874) und der sechsten
Auflage (1910). Die Zahl der wichtigsten Stufen in unserer
tierischen Ahnenreihe hatte ich schon 1898 in meinem Cam
bridge-Vortrage „Uber unsere gegenwartige Kenntnis vom Ursprung des Menschen“ auf 30 fixiert; sie sind in der Festschrift
(1908) auf sechs Strecken verteilt und in Tabellen iibersichtlich
zusammengestellt. (Vgl. unten Tabelle 7 und 8, Seite 70, 71.)
Die tatsachlichen Grundlagen, auf denen sich unser phyletisches Hypothesen-Gebaude erhebt, sind wegen der groBen Liickenhaftigkeit des palaontologischen Materials natiirlich unvollstandig
und werden immer so bleiben im Einzelnen. Das hindert
�aber nicht, daB wir im Ganzen daraus gewisse Schliisse ziehen,
> die fur unsere Stammesgeschichte sichere Grundlagen liefern.
IDarunter steht in erster Linie die historische Reihenfolge,
r in der die Klassen und Ordnungen der Wirbeltiere nacheinander
puftreten. In der zweiten Halfte unserer Progonotaxis (S. 71),
.die im Silur beginnt und sich unmittelbar auf Tausende von
wohlerhaltenen Petrefakten (-handgreifliche Urkunden!—) stiitzt,
erscheinen zuerst (Millionen von Jahren hindurch!) nur Fische,
im silurischen und devonischen Schichtensystem. Erst in der
Steinkoblenzeit, im karbonischen System, treten die altesten
landbewohnenden und vierfiiBigen Vertebraten auf, salamanderahnliche Amphibien (Stegocephalen). Auf sie folgen spater
im permischen System die altesten Reptilien, eidechsen-ahnliche Tokosaurier. Erst in der dariiber abgelagerten Trias, der
altesten mesozoischen Formation, treten die Stammformen der
Saugetiere auf, die niedersten Implazentalien (Monotremen).
In der ganzen Sekundarzeit, in Trias-, Jura- und Kreide-Formation, besteht die iiberwiegende Herrschaft der Reptilien, und
erst in der nachfolgenden Tertiarzeit geht dieselbe auf die
hbheren plazentalen Saugetiere uber. Auch hier entspricht
die historische Sukzession der groBeren und kleineren Gruppen
durchaus den phyletischen Entwicklungsgesetzen; das sind si
chere Tatsachen, deren Wert nicht iiberschatzt werden kann.
Losung des Seelen- Ratseis.
(Psychologische Fundamente des Monismus.)
Die Frage vom Wesen der Seele des Menschen, von ihrem
Verhaltnis zum Korper und andererseits zu Gott, von ihrer
Fortdauer nach dem Tode, gehort zu den strittigsten Problemen
der Wissenschaft. Das zeigt sich schon darin, daB die Seelenkunde oder Psychologie von der groBeren Halfte der Fachgelehrten (den Theologen und den sogenannten „eigentlichen
Psychologen“) als eine iibernaturliche „Geisteswissenschaft“
in Anspruch genommen wird, hingegen der kleineren Halfte
�28
(den meisten Medizinern und empirischen Naturforschern) als
ein besonderer Zweig der Naturwissenschaft gilt. Naeh
meiner festen Uberzeugung ist dieser groBe „Kampf um die
Seele“ seit fiinfzig Jahren endgiiltig zugunsten dieser letzteren
entschieden. Die bewunderungswiirdigen Fortschritte der Biologie in diesem Zeitraume haben uns gelehrt, daB die „Seele“
oder der „ Geist “ des Menschen kein besonderes, vom Korper
unabhangiges „Wesenu ist, sondern eine Summe von Gehirntatigkeiten. Die vergleichende Anatomie des Gehirns hat 11ns
iiberzeugt, daB der grobere und feinere Bau, ebenso wie die
chemische Zusammensetzung des Gehirns, im allgemeinen beim
Menschen dieselben sind, wie bei alien anderen Saugetieren, im
besonderen aber gleich denjenigen der Menschenaffen. Die ver
gleichende Physiologie und Psychiatrie haben nachgewiesen,
daB die Funktionen dieses „Seelenorgans“ beim Menschen durch
dieselben Gesetze der „Psychophysikw bedingt sind, wie bei
alien anderen Wirbeltieren. Auch seine embryonale Entwick
lung erfolgt in derselben Weise; die einfache birnformige Anschwellung der primitiven Hirnblase gliedert sich iiberall auf
dieselbe Weise in drei hintereinandergelegene Hirnblasen: Vorderhirn, Mittelhirn und Hinterhirn. Die wichtigste von diesen
ist das Vorderhirn oder GroBhirn; ein Teil seiner grauen Rinde
entwickelt sich bei den hoheren Saugetieren zum Denkorgan
(Phronema). In diesem eigentlichen „Geisteswerkzeuge“ sind
die hoheren Seelentatigkeiten dergestalt lokalisiert, daB die Zerstorung einzelner Zentralteile (durch Erkrankung oder durch
physiologisches Experiment) den Verlust der einzelnen, daran
gebundenen Seelentatigkeiten bedingt (z. B. Sehvermogen, Gehor,
Sprache, Raumsinn, Willen). Daraus ergibt sich klar und unzweideutig, daB es keinen „freien Willen“ gibt und ebenso keine
personliche Unsterblichkeit der Seele.
Unsere monistische Psychologie befindet sich freilich
noch in den Kinderjahren; sie vermag viele einzelne „Seelenratsel“ nicht zu erklaren. Namentlich gilt dies vom BewuBtsein, das von vielen Philosophen und Naturforschern immer
�29
noch ate ein „unlosbares Weltratsel“ betrachtet wird. Ich habe
indessen gezeigt, daB dieses „psychologische Zentralmysterium“
nicht mehr und nicht weniger wunderbar ist als alle iibrigen
Seelentatigkeiten, und daB es gleich alien anderen Naturerscheinungen dem Substanzgesetze unterworfen ist. Vergleichende
Betrachtung unserer eigenen personlichen Seelentatigkeit iiberteugt uns bei unbefangener Selbstkritik, daB der weitaus groBte
Teil derselben tatsachlich unbewuBt verlauft; die „innere
Spiegelung“ im Phronema, welche das eigentliche Wesen des
BewuBtseins ausmacht, ist ein voriibergehender Zustand der
GroBhirnrinde (Kap. 10 der Wl.).
Die dualistische Psychologie, die „iibernatiirliche Seelenkunde“, welche immer noch in den Kreisen der Theologie und
der mit ihr verbiindeten Schulphilosophie herrschend ist, be
trachtet die Seele als ein immaterielles, selbstandiges Wesen,
welches den materiellen Korper nur zeitweise bewohnt und
jhn. beim Tode verlaBt. Zu welchen Irrungen der Vernunft
diese ,,Unsterblichkeitslehre“ fiihrt, zeigen die absurden Spuklehren des Spiritismus und Okkultismus. Sie wiirden langst
iiberwunden sein, wenn nicht das „Gespenst“ der unsterblichen
Seele eine so groBe Rolle in der praktischen Sittenlehre und
in der staatlich konzessionierten Religion spielte.
Empirische Grundlagen der monistischen
Psychologie.
Da die Erkenntnis ein Teil unserer Seelentatigkeit ist, so
bildet auch die vielumstrittene Erkenntnistheorie einen Teil
der Seelenlehre oder Psychologie. Da ferner die vorgeschrittene Psychologie in der zweiten Halfte des neunzehnten
Jahrhunderts als ein besonderes Kapitel der Physiologie er*wiesen ist, so gelten auch deren Gesetze, auf sicherer physikalischer und chemischer Basis ruhend, fur die gesamte Seelenkunde. Nun wissen wir auch sicher, daB das Gehirn beim
Menschen wie bei alien anderen Wirbeltieren das wirkliche
�30
Organ des Seelenlebens ist. Mit seiner Zerstdrung hort die
Seelentatigkeit auf. Wir wissen ferner, daB die hochststehende
Klasse der Saugetiere sich vor den anderen Wirbeltieren durch
eine hohere Entwicklung des GroBhirns auszeichnet und daB
dessen graue Rinde das eigentliche „Geistesorgan“ darstellt. Die
vergleichende Gehirnkunde der Wirbeltiere (Anatomie und
Histologie) enthiillt uns die lange Stufenleiter, in der sich
seit vielen Jahrmillionen langsam und stufenweise die verwickelten Gehirnstrukturen, entsprechend der Hohe ihrer Leistungen, historisch entwickelt haben. Die vergleichende Keimesgeschichte dieser verschiedenartigen Vertebratengehirne zeigt
uns ferner, daB sie sich samtlich aus denselben einfachen Grundlagen, aus dem blasenformigen Kopfteil des Markrohrs oder Medullarrohrs noch heute entwickeln; iiberall teilt sich dieses Urhirn
in gleicher Weise in drei primare Hirnblasen: Vorderhirn (GroBhirn), Mittelhirn (Zwischenhirn) und Hinterhirn (Kleinhirn). Nur
die erste von diesen drei Hirnblasen, das GroBhirn, ist das
Werkzeug der hoheren Geistestatigkeit; mit seiner Zerstorung
(z. B. durch Gehirnschlag, durch Erkrankung der Seelenzellen,
durch experimentelle Vernichtung) verschwindet der sogenannte
„Geist“, wahrend die vegetativen Funktionen der Ernahrung
ungestort fortgehen konnen. Mit diesen sicheren Ergebnissen
der anatomischen und genetischen Hirnforschung stehen in
volliger Ubereinstimmung die bedeutungsvollen Resultate der
vergleichenden und der experimentellen Physiologie, sowie der
Pathologie (Psychiatrie).
Unsere monistische, objektiv auf diese Erfahrungen gegriindete Seelenlehre steht in volligem Widerspruch zu der dualistischen, subjektiv erdichteten Psychologie, wie sie noch heute
durch die herrschende metaphysische Philosophie und die mit
ihr verbiindete mystische Theologie gelehrt wird. Diese ignoriert
jene grundlegenden biologischen Tatsachen vollstandig; sie
will die Tatigkeit der Seele und das Wesen des Geistes allein
durch ihre innere Selbstbeobachtung, die introspektive Methode
ergriinden. Der unversonliche Gegensatz, in welchem diese
�31
[ transszendente Seelenlehre der Metaphysiker und Theologen zu
’ der empirisch begriindeten Psychologie der Biologen und Psykchi ater steht, ist deshalb von so fundamentaler Bedeutung, weil
die erstere sich mit dem Dogma von der Unsterblichkeit der
Seele verkniipft, wahrend die letztere dasselbe ablehnen muB.
Unsterblichkeit der Seele (Athanismus).
Die erstaunlichen Fortschritte, welche die monistische Psy
chologie in dem letzten halben Jahrhundert gemacht hat, die
gesicherten Ergebnisse der objektiv urteilenden Anatomie und
Physiologie des Gehirns, insbesondere die „Keimesgeschichte
und Stammesgeschichte der Seele haben uns zu der klaren
Erkenntnis gefiihrt, daB der weitverbreitete „Glaube an die
Unsterblichkeit der Seele “ jeder wissenschaftlichen Begriindung
entbehrt. Ich habe bereits im elften Kapitel der „Weltratsel“
die schwerwiegenden Griinde zusammengestellt, welche dieses
„hdchste Gebiet des Aberglaubens“ vernichten. Allein die enge
Verknupfung desselben mit den wichtigsten Glaubenslehren des
Christentums, der zahe Widerstand, welchen diese „unzerstorbare
Zitadelle aller mystischen und dualistischen Vorstellungskreise“
alien Angriffen der kritischen und reinen Vernunft entgegensetzt, besonders aber seine hohe Bedeutung sowohl fur die
theoretische Weltanschauung wie fur die praktische Lebensfiihrung, zwingen uns, seine volligeUnhaltbarkeit ganz ausdriicklich zu betonen. Das ist namentlich deshalb notwendig,
weil der Athanismus (das herrschende „Unsterblichkeitsdogma“)
die metaphysische und dualistische Erkenntnistheorie von vornherein in ganz falsche Bahnen fiihrt; die Voraussetzung eines
selbstandigen, vom Korper unabhangigen Geistes schlieBt alles
Verstandnis der wahren Seelentatigkeit aus.
Tatsachlich ist fur die allermeisten Menschen, ebenso die
hoheren „Gebildeten“ der Gegenwart, wie die niederen Klassen
des ungebildeten Volkes, seit mehr als zwei Jahrtausenden ihre
personliche Unsterblichkeit die wichtigste von alien Fragen der
�32
„Weltratsel44; sie ist ihnen wertvoller selbst als die Frage nach
dem „lieben Gott44 und nach der Freiheit des Willens. Unzufrieden mit den vielen Mangein dieses irdischen Daseins, unbefrie*
digt von den Ergebnissen seiner miihseligen Arbeit, gequalt von
Hindernissen im Kampfe urns Dasein, verlangt der arme Mensch
nach einem hoheren besseren Leben in einem idealen „Jenseits“,
nach einem „ewigen Leben“ im Paradiese. Diese „frommen
Wiinsche44 sind im Gebiete der Dichtung vollberechtigt und
linden im schonen Reiche der Kunst ihre vielseitige Befriedigung; sie konnen auch praktisch fur viele Aufgaben der
Lebensfiihrung, insbesondere fur die Schule und Erziehung, von
groBem Nutzen sein. Die reine Vernunft, auf den unwiderleglichen Tatsachen der Biologie fuBend, iiberzeugt jedoch den
unbefangenen und ehrlichen Denker mit voller Sicherheit, daB
der Athanismus mit der klar erkannten Wahrheit vollig unvereinbar ist; die Wissenschaft kennt keine „personliche
Unsterblichkeit der Seele44. Diese schwerwiegende Uberzeugung ergibt sich fiir uns aus den unerschiitterlichen empirischen Grundlagen unserer phyletischen Psychologie.
Losung des Substanz-Ratseis.
(Kosmologische Fundamente des Monismus.)
Die Frage vom Wesen der Welt, in der wir leben, von der
Wirklichkeit der Dinge, die uns umgeben, ist die umfassendste
und allgemeinste Aufgabe der eigentlichen „Naturphilosophie44;
sie hat seit mehr als 2000 Jahren die bedeutendsten Philosophen
und Theologen beschaftigt und ist in der verschiedensten Weise
beantwortet worden. Soweit nun auch deren Anschauungen
im einzelnen auseinandergehen, so lassen sich schlieBlich doch
alle in zwei groBe Gruppen gegeniiberstellen, die monistische
und die dualistische Kosmologie.
Die monistische Kosmologie betrachtet als ihr wichtigstes Fundament die allgemeine Geltung des universalen Substanzgesetzes. Ein einziges, allumfassendes, oberstes Natur-
�33
gesetz beherrscht das ganze Weltall (Universum oder Kosmos),
und Alles ist zugleich Natur (oder Physis). In dem universalen
Begriffe der Substanz — als des „wirklichen Weltwesens“ —
vereinigt unser naturalistischer Monismus drei untrennbare
Attribute oder Grundeigenschaften: die raumerfiillende Materie
(= Stoff), die wirkende Energie (= Kraft) und die empfindende
Weltseele (= Psychom). Indessen gehen die Ansichten der
namhaftesten Naturphilosophen uber die Beziehungen dieser
drei Attribute noch sehr auseinander. Dagegen stimmen fast
Alle darin iiberein, daB die Gesetze von der „Erhaltung des
Stoffes“ (= Konstanz der Materie) und von der „Erhaltung der
Kraft“ (= Konstanz der Energie) ganz allgemein giiltig sind.
Viele verkniipfen damit auch das Gesetz von der „Erhaltung der
Empfindung“ (= Konstanz des Psychoms). Der wesentliche
Grundgedanke, in dem alle drei Konstanzgesetze sich vereinigen, ist die Bestandigkeit und Unzerstorbarkeit des Uni
versums. Bei allem Wechsel des bestandigen „Werdens und
Vergehens“ (im einzelnen!) bleibt die Quantitat der Substanz
(im ganzen!) bestandig und unzerstorbar; es gibt keinen
„Anfang der Welt“ und gibt auch kein „Ende der Welt“.
Die dualistische Kosmologie unterscheidet zwei verschiedene Welten, die nebeneinander bestehen und verschiedenen Gesetzen gehorchen. Die Natur als „Kbrperwelt“ unterliegt den festen und unabanderlichen Naturgesetzen und besitzt
keine Freiheit. Die iibernaturliche „Geisteswelt“ hingegen soil
von den festen Naturgesetzen unabhangig sein und in ihrer
Freiheit die Grenzen der ersteren iiberschreiten konnen. Dieser
kosmologische Dualismus herrscht zurzeit noch im groBten Teile
der Schulphilosophie und ist meistens eng verkniipft mit ontheistischen und metaphysischen Vorstellungen. Unsere moni
stische Kosmologie verweist ihn in das Gebiet der spiritualistischen Phantasiegebilde und der uferlosen religidsen Dichtung; aber seine wissenschaftliche Geltung miissen wir auf
das Entschiedenste bestreiten.
3
�34
Konstanz des Universum.
(Universum perpetuum mobile — „Weltratsel“ Kap, 13.)
Die Frage nach dem Begriffe und dem Wesen der Substanz
(= Hypokeimenon) gehort zu den allgemeinsten, schwierigsten
und wichtigsten Problemen der Philosophie; sie hat demgemaB
seit mehr als 2000 Jahren die verschiedenste Beantwortung
erfahren. Ich habe im 12. Kapitel der „Weltratsel“ (1899) das
monistische „Substanz-Gesetz“ an die Spitze aller Naturgesetze gestellt und dasselbe geradezu als „das wahre undeinzige“
kosmologische Grundgesetz bezeichnet. Ich vereinigte unter
diesem Begriffe zwei hochste allgemeine Gesetze verschiedenen
Ursprungs und Alters, das altere chemische Gesetz von der
Erhaltung des Stoffes (=,, Konstanz der Materie“, Lavoisier
1789) und das jiingere physikalische Gesetz von der Erqaltung der Kraft (=„Konstanz der Energie“, Robert Mayer,
1842). Das erstere, das „Konstanzprinzip der Materie“, besagt:
..Die Summe des Stoffes, welche den unendlichen Weltraum
erfiillt, ist unveranderlich“; das zweite, 53 Jahre jiingere Gesetz,
das „Konstanzprinzip der Energie “, behauptet: „Die Summe
der Kraft, welche in dem unendlichen Weltraum tatig ist und
alle Erscheinungen bewirkt, ist unveranderlich.“
Die Vereinigung dieser beiden fundamentalen „KonstanzPrinzipien“ in einem einzigen, einheitlichen ,,Substanzgesetze"
ist von hochster prinzipieller Bedeutung fur unsere monistische
Weltanschauung. GewiB sind schon lange viele denkende Naturforscher, welche nach einer harmonischen einheitlichen Welt
anschauung suchten, gleich mir zu der Uberzeugung von der
universalen Bedeutung dieser Einheit gefiihrt worden. Vielen
wird unser „monistisches Substanzgesetz“ selbstverstandlich
erscheinen. Allein diese Auffassung ist noch heute weit entfernt, sich allgemeiner Anerkennung zu erfreuen; sie wird
energisch bekampft von der ganzen dualistischen Philosophie,
von der vitalistischen Biologie, ja sogar von manchen angesehenen Physikern. Diese seltsame Tatsache erklart sich daraus^
�35
daB die beiden Konstanz-Prinzipien unmittelbar die groBe
Grundfrage vom Zusammenhang ihrer beiden Objekte: „ Materie
und Energie “ beriihren, und somit den alten Streit der materialistischen und spiritualistischen Ansichten uber das Wesen von
nStoff und Kraft“ und uber das Verhaltnis dieser beiden
Attribute der Substanz. Das Axiom von der Konstanz des
Uni versums ist nicht allein mit dem allgemeinen „Prinzip
der Kausalitat“ verkniipft, sondern beriihrt auch viele andere
wjchtige Probleme der Naturphilosophie und der Religion.
Unser „Naturalistischer Monismus“ — oder „Hylozoismus“ — griindet sich auf die Uberzeugung, daB die Substanz
als „Urgrund aller Erscheinungen“ in der untrennbaren Verbindung von Stoff und Kraft beruht, daB Materie ohne Energie
[ebensowenig gedacht werden kann, als umgekehrt Energie ohne
Materie. Dieser Grundgedanke der monistischen „IdentitatsPhilosophie“, der schon vor mehr als 2000 Jahren den groBert
Denkern der Jonischen Naturphilosophie vorschwebte, fand
Seinen ersten systematischen Ausdruck im System von Baruch
Spinoza (1670). Aber schon 90 Jahre friiher hatte als sein
Aorlaufer der gewaltige Dominikanermonch Giordano Bruno,
gestiitzt auf das neue heliozentrische Weltsystem des Kopernikus, demselben naturalistischen Pantheismus einen hochpoetischen Ausdruck gegeben (1584); zur Strafe fur diese Ketzerei
wurde er vom romischen Papste (dem von Menschenliebe beseelten „Statthalter Christi “!) 7 Jahre lang im Kerker gequalt
und dann am 17. Februar 1600 auf dem Scheiterhaufen in Rom
aebendig verbrannt. Bruno vertrat im Sinne unserer monistiachen Religion ebenso klar und entschieden den Grundgedanken
der ,, Gott-Natur’\ wie Spinoza, dessen System seinen lapidaren
Ausdruck in den drei Worten fand: „Deus sive natura“ — Gott
ist die Natur selbst.
Die Begriindung des monistischen Substanzgesetzes, welche
ich 1892 in dem Altenburger „Glaubensbekenntnis eines Naturforschers“ versucht und 1899 im 12. Kapitel der „Weltratsel“
eingehender ausgefiihrt hatte, wurde 1904 im 19. Kapitel der
3*
�36
.. Lebenswunder“ wesentlich dadurch verbessert, daB ich den
Begriff der Energie in zwei gleichgeordnete Begriffe spaltete
und die Empfindung (Psychoma) von der Kraft (oder „Arbeit“
im weitesten Sinne = „Wille“ von Schopenhauer) abloste. Die
Cberzeugung, daB die Empfindung (als unbewuBte Fuhlung oder
Asthese) ein ganz allgemeiner Vorgang in der Natur ist, wurde
schon vor mehr als 2000 Jahren von Empedokles und den
alteren „Panpsychisten“ ausgesprochen, neuerdings namentlich
von Carl Naegeli und Albrecht Rau (vgl. Kap. 19 der „Lebenswunder“). Wenn diese Anschauung, wie ich glaube, richtig ist,
dann muB man auch den beiden „Konstanz-Prinzipien4< der
Materie und Energie als drittes, koordiniertes „Erhaltungsgesetz44 das psychologische Gesetz von der „Erhaltung der
Empfindung“ (= Konstanz des Psychoms) an die Seite stellen.
Bei der eingreifenden Bedeutung, welche die daraus folgende
„Trinitat der Substanz44 besitzt, ist es zweckmaBig, hier
noch einen Blick auf die drei fundamentalen Attribute der
Substanz gesondert zu werfen (vgl. unter Tabelle 3 und 4, S. 67).
Trinitat der Substanz.
Wenn wir die Gleichberechtigung der oben angefiihrten drei
Konstanzgesetze anerkennen und die drei Attribute der Sub
stanz: 1. Materie, 2. Energie, 3. Psychom als untrennbar iiberall verbunden betrachten, so gelangen wir zu einer einfachen
Auffassung des universalen Substanzbegriffes, welche die alten
und immer noch fortdauernden Streitigkeiten zwischen Materialismus, Energetik und Panpsychismus in Harmonie versohnt.
Der Hauptfehler dieser drei sich bekampfenden Richtungen
der Naturphilosophie liegt darin, daB jede von ihnen einseitig
das eine Grundprinzip betont und die beiden anderen als
untergeordnet von diesem ersten ableitet. So will der alte
Materialismus oder die neuere Mechanistik den Stoff als
einziges Urwesen geltend machen und sowohl die Kraft als
die Empfindung ihm unterordnen. Die neuere Energetik
�37
will alle Erscheinungen aus der Kraft ableiten; sie laBt sowohl
die Materie als die Psyche nur als besondere Faile der Energie
gelten („Karma“ im Buddhismus). Die Psychomatik oder
der Pampsychismus (auch Psychomonismus in gewissem Sinne)
laBt nur die Psyche oder den „ Geist “ als alleiniges Weltwesen
gelten und will sowohl die Materie als die Energie diesem
ersten und obersten Prinzip unterordnen (gleich dem ,.Atman“
im Veda). Aus dieser exklusiven Einseitigkeit der drei SubstanzAuffassungen entspringt der immerwahrende Streit um die
ausschlieBliche Geltung eines jener drei Grundprinzipien.
Unser naturalistischer Monismus — oder „kosmischer Hylozoismus“ — vermeidet diese Einseitigkeit, indem er die drei
Grundeigenschaften aller Substanz als untrennbar verbunden
ansieht, als allgemeingiiltig (im ganzen Raume) und als unzerstorbar (in aller Zeit). Er ist also weder reiner Materialismus,
noch absolute Energetik, noch unbedingte Psychomatik; vielmehr vereinigt er diese drei Hauptrichtungen zu einer vollkommenen Einheit. Wir gewinnen dadurch eine anschauliche
Auffassung aller Erscheinungen, die von hochstem Werte fur
das Verstandnis ihrer Natur ist. Der Urgrund alles Seins,
alles Werdens und Vergehens laBt uns dann in der Universal Substanz zugleich das „hochste Wesen“ unserer monistischen
Religion erblicken, Allgott oder Pantheos. Dieser „Uni
ver sal got t“ ist ewig und unverganglich, unendlich in Raum
und Zeit; er ist unpersonlich und unbewuBt; er regiert die
Welt durch seine „ewigen, ehernen, groBen Gesetze“. Das
glaubige Gemiit findet in der Anbetung und Verehrung dieses
Allgottes ebenso voile Befriedigung, wie die reine Vernunft im
klaren Verstandnis seines WesenS und Wirkens.
Losung des Gottes-Ratsels.
Theologische Fundamente des Monismus.
Die Frage vom Wesen Gottes und vom Verhaltnis des Men
schen zu diesem „hochsten Wesen“ wird allgemein als eines
der vornehmsten und wichtigsten Probleme im menschlichen
�38
Geistesleben betrachtet. Der metaphysische „Glaube an Gott“
gilt noch heute der Mehrzahl der Menschen sowohl in theore*
tischer Hinsicht als die befriedigendste Losung des „Weltratsels‘4,
als auch in praktischer Beziehung als das wichtigste Fundament
einer geordneten sittlichen „Lebensfuhrung“. Da ich in der
zweiten Halfte der „Weltratsel“ (Kap. 15—19) meine Ansichten
dariiber eingehend behandelt habe, kann ich mich hier darauf
beschranken, meine Dberzeugung von der Sicherheit meiner
monistischen Religion zu begriinden und die Unhaltbarkeit der
ihnen entgegenstehenden dualistischen Gottes-Vorstellungen nachzuweisen. In der unten gegebenen Tabelle I (S. 64) habe ich die
wichtigsten Unterschiede der beiden theologischen Theorien, des
monistischen Pantheismus und des dualistischen Ontheismus,
in knappster Form gegeniibergestellt.
Pantheismus (Monistische Theologie).
Der Allgott oder Universalgott. (= „Deus intramundanus44.)
(= „Atheismus44 im negativen vulgaren Sinne.)
Gott und Welt sind iiberall untrennbar verkniipft; als die
letzte unerkennbare Ursache aller Dinge ist ,. Gott44 der hypothetische „Urgrund der Substanz “. Die drei fundamentalen
Attribute, welche wir als unverauBerliche, untrennbare Grundeigenschaften der universalen Substanz oder dem ganzen „Kosmos44 zugeschrieben haben, sind also zugleich die drei wesentlichsten allgemeinen Charakterziige unseres Pant he os, des All
gott es. Ob wir diesen unpersonlichen „Allmachtigenw als „GottNatur44 (Theophysis) oder als „ Allgott “ (Pantheos) bezeichnen;
ist im Grunde gleichgiiltig. Sicher ist nur, daB derselbe nicht
die anthropistischen Eigenschaften besitzt, welche der Ontheismus
oder der dualistische vulgare „Theismus“ seinem personlichen
„Lieben Gotte44 zuschreibt. Im klaren Lichte der „reinen Vernunft44 beweist uns die moderne Wissenschaft, daB der Kosmos
als Ganzes nur dem unbewuBten Naturgesetze gehorcht
Alles geschieht mit absoluter Notwendigkeit nach dem mecha-
�39
nischen „Kausalgesetz“. Dabei spielt aber der blinde Zufall
die groBte Rolle, indem mehrere Ereignisse, die in keiner
katisalen Beziehung zueinander stehen, zusammentreffen. Trotzdem ist Inirner jedes einzelne von ihnen die notwendige Folge von
bewirkenden Ursachen. (Vgl. den SchluB von Kap. 14 der „W1.“ :
„Ziel, Zweck und Zufall“.),
Ontheismus. (Dualistische Theologie.)
Der Schulgott oder Personalgott. (= „Deus extramundanus“.) (= „Theismus“ im engeren vulgaren Sinne.)
Gott und Welt sind zwei verschiedene Wesen. Der „Per’sonHche Gott" (== Schulgott) ist ein individueller Geist, der als
unsichtbarer „immaterieller Spiritus“ die Naturgesetze schafft
und beliebig andert. Gewohnlich werden diesem „Allmachtigen
Gott“ folgende Eigenschaften und Taten zugeschrieben: 1. Als
^Schopfer44 hat Gott „die Welt erschaffen44 (aus Nichts?). 2. Als
weiser „Weltherrscher“ regiert er den Weltlauf hochst zweckmafiig. (Ewiges „Werden und Vergehen44 in der Entwicklung
der Weltkorper und der Organismen?.) 3. Als moralischer Gewtzgeber hat Gott seine „Gebote“ gegeben, als bleibende Norm
Ito eine „Sittliche Weltordnung.44 (Krieg? Krankheiten? soziales
Elend?) 4. Als „ lie bender Vater44 hat er alle Verhaltnisse zum
Besten seiner „Geschopfe“ zweckmaBig geordnet. (Kampf urns
Dasein? Parasitismus?) 5. Als gerechter Richter belohnt er
die Guten und bestraft die Bosen; am „Tage des jiingsten Gerichts44 (Wann?) werden alle „wiederauferstandenen“ Menschen
in zwei groBe Haufen geschieden: die Guten (schuldlos erkannten) kommen zu „ewiger Seligkeit“ in den iiberirdischen Himmel
fWo?); die Bosen (schuldig verurteilten) werden in die untertrdische „ Hoile geworfen und ewig verbrannt.44 (Wo?)
Wir brauchen hier nicht nochmals daran zu erinnern, wie
alle diese Glaubenssatze des Ontheismus fur die reine Vernunft
unhaltbar erscheinen miissen; sie erscheinen als grobere oder
feiriere „ Anthropismen44. Die Vermenschlichung Gottes
�40
ist dabei in den mannigfaltigsten Formen ausgebildet. Den
meisten monotheistischen Religionen liegt dabei die Vorstellung
eines orientalischen Monarchen zugrunde (Jehovah im Mosaismus, Gott-Vater im Christentum, Allah im Islam). Wenn
aber vielfach dieser immaterielle Gott als „unsichtbarer Geist44
vorgestellt wird, und ihm trotzdem die menschlichen Eigenschaften des Sehens, Horens, Sprechens, Denkens usw. beigelegt
werden, so gelangt man notwendig zu dem absurden Bild eines
„gasformigen Wirbeltieres44. Denn der Mensch, der sich Gott
nach seinem Ebenbilde formt, bleibt unzweifelhaft ein echtes
Wirbeltier; und der „ Geist44, der seinen Organismus belebt,
wird tatsachlich schon seit alter Zeit gasformig oder als unsichtbarer Spiritus („0dem Gottes“) vorgestellt, ebenso wie die
„unsterbliche Seele44 des Menschen selbst. Ich hebe das Ungeniigende dieses groben Anthropomorphism us hier des
halb besonders hervor, weil viele Glaubige daran AnstoB genommen und mir „abscheuliche Blasphemie44 vorgeworfen haben.
Aber diese widersinnige Bezeichnung ist weder ein „schlechter
Witz44 von mir, noch eine „boswillige Verhohnung heiliger Gefiihle44, sondern vielmehr eine streng wissenschaftliche
Charakteristik einer weitverbreiteten Vorstellung, welche ich
selbst als Pantheist bekampfe, wahrend viele glaubige Theisten
daran zahe festhalten und sie sogar fur hochst wesentlich erklaren. (Wl. Kap. 15.)
Gott in der Anorgik.
Die vielumstrittene Losung des „Gottes-Ratsels44 wird dadurch sehr erleichtert, daB wir die Geltung des ublichen Gottesbegriffes in den beiden groBen Naturreichen kritisch vergleichen.
Wenn wir die Gesamtheit der sogenannten toten oder anorganischen Natur unter dem Begriffe des An or gon zusammenfassen und die Wissenschaft davon als Anorgik, so finden wir,
daB seit einem Jahrhundert von „ Gott44 darin nur sehr selten,
meistens aber gar nicht die Rede ist. Das gilt von der ganzen
�11
modernen Kosmologie und Astronomie, von der ganzen anorganischen Physik und Chemie, von der ganzen Geologie und
Meteorologie. Hier gilt jetzt allgemein die Uberzeugung, daB
ausschlieBlich feste, „ewige und eherne Gesetze“ das ganze
Weltgetriebe beherrschen. „Gott ist selbst das allmachtige
Natur gesetz.“ Diesem Allgott oder Pantheos werden nirgends
jene anthropistischen Eigenschaften zugeschrieben, welche der
Mensch, als „Ebenbild Gottes“ in der Biologie dem personlichen
„Schopfer“ beilegt. Die genannten, streng „physikalischen“ Wissenschaften sind also im Gesamtgebiete der Anorgik rein „pantheistisch", oder was dasselbe heiBt: „atheistisch“. Kein
Physiker oder Chemiker, kein Astronom oder Geologe spricht
in seinen Arbeiten und Vortragen jemals mehr von „Gott“,
von einem personlichen Schopfer und Regenten der anorganischen Natur. Nach Schopenhauer ist der „Pantheismus“ nur
ein hoflicher „Atheismus“ („SchluB“ des 15. Kap. der Wl.).
Der Pantheos der Anorgik, der „Allgott“ in der gesamten anorganischen Naturkunde, ist ein theistischer Ausdruck
fur unseren atheistischen Substanzbegriff. Als einheitliche „Urkraft des Weltalls“ wirkt er unbewufit in ewiger Bewegung
und Energiebetatigung. Die ganze anorganische Natur wird
durch blinde Werkursachen (Causae efficientes) beherrscht;
es gibt keine zielstrebigen Zweckursachen (Causae finales).
Demnach ist auch der ganze EntwicklungsprozeB der Welt ohne
Anfang und ohne Ende, ein kosmischer Kreislauf, der seinen
prazisen Ausdruck in dem Satze findet: „Universum perpetuum mobileu (Kap. 13 der „Weltratsel“). Es gibt keine
„Vorsehung“, keine „Sittliche Weltordnung“.
Dieser streng monistischen Auffassung wird jedoch auch
heute noch von namhaften Naturphilosophen, darunter sehr bedeutenden Physikern, widersprochen. Besonders wird dagegen
das beruhmte Entropie-Gesetz geltend gemacht, der sogenannte
„zweite Hauptsatz der mechanischen Warinetheorie". Nach
diesem „Prinzip der Dissipation “ hat unsere Welt (—wenig-.
stens unser Sonnensystem —) einmal einen Anfang seiner Be
�42
wegung gehabt (durch eine „Schopfung Gottes"?) und geht
einem endlichen Tode entgegen (durch „Warmetod?“). Indessen
ist schon vielfach darauf hingewiesen worden, daB dieser „zweite
Hauptsatz der mechanischen Warmetheorie" dem ersten (dem
Konstanz-Prinzip der Energie) in gewissem Sinne widerspricht.
Neuerdings hat namentlich Svante Arrhenius, der „das Werden
der Welten" in groBziigiger Weise beleuchtet, betont, wie der
kosmische „Strahlungsdruck“ der Dissipation entgegenwirkt, und
wie auch andere Verhaltnisse in der Entwickelung der Weltkorper die Wirkung des Entropiegesetzes wieder aufheben.
(Vgl. Kap. 13 der Wl.)
Gott in der Biologie.
Wahrend somit in alien angefiihrten Gebieten der Anorgik
(im groBen Ganzen des anorgischen „Kosmos") der „allmachtige Gott" seine Rolle ausgespielt hat und seinen Thronsitz
dem unbewuBten Naturgesetz hat einraumen miissen, hat
er seinen EinfluB in einem groBen Teile der Biologie noch behalten. Vor allem scheinen die zweckmaBigen Einrichtungen
der Organisation im Tier- und Pflanzenreich nur durch die Annahme eines vorbedachten „Zweckes" erklarbar zu sein. Die
alte dualistische und teleologische Vorstellung, daB der Schopfer
„mit Weisheit und Verstand" alle Dinge geordnet habe, scheint
hier notwendig auf den Glauben an einen „personlichen Gott"
hinzudrangen, einen „Maschinen-Ingenieur", der nach vorbedachtem Plane alle Einrichtungen zweckmaBig geordnet hat. Von
der modernen wie von der alten Theologie, und ebenso von
der mit ihr verbiindeten dualistischen Schulphilosophie, wird
diese anthropomorphe Vorstellung noch jetzt hartnackig festgehalten, trotzdem ihr Darwin seit 55 Jahren durch seine geniale Selektionstheorie den Boden vollig entzogen hat.
Einer der wesentlichsten Irrtiimer dieses biologischen
Ontheismus ist darin begriindet, daB die zweckmaBige Orga
nisation der Lebewesen (— eine rein biologische Tatsache —) auf
�43
die kosmische Entwicklung des Weltganzen und aller seiner
Teile ubertragen wird. Allein die unleugbare ZweckmaBigkeit
(— Oder besser Niitzlichkeit —) in der Organisation der Tiere
uiid Pflanzen ist nicht die Folge eines bewuBten metaphysischen
Sohopfungsplanes (eine teleologische „Entelechie“), sondern die
Folge der Anpassung, die auf der physikalischen Wechselwirkung der Organismen und ihrer Umwelt beruht; sie ist das
k notwendige Ergebnis des blinden „Kampfes ums Dasein“, der
■ seit mehr als hundert Jahrmillionen die Stammesgeschichte der
I Organischen Welt geregelt hat. Bei den hoheren sozialen Tieren
■ hat dieser unaufhorliche Kampf zur Ausbildung der Vernunft
I und zur geordneten Einrichtung der Sittengesetze in der Gesellschaft gefiihrt. Dagegen kann von einer solchen moralischen
Organisation im Weltganzen, im Gesamtgebiet der Anorgik,
nicht die Rede sein; es gibt keine allgemeine Weltvernunft,
keine uberall giiltige „sittliche Weltordnung".
Wenn auch gegenwartig die dualistischen Philosophen immer
noch vergeblich nach einem „Sinn des Lebens“, nach einer
hoheren „Bestimmung des Daseins“ suchen, so ist dagegen an
die Kristalle zu erinnern. Wenn in einer Salzlosung beim
Verdampfen sich feste Kristalle von ganz bestimmter geometrischer Form ausscheiden, so fragt kein Mineraloge oder Chemiker
nach einem bestimmten „Sinn oder Zweck" dieser Strukturen;
er betrachtet sie vielmehr als notwendige und selbstverstandliche Folgen ihrer chemischen Konstitution. Ganz ebenso sind
I aber auch die altesten und primitivsten Formen der Moneren
(-- wahrscheinlich einfache Plasmakiigelchen gleich den heute
noch lebenden Chrookokken und Nitrobakterien —) als individualisierte Korner aus fliissigem Plasma ausgeschieden. Ihre
weitere Entwicklung zu kernhaltigen Zellen und deren Umbildung zu Geweben, ist nicht das teleologische Produkt eines
| besti mm ten „Lebenszweckes“, sondern die mechanische Folge
ihrer chemischen Konstitution und bestandigen Wechselbeziehung
I zu ihrer Umgebung.
�-
44
-
Mechanistik und Vitalismus.
Die naive Naturanschauung des Naturmenschen unterschied
friiher allgemein zwischen toten und lebendigen Naturkbrpern;
die besonderen Lebens-Erscheinungen, die nur an den Organismen wahrzunehmen sind, vor alien spontane Bewegung, Em
pfindung, Ernahrung und Fortpflanzung wurden den Anorganen,
den sogenannten „toten Kdrpern" abgesprochen. Auch in der
Naturwissenschaft blieb dieser organische Dualismus in Geltung
und veranlaBte ihre Spaltung in zwei prinzipiell verschiedene
Zweige: Anorgik und Biologie. Das organische Leben sollte
durch eine besondere Lebenskraft (Vis vitalis) veranlaBt sein,
welche die „rohen Naturkrafte“ in ihren Dienst nahme und beim
Tode den Korper verlasse. Die groBen Fortschritte, welche
die Physik und Chemie der Anorgane einerseits, die Physio
logie und Biogenie der Organismen anderseits, in der ersten
Halfte des 19. Jahrhunderts machten, fiihrten zur Aufhebung
dieses Vitalismus und verwiesen die „iibernaturlicheu Lebens
kraft (— ebenso wie die transszendente ..Seele". mit der sie
oft identifiziert wurde —) als metaphysische „Gespenster“
in das Reich der Dichtung. Sie verlor vollends alles Ansehen,
nachdem Darwin 1859 das schwierigste „Lebensratsel“ gelost
und den Glauben an eine iibernaturliche „Schopfungu der Arten
durch die mechanistische Erklarung ihrer Entwicklung aus der
Wissenschaft entfernt hatte.
Neovitalismus. In befremdendem Gegensatze zu diesen
mechanistischen Fortschritten der modernen Biologie hat sich
im Laufe der letzten zwanzig Jahre eine mystische Richtung
anspruchsvoll geltend gemacht, welche als „Neovitalismus“ den
langst begrabenen Aberglauben der alten Irrlehre von der iibernatiirlichen Lebenskraft, den „Palavitalismus“. neuerdings
zur Geltung zu bringen sucht. Ohne irgend welche neuen
Tatsachen zu seinen Gunsten vorzubringen, suchte dieser konfuse
Neovitalismus die angebliche „ Autonomie des Lebens “, die
�45
ratselhafte „Eigengesetzlichkeit“ der organischen Prozesse, durch
eine sophistische Dialektik zur Geltung zu bringen. DaB er trotzdem ein gewisses Ansehen erlangte, erklart sich aus der bedauerlichen Zunahme der Verwirrung, in welche einerseits kurzsich tiger Spezialismus, andrerseits Unfahigkeit zu philosophischer
Beurteilung der allgemeinen Verhaltnisse, viele moderne Naturforscher fiihrt. Ich habe die Griinde, welche diesen biologischen.
Dualismus widerlegen und dagegen die prinzipielle Einheit der
organischen und der anorganischen Natur beweisen, bereits im
14. Kap. der Wl. erortert. Im 15. Kap. der Lr. ist namentlich die
damit eng verbundene Frage vom Lebensursprung besprochen.
Dieses dunkle „Lebensratsel“, die Entstehung der altesten und
einfachsten Organismen aus anorganischer Substanz ist durch
die Hypothese der Urzeugung (Archigonie) in dem dort bestimmten Sinne befriedigend gelost.
Urzeugung (Archigonie).
Die Frage von der Urzeugung, von der natiirlichen Ent
stehung des ersten organischen Lebens auf unserer Erde, gehort
noch heute zu den unklarsten und verworrensten Problemen
der ganzen „Naturgeschichte“. Viele denkende Leser, sogar
angesehene Naturforscher, halten sie noch heute fur ein hochst
schwieriges, manche sogar fur ein unlosbares Problem. In
diesem Sinne fiihrte sie 1880 E. du Bois-Reymond als das
dritte seiner „ Sieben Weltratsel“ auf. Nach meiner festen
Cberzeugung ist dieses groBe biologische Problem nur ein besonderer Teil des oben behandelten „ Substanz-Ratseis “ und ist
somit seit fiinfzig Jahren im Prinzip gelost; ich stimme darin
vollkommen mit den Anschauungen des ebenso klar denkenden
als tatsachenkundigen Botanikers Carl Naegeli iiberein, welcher
vor 30 Jahren in seinem gedankenreichen Werke „MechanischPhysiologische Begriindung der Abstammungslehreu (1884)
die betreffende Betrachtung mit dem Satze schloB: „Die Ur
zeugung leugnen heiBt das Wunder verkiinden“.
�46
Meine eigenen Untersuchungen uber Urzeugung erstrecken
sich uber den Zeitraum eines halben Jahrhunderts; sie wurden
friihzeitig dadurch hervorgerufen, daB ich (schon seit dem Jahre
1859) mit besonderer Vorliebe mich dem Studium der einfachsten
Urtiere, insbesondere der Radiolarien zuwandte. Die bedeutungsvolle Reform der Zellen-Theorie, welche damals Max
Schultze durch Aufstellung seiner Protoplasma-Theorie herbeifiihrte, und unsere gemeinsamen Studien uber , die „Sareode der
Rhizopoden“, waren dabei fur mich von bestimmendem EinfluB;
spater ganz besonders meine Beobachtungen uber Moneren
(Chromaceen, Bakterien, Protamoeben, Protogenes etc.). Ich wies
schon in der Generellen Morphologie (1866, Kap. V) auf die
hohe prinzipielle Bedeutung dieser einfachsten „Organismen
ohne Organe“ hin, deren ganzer lebendiger Korper weiter
nichts ist, als ein Stiickchen von strukturlosem Plasma und
also noch nicht einmal den Formwert einer einfachen kernhaltigen Zelle besitzt.
Das zweite Buch meiner Generellen Morphologie (1866) ent
halt sehr eingehende, kritische „Allgemeine Untersuchungen uber
die Natur und erste Entstehung der Organismen; ihr Verhaltnis
zu den Anorganen, und ihre Einteilung in Tiere und Pflanzen “
(Bd. II. S. 109—238). Die hier entwickelten Gesichtspunkte der
vergleichenden Biologie, besonders die objektive Vergleichung
der Zellenbildung und Kristallbildung, haben die fundamentale
Einheit der organischen und anorganischen Natur geniigend
dargelegt. Der ganze Bios (d. h. die gesamte Welt der Orga
nismen) ist sowohl in der Zeit, als im Raume verglichen,
nur ein ganz geringer Bruchteil des Universum, nur eine kleine
Episode in der unermesslichen Geschichte des Anorgon, der
falschlich sogenannten toten Natur.
Nun haben freilich bis jetzt die vielen Versuche, die Archigonie
experimentell zu beweisen, d. h. lebendiges Plasma aus anorgischen Kohlenstoff-Verbindungen kiinstlich herzustellen, keine
positiven Erfolge gehabt. Allein das negative Ergebnis dieser
Experimente, namentlich die beriihmten Versuche von Pasteur
�47
fiber Generatio spontanea, haben fur die Losung dieses Ratseis
nicht die geringste Bedeutung. Die meisten Biologen, die sich
damit beschaftigen, gehen von der irrtiimlichen Vorstellung
einer urspriinglichen Organisation der einfachsten Lebewesen
aus und beriicksichtigen nicht, daB diese dem strukturlosen
Korper der genannten Moneren noch ganz fehlt, ebenso wie
dem zahfliissigen Plasmaleibe vieler einfachsten Rhizopoden
(Myzetozoen) und dem stromenden homogenen Plasma innerhalb vieler Pflanzenzellen. Das Problem der Archigonie ist also
ein rein chemisches; es kommt nur darauf an, durch Katalyse kolloidaler Substanz die einfachste Form von Plasma
zu erzeugen; wenn diese fest-fliissige homogene Substanz sich
individualisiert und in kleine Kiigelchen zerfallt (— gleich den
Regentropfen in der Wolke —), haben wir Moneren; ihre
weitere Umbildung zu kernhaltigen Zellen einfachster Art ist
eine Frage der physiologischen Chemie. (Naheres im 15. Kap.
der „Lebenswunder“.)
Lebensfiihrung.
(Grundlinien der Ethik oder Sittenlehre.)
Die wichtigste praktische Aufgabe der Religion ebenso wie
der Philosophie ist die Begriindung einer verniinftigen Sitten
lehre; diese „ Ethik" soil das Gute oder die Tugend fordern
und das moglichste Gluck der Menschen erzielen. Ich habe die
Grundziige unserer monistischen Ethik bereits in den ,,Weltratseln" (Kap. 18, 19) und in den „Lebenswundern“ (Kap. 18,
19) erortert, und ihren Gegensatz zu der traditionellen Sitten
lehre der dualistischen Religion und Metaphysik scharf beJeuchtet. Ich kann mich daher hier darauf beschranken, die
Bicherheit ihrer Grundlagen zu priifen und kurz ihre Beziehungen zur Anthropologie und zur Theophysik zu erlautern. Im
iibrigen verweise ich auf die 18. Tabelle, welche am Schlusse
des 18. Kapitels der ..Lebenswunder" den „Gegensatz der mo
nistischen und der dualistischen Sittenlehre" zeigt. Unsere
monistische oder theophysische Ethik behauptet einen natur-
�48
lichen Ursprung unserer Moral, hingegen die dualistische oder
metaphysische Ethik einen iibernatiirlichen Ursprung. Aus
der umfangreichen ethischen Literatur sind namentlich die
Schriften von Ludwig Feuerbach, Herbert Spencer, Bartholomaeus Carneri und Friedrich Jodi hervorzuheben. In dem
vortrefflichen kleinen „Katechismus der monistischen Weltan
schauung “ (Brackwede 1914) hat Dr. L. Frei die wichtigsten Grundsatze der naturgemaBen Ethik, die sich auf der Grundlage unserer
einheitlichen Weltanschauung aufbauen, kurz und gemeinverstandlich zusammengefaBt.
Natiirlich gibt uns eine klare theoretische Weltanschauung
die sicherste Grundlage fur eine gute praktische Lebensfiihrung.
Allein in Wirklichkeit ist der EinfluB der ersteren auf die
letztere viel geringer, als man gewohnlich annimmt. Denn die
Richtschnur des Handelns, welches uns die Vernunft vorschreibt, wird iiberall gekreuzt durch die Wiinsche des Ge
mlites und beeintrachtigt durch die altehrwiirdigen Uberlieferungen der mystischen Glaubenslehren, sowie durch die
Macht der Leidenschaften, welche die Befriedigung der
menschlichen Bediirfnisse erzielen. Wahrend die Vernunft mit
Hiilfe der Wissenschaft die Erkenntnis des Wahren erstrebt,
sucht das Gemlit den Weg zum Guten und Schonen zu finden.
Als wertvollstes Mittel zur Forderung des menschlichen
Lebensgliickes ist vor allem die Pflege der Kunst zu betonen.
Eine unerschopfliche Quelle des edelsten Lebensgenusses ist dem
modernen Menschen in den herrlichen Gefilden der Dichtkunst
und Tonkunst, in der bildenden Kunst und im NaturgenuB, in
der Betrachtung der wunderbaren „Kunstformen der Natur “
gegeben. Wie der Kulturmensch durch diese realen Geniisse
des irdischen Lebens fur den Verlust der eingebildeten Seligkeit in einem iiberirdischen Leben entschadigt wird, das hat
namentlich David Strauss in seinem beriihmten Bekenntnis:
„Der alte und der neue Glaube“ (1872) gezeigt. Wir erinnern
nur nochmals an das unsterbliche Wort von Goethe: „Wer
Wissenschaft und Kunst besitzt, hat auch Religion. “
�49
Anthropologische Grundlagen der Ethik. Die moderne
Menschenkunde hat uns zu der sicheren Erkenntnis gefiihrt,
daB der Mensch sich aus dem Stamm der Wirbeltiere entwickelt
hat und daB alle seine morphologischen, physiologischen und
psychologischen Eigenschaften aus denjenigen der SaugetierKlasse abzuleiten sind. Die „sozialen Instinkte“ der letzteren sind durch Anpassung an ihre Lebensgewohnheiten entstanden und durch Vererbung auf alle Glieder der Klasse iibertragen; sie sind die Quelle, aus welcher die „Sitten“ der
Menschen entstanden sind. Eine lange Stufenleiter der aufsteigenden Entwicklung fiihrt uns von den niederen Instinkten
der alteren Saugetiere zu den hoheren „Sitten“ der jiingeren
Mammalien hinauf, an deren Spitze die sozialen Raubtiere
(Hunde) und Herrentiere (Menschenaften) stehen. An diese
letztern schlieBen sich dann unmittelbar die Instinkte der niedersten Menschenrassen (Wilde) an, und aus diesen sind die
hoheren moralischen Gewohnheiten der Barbaren und spater
die feineren Sitten der Kulturvolker hervorgegangen.
Sittengesetze. Die moralischen „Gesetze“, welche unsere
sittliche Lebensfiihrung bestimmen, sind demnach keine „Gebote“ eines iibernaturlichen Schulgottes, sondern niitzliche Ein
richtungen der menschlichen Gesellschaft, welche sich als zweckmaBig erwiesen und im Laufe natiirlicher Entwicklung durch
Anpassung an das geordnete Staatsleben allmahlich befestigt
haben. Gleich alien anderen Institutionen sind sie bestandigen
Umbildungen und Verbesserungen unterworfen. Das gilt auch
von dem beriihmten „kategorischen Imperativ“, den Im
manuel Kant an die Spitze seiner Moralphilosophie gestellt
hatte. Ich habe seine Unhaltbarkeit bereits im 19. Kapitel der
Weltratsel dargetan. Wilhelm Ostwald hat an dessen Stelle
seinen „energetischen Imperativ“ gesetzt, welcher in dem
Satze gipfelt: „Vergeude keine Energie, sondern verwerte sie“.
Dieser wichtige Satz ist in der Gegenwart um so mehr zu beherzigen, als unsere verfeinerte moderne Kultur die Vergeudung
wertvoller Energie in stetig zunehmendem MaBe fordert. Welche
4
�50
Kraftvergeudung wird nicht im modemen Staatsleben durch
den wahnsinnigen Militarismus geiibt, der in den stetig wachsenden Kriegsriistungen den weitaus groBten Teil des NationalVermogens verschlingt! Welche Energievergeudung fordert der
iibertriebene Luxus und der raffinierte Hedonismus der hoheren
Gesellschaftsklassen, der Prunk des Protzentums, der stets sich
iiberbietende Hang nach sinnlichen Geniissen aller Art!
Seitdem der verdienstvolle Naturphilosoph Wilhelm Ostwald
vor drei Jahren das Presidium des deutschen Monistenbundes
iibernommen, hat derselbe in seinen gedankenreichen monistischen Sonntagspredigten sowie in zahlreichen Aufsatzen der
von ihm herausgegebenen Wochenschrift: „Das monistische
Jahrhundert“ viele wichtige Probleme des praktischen Monis
mus zeitgemaB behandelt. Andere vortreffliche Aufsatze uber
monistische Ethik finden sich in der von Wilhelm Breitenbach
herausgegebenen Monatsschrift: „Neue Weltanschauung in der
Halbmonatsschrift: „Das freie Wort“ (Frankfurt a. M.); ferner
in den von Dr. Paul Carus (Chicago) redigierten englischen
Zeitschriften: „Monist“ and „Open Court“. Auch in den amerikanischen Zeitschriften „Der Freidenker“ (Milwaukee) und der
Truthseeker (New York); ferner in den deutschen Zeitschriften
„Der Freidenker“, „Die Tat“ von Diederichs usw. erscheinen
gegenwartig zahlreiche Abhandlungen, welche die Prinzipien
unserer monistischen Weltanschauung auf die verschiedensten
Probleme des menschlichen Lebens, in Soziologie und Politik,
in Padagogik und Schulbildung, fruchtbar anwenden. Ich kann
mich daher auf diese monistische Propaganda und die dort angefiihrte Literatur um so mehr beziehen, als ich selbst nicht geeignet bin, diese wichtigen Aufgaben der praktischen Philo
sophie wesentlich zu fordern. Einige Hinweise auf deren wesentlichste Satze habe ich in den 30 „Thesen zur Organisation des
Monismus “ gegeben, welche 1904 bei Gelegenheit des zehnten
internationalen Freidenker-Kongresses in Rom formuliert und
zunachst im ersten Oktoberheft des „Freien Wort“ (Frank
furt a. M.) veroffentlicht wurden. Sie sind abgedruckt im ersten
�51
Heft mciner kiirzlich von Wilhelm Breitenbach gesammelten und
herausgegebenen „ Monistischen Bausteine“ (Brackwede 1914).
Wenn wir hier von alien einzelnen Sittengesetzen und speziellen Regulativen ganz absehen, so bleibt uns an der Spitze
aller Moralphilosophie jenes hochste Pflichtgebot iibrig, das man
gewohnlich' als das „goldene Sittengesetz“ (auch als die
„goldene )Regel“ oder den „goldenen Imperativ“) bezeichnet.
Es wurde' schon vor mehr als zweitausend Jahren von den beriihmten ..Wei sen" Griechenlands und von den Religionsstiftern
Asiens (in China und Indien) mit grofiem Erfolge gelehrt. Ich
habe dieses ethische Grundgesetz bereits im 19. Kapitel
der „Weltratsel“ eingehend besprochen und gezeigt, daB sein
hochstes Ziel die Herstellung des naturgemaBen Gleichgewichts zwischen Egoismus und Altruismus, zwischen
„Eigenliebe und Nachstenliebe“ ist.lp„Was du willst, daB dir
die Leute tun sollen, das tue du ihnen auch.“ Christus sprach
dasselbe wiederholt in dem einfachen Satze aus: ^„Du sollst
deinen Nachsten lieben wie dich selbst
Dieses vornehmste Gebot des Christentums. das auch unser
Monismus anerkennt, war aber keine neue Erfindung von
Christus, sondern schon 500 Jahre vor ihm von verschiedenen
Weisen des Altertums gelehrt worden. Andererseits beging das
Christentum in seiner weiteren paulinischen Entwicklung den
groBen Fehler, daB es .das hochste Gebot^der Menschenliebe
allzu einseitig iibertrieb und vielfach die natiirlichen Rechte
des Individuums zugunsten der Gesellschaft herabsetzte. Die
beiden naturlichen Triebe des Egoismus und des Altruismus
sind aber gleichberechtigt. Wie die Selbstliebe die Erhaltung
des Individuums anstrebt, so gilt die Nachstenliebe der Er
haltung der Gesellschaft, die der Einzelmensch nicht entbehren
kann. Indem der Mensch das soziale Wohl des Staates fordert,
dessen geordnete Gesetzgebung die erste Bedingung fur hohere
Kultur ist, arbeitet er zugleich fiir sein eigenes personliches
Gluck.
4*
�52
Diesseits und Jenseits.
Von groBter Bedeutung fiir die naturgemaBe Lebensfiihrung
ist natiirlich der Verzicht auf den Unsterblichkeitsglauben. In
den „Monistischen Studien“ uber Thanatismus und Athanismus
(im 11. Kapitel der Wl.) habe ich gezeigt, daB der herrschende
Glaube an die Unsterblichkeit der personlichen Menschenseele
jeden Anhalt in der Wissenschaft verloren hat. Die Priester
der meisten dualistischen Religionen (und namentlich der christlichen) fahren freilich trotzdem fort, den Glauben an die personliche Unsterblichkeit und an ein ewiges Leben im „Paradiese“
(oder auch in der „Holle“) als eine der wichtigsten Offenbarungs-Wahrheiten zu preisen. Das unbekannte „Jenseits“ im
Himmel, mit den ewigen Freuden des Paradieses, soil den
armen Menschen fur all die Mangel und Leiden entschadigen,
welche er in dem mangelhaften „Diesseits“ auf unserer Erde
zeitlebens zu ertragen hat. Unzweifelhaft ist fiir die naiven
Glaubigen jener verheiBungsvolle „Wechsel auf die Zukunft"
ein groBer Trost und fur die leidenden Armen und Elenden ein
Palliativmittel zur Beruhigung. Aber leider ist jenes schone Versprechen nur ein reines Phantasiegebilde der Dichtung, und die
begliickende Hoffnung darauf entbehrt jeder realen Unterlage.
Unsere monistische, auf die klarste Erfahrung gegriindete
Anthropologie hat uns fest uberzeugt, daB die personliche
Existenz jedes Menschen — mit Leib und Seele — ebenso
si ch er mit seinem To de aufhort, wie sie mit der Entstehung
der Stammzelle (mit der Befruchtung der miitterlichen Eizelle
durch die vaterliche Spermazelle) begonnen hat. Demzufolge
hat unsere monistische Ethik allein die Aufgabe, dieses unser
irdisches Leben so gut und schon, so gliicklich und zufriedenstellend als moglich zu gestalten; unsere Erziehung kann keine
weitere Aufgabe haben, als unsere Jugend, von friihester Kindheit an, allein fur dieses ..Diesseits" gut zu erziehen. Der einfachste, beste und wirksamste Leitfaden dazu bleibt immer das
,,Goldene Sittengesetz“.
�53
Monistische und christliche Religion.
Der natiirliche und notwendige Gegensatz, welcher zwischen
unserer auf Wissenschaft begriindeten monistischen Religion
und den herrschenden, auf angebliche Offenbarung gestiitzten
dualistischen Religionen — in erster Linie des traditionellen
Christentums — besteht, ist in meinen friiheren naturphilosophischen Schriften, besonders aber im 17. Kapitel der „Weltratsel“ hinreichend beleuchtet worden. Hier wollen wir nur
noch besonders auf den ganz verschiedenen Wert hinweisen,
welchen in unserem modernen Kulturleben einerseits die theoretischel christliche Glaubenslehre als Weltanschauung besitzt; andererseits die praktische christliche Sittenlehre als Norm
und Richtschnur fur unsere Lebensfiihrung. Beide Aufgaben
werden zwar, der alten geheiligten Tradition entsprechend, im
christlichen Katechismus dogmatisch zusammengefaBt und in
den Kirchen zusammenhangend gelehrt; tatsachlich aber ist in
unserem heutigen Kulturleben die aberglaubische christliche
Weltanschauung vollig iiberwunden und durch die vernunftgemaBen Erkenntnisse der Wissenschaft ersetzt. Hingegen sind
die ethischen Gebote der christlichen Lebensfiihrung, soweit sie
den naturgemaBen Forderungen der Humanitat entsprechen,
wertvolle Bausteine auch fiir unsere gereinigte monistische Sit
tenlehre geblieben.
Das Christentum als Weltanschauung, als theoretische
Grundlage des allgemeinen Weltbildes, wird zwar auch heute
noch von den orthodoxen Anhangern der christlichen Religion
mit Fanatismus verteidigt. In vielen Kulturlandern, in denen
Thron und Altar zum Schutz des „ alten Glaubens“ sich verbiinden, wird die christliche Oflenbarungslehre, von der Schopfungsgeschichte des Moses im Alten Testament bis zur Auferstehung und Himmelfahrt des Christus im Neuen Testament,
als wichtigste Grundlage der Volksbildung festgehalten. Die
dualistische Kirchenlehre, ebenso die rechtglaubige evangelische,
wie die alleinseligmachende katholische, bemiihen sich, einen
�54
Weg der Versohnung ihres iiberlebten Aberglaubens mit den
entgegenstehenden Ergebnissen der modernen Naturerkenntnis
zu finden. Besonders wirksam erweist sich dabei die Sophistik
der Jesuiten, sowohl in dem alteren Thomasbunde als in dem
neueren Keplerbunde. DaB der dualistische Jesuitenbund hierbei keine Mittel der Tauschung fur zu schlecht halt, habe ich
1910 in meiner Broschiire „Sandalion“ gezeigt („Offene Ant
wort auf die Falschungsanklagen der Jesuiten “). Obgleich nun
leider diese Irrlehren des judisch-christlichen Religionsgebaudes
durch die Macht der konservativen Bildungskreise erfolgreich
unterstiitzt werden, haben sie doch tatsachlich in der modernen
Wissenschaft alien Boden verloren. Schon vor 400 Jahren
hatte Kopernikus das alte geozentrische Weltbild zerstort,
unsere Erde aus .dem Mittelpunkt der Welt entfernt und ihr
ein bescheideneres Planeten-Platzchen im Sonnensystem angewiesen. Durch Darwin wurde uns vor 50 Jahren der Weg zur
modernen Anthropogenie geoffnet, welche die anthropozentrische Weltanschauung aufhebt, den Menschen seiner angemaBten Gottahnlichkeit entkleidet und ihm seine wahre Stellung
an der Spitze der Herrentiere anweist.
Die moderne Christologie hat es sehr wahrscheinlich gemacht, daB Christus ein reines Idealbild der religiosen'"Dichtung
ist und daB er als personlicher Mensch, als „Gottessohn“ Jesus
niemals gelebt hat. 'Aber auch wenn er wirklich existiert hat,
kann seine Ansicht von Gott und Welt, von Seele und Mensch,
keinen Anspruch auf wissenschaftliche Geltung erheben. Jesus
behauptete freilich 'in gutem Glauben: „Ich bin der Weg, die
Wahrheit und das Leben“! Aber er war ein idealistischer
Schwarmer, der 'sich seine iibernatiirliche Weltanschauung auf
Grund der orientalischen Mythologie aufbaute, nicht auf
der unbefangenen Anschauung der Wirklichkeit und der klaren
Naturerkenntnis. Jesus hatte keine Ahnung von der bewunderungswiirdigen Hohe des klaren monistischen Weltbildes,
welche die griechische Naturphilosophie schon 500 Jahre vor
ihm erklommen hatte. Niemals aus den engen Grenzen von
�55
Palastina herausgekommen, hatte er keine Kenntnis von dem
hohen Wert der feineren Geisteskultur, von den kostbaren
Schatzen der Kunst und Wissenschaft, welche schon vor seiner
Zeit in Griechenland und Agypten, in Sizilien und Rom aufgespeichert waren. Da Christus unser unvollkommenes irdisches
Leben verachtete und seinen Wert nur in der Vorbereitung fur
ein besseres unbekanntes „Jenseits“ suchte, blieb ihm der Weg
zur Wahrheit verschlossen. (Vergl. Kap. 17 der „Weltratsel“.)
�Abschied
Indem ich mit den vorliegenden Studien fiber „Gott-Natur“
meine naturphilosophischen Studien abschlieBe, fiihle ich die
Verpflichtung, den zahlreichen Lesern der „Weltratsel“ und
„Lebenswunder“ zum Abschiede nicht nur meinen aufrichtigen
Dank fiir ihre Teilnahme an meiner Lebensarbeit auszusprechen,
sondern auch einige Worte der Entschuldigung, dab ich viele
der an mich gerichteten Fragen nicht befriedigend beantworten
konnte. In wenigen Tagen vollende ich mein achtzigstes Lebensjahr und iiberschreite somit die Schwelle des „biblischen
Alters “, durch welche naturgemaB der produktiven Geistesarbeit eine normale Grenze gesetzt ist. Zuriickblickend auf
den Zeitraum von sechzig Jahren, in welchem ich ununterbrochen meine wissenschaftliche Lebensaufgabe zu fordern bemiiht war, empfinde ich mit besonderer Starke den driickenden
Gegensatz zwischen dem Erstrebten und Erreichten, zwischen
den hohen Zielen, die ich mir in frischer Jugendkraft gesteckt
hatte, und den unvollstandigen Ergebnissen, die ich in fleiBiger
und gewissenhafter Arbeit wirklich erreicht habe.
Anderseits aber will ich Jnicht verschweigen, daB mich
heute der Triumph der monistischen Weltanschauung, fur welche
ich wahrend eines halben Jahrhunderts ununterbrochen gekampft habe, mit einem hohen inneren Gliicksgefiihl erfullt
Denn ich habe in diesem denkwiirdigen Zeitraum nicht nur
die gewaltigsten Fortschritte der Naturerkenntnis und der mit
ihr verkniipften Kulturarbeit als staunender Zuschauer passiv
miterlebt, sondern auch als begeisterter Mitarbeiter aktiv an
deren Ausbau mich beteiligen konnen.
�57
Die zweite Halfte des 19. Jahrhunderts wird fiir alle Zeiten
in der Kulturgeschichte der Menschheit eine der glanzendsten
Reformperioden bleiben. Die erstaunlichen Fortschritte der
Astronomie und Kosmologie, der Geologie und Palaontologie,
der Physik und Chemie, der Biologie und Anthropologie haben
in diesem Zeitraum den groBten Teil der triiben Wolken verscheucht, welche der dunkle Aberglaube des Mittelalters noch
fiber der herrschenden dualistischen Weltanschauung ausgebreitet hatte. Die ersehnte „L6sung der Weltratsel“ ist
dadurch in erfreulichster Weise gefordert worden, wie ich in
der kurzen Ubersicht am Schlusse dieses Buches (im 20. Kapitel)
gezeigt habe. Dadurch ist zugleich unser monistisches Substanzgesetz (Kapitel 12) als das allumfassende „kosmologische Grundgesetz“, zu dem „sicheren, unverriickbaren
Leitstern geworden, dessen klares Licht uns durch das dunkle
Labyrinth der unzahligen einzelnen Erscheinungen den Pfad
zeigt.“ Der sichere Ariadnefaden, den wir dabei in fester Hand
halten, ist unsere moderne Entwicklungslehre.
DaB dadurch nicht nur ein fester Boden fur die monistische
Philosophie, sondern auch fur die naturgemaBe, davon nicht
zu trennende Religion gewonnen ist, habe ich bereits 1866
in der „Generellen Morphologie“ gezeigt, in dem Jugendwerk, in welchem ich vor 48 Jahren alle wesentlichen Grundgedanken meiner spateren naturphilosophischen Arbeiten zu
einem festen Programm gestaltet hatte. Das letzte (30.) Kapitel
dieses Werkes (Band II, S. 448) ist betitelt „Gott in der
Natur“ und sucht zu zeigen, daB unser Monismus zugleich
der vollkommenste Pantheismus ist. Wenn man nun den
Gottes-Begriff — im Sinne von Giordano Bruno, von Spinoza
und von Goethe — alles personlichen Anthropismus entkleidet,
und wenn man die Spur von „Gottes Geist “ iiberall in der
Natur bewundernd und andachtsvoll erkennt, so kann man
wohl sagen, daB dieser Monismus auch der reinste Monotheismus ist. Der SchluBsatz jenes Werkes (— von dem
40 Jahre spater der dritte Teil in unverandertem wortlichen
�Abdruck unter dem Titel: „Prinzipien der generellen Mor
phologies Berlin 1906, erschienen ist —) hebt ausdriicklich hervor, daB „Gott die notwendige Ursache aller Dinge ist“. „Indem der Monismus keine anderen als die gottlichen Krafte in
der Natur erkennt, indem er alle Naturgesetze als gottliche
anerkennt, erhebt er sich zu der groBtenund erhabensten Vor
stellung, welcher der Mensch fahig ist, zu der Vorstellung der
Einheit Gottes und der Natur.“
Wie sich auf diesem einheitlichen einfachen Grundgedanken
unser „ Monismus als Band zwischen Religion und Wissenschaft “
aufbaut, habe ich vor 22 Jahren in meinem Altenburger Vortrage (1892) gezeigt und sodann im 18. Kapitel der Weltratsel
(1899) weiter ausgefiihrt. Die feste, unerschiitterliche tlberzeugung von der Wahrheit dieses „Glaubensbekenntnisses eines
Naturforschers“ hat durch meine vielen biologischen SpezialArbeiten, und namentlich durch die vier groBen Monographien
(Radiolarien, Spongien, Medusen, Siphonophoren), mit denen
ich 30 Jahre hindurch beschaftigt war, eine sichere empirische
Grundlage erhalten. Denn ich behielt bei der speziellen Ana
lyse der vielen tausend beschriebenen Lebensformen und ihrer
Entwicklung bestandig ihre Beziehungen zu dem groBen Ganzen
der Natur im Auge. Das alte Leitwort der echten Naturforschung: „ Rerum cognoscere causas“ (die wahren Ursachen
der Dinge ergriinden) fiihrte mich dann immer sicherer zur
Erkenntnis der kausalen Einheit in alien Erscheinungen, und
zu jener andachtsvollen Naturreligion, welcher der groBe Gior
dano Bruno schon vor mehr als 300 Jahren den klarsten Aus
druck in den Worten gegeben hat: „Ein Geist lebt in alien
Dingen und es ist kein Korper so klein, daB er nicht einen Teil der
gottlichen Substanz in sich enthielte.“ In demselben Sinne hat
spater Spinoza in seiner Identitatsphilosophie Gott und Natur fiir
gleichbedeutend erklart („Deus sive natura“), und kein Geringerer
als Goethe hat diesem tiefsten Grundgedanken der Theophysis in
seinen unvergleichlichen Dichtungen: Faust und Prometheus, Gott
und Welt usw. den schonsten poetischen Ausdruck gegeben.
�59
Wenn ich in meiner langen Lebensarbeit zu einer festen,
subjektiv vollkommen klaren Uberzeugung von der Wahrheit
der monistischen Naturphilosophie und Religion gelangt bin,
SO verdanke ich das nicht nur jener breiten Basis meiner naturwissenschaftlichen Forschungen und der damit verkniipften
griindlichen medizinischen Bildung, sondern auch dem gliicklichen Umstande, daB die ersteren mich auf zahlreichen Reisen
in alle Teile von Europa sowie in die interessantesten Gebiete
des siidlichen Asiens und des nordlichen Afrikas fiihrten. Da
erwarb ich mir durch lebendige Anschauung eine umfassende
Kenntnis nicht allein der unendlich formenreichen Tier- und
Pflanzenwelt unserer herrlichen Erde, sondern auch des Men
schen in seinen mannigfaltigsten Gestalten und in seinen Beziehungen zu den verschiedensten Lebensbedingungen. Ich tat
einen unbefangenen Blick auch in die verschiedenen Hauptformen der Religion und streifte dabei die Vorurteile ab, welche
uns in Europa durch die friihzeitige Anpassung an die mystischen Glaubenssatze des Christentums anerzogen werden. Die
viel betonten Gegensatze in den Glaubenslehren der drei groBen
Mediterran-Religionen — der mosaischen, der christlichen und
der mohammedanischen Religion — erweisen sich sowohl hinsichtlich der theoretischen Weltanschauung als der praktischen
Lebensfiihrung bei weitem nicht so groB, als sie von unserem
einseitig konfessionellen, orthodoxen, katholischen oder protestantischen Gesichtspunkte aus gewohnlich dargestellt werden.
Und dasselbe gilt von der buddhistischen und brahmanischen
Religion in Indien, von den alteren Religionsformen des ostlichen Asiens. Uberall kehren gewisse Grundgedanken des On
theismus in ahnlichen Formen wieder und zeigen eine lange
Stufenleiter der religiosen Entwicklung; sie beginnt mit dem
Fetischismus und Damonismus der rohen Naturvolker und
Barbaren; sie steigt ija vielen Abstufungen zu dem Polytheismus und Monotheismus der Kulturvolker hinauf (Kapitel 15
der „Weltratsel“). Die reinsten Formen dieses Ontheismus
(wie sie z. B. der evangelische Theologe Schleiermacher ent-
�60
wickelte) gehen dann unmerklich in unseren monistischen
Pantheismus fiber.
„ Gottes ist der Orient,
Gottes ist der Occident,
Nord und siidliches Gelande
Ruht im Frieden seiner Hande.“
(Goethe.)
Mit Leitworten von Wolfgang Goethe habe ich jedes einzelne der 30 Kapitel meiner Generellen Morphologie eingefiihrt
und auch in anderen Schriften habe ich oft Gelegenheit gehabt, aus seinen wunderbaren Dichtungen die schonste Form
fur den unvollkommenen Ausdruck meiner eigenen monistischen
Gedanken zu entleihen. Es geschah dies nicht bloB aus Ehrfurcht vor unserem groBten deutschen Dichter, dessen unvergleichliche Geisteserzeugnisse ich schon in friiher Jugend bewundern lernte, sondern auch in dankbarer Erinnerung daran,
daB es mir in Jena vergonnt war, ein halbes Jahrhundert hindurch in den unvertilgbaren Spuren des Geisteshelden von
Weimar zu wandeln. In den engen Raumen der alten Ana
tomie, wo Goethe die Schadeltheorie aufstellte und die Mor
phologie begrfindete, hielt ich vor 50 Jahren meine ersten
Vorlesungen fiber vergleichende Anatomie; in unserem reizenden botanischen Garten, wo er die „Metamorphose der Pflan
zen “ ausfiihrte, studierte ich die von ihm gepflanzten Baume,
darunter die beriihmte Conifere Gingko biloba, welcher er in
dem Westostlichen Divan (in Gedanken an Suleika) Unsterblich
keit verliehen hat. In den blumenreichen Waldungen des
Forstes und auf den malerischen Felsen der Kernberge genoB
ich viele hundert Male den Reiz unserer wundervollen Thiiringer Landschaft, welcher wir so viele seiner schonsten Dich
tungen verdanken. In den Ruinen der alten Lobedaburg („wo
hinter Tiiren und Toren einst lauerten Ritter und RoB“) sah
ich Goethes Blicke nach dem Wahrzeichen der Leuchtenburg
hiniiberschweifen; und am Fenster des westlichen rosenum-
�61
kranzten Schlosses von Dornburg fiihlte ich, wie hier unser
groBter Dichter den Schlangenwindungen der Saale gefolgt war.
Ja, ein besonders giitiges Geschick schenkte mir das auserlesene
Gluck, daB ich vor 30 Jahren mir auf demselben malerischen
Erdenfleck (am rechten Leutra-Ufer, damals Kartoffelfeld) mein
bescheidenes Hauschen — die Villa Medusa — erbauen durfte,
auf welchem Goethe 100 Jahre friiher eine Zeichnung von dem
schrag gegeniiberliegenden „Schillergarten“ und der Leutrabriicke entworfen hatte.
Uberall lebt in Jena wie in Weimar der wahrhaft „unsterbliche“ Geist von Goethe lebendig fort; und iiberall sehen wir,
wie dieser „groBe Heide von Weimar“ (der sich selbst als
„dezidierten Nichtchristen“ bekannte) in seiner „Gott-Natur“
den theophysischen Grundgedanken unseres heutigen Monis
mus vorwegnahm. So kann ich denn diese meine letzte
Studie uber monistische Philosophie und Religion auch nur
mit seinen Worten schlieBen:
„GewiB, es gibt keine schonere Gottesverehrung als
diejenige, welche aus dem Wechselgesprach mit der
Natur in unserm Busen entspringt!“
�Nachwort.
Diejenigen Leser der „Weltratsel“ und „Lebenswunder
welche an den vorstehenden „ Studien fiber monistische Religion “
ein tieferes Interesse finden und eine weitere Begriindung meiner
beziiglichen Anschauungen in meinen friiheren Schriften aufzusuchen
wiinschen, kann ich besonders auf folgende Werke verweisen:
I. Generelle Morphologie der Organismen, 1866 (Berlin, G. Rei
mer). 2 Bande. Da dieses Werk schon lange vergriffen ist, wurde
1906 sein dritter Teil in wortlichem Abdruck unter dem Titel „Prinzipien der generellen Morphologie “ herausgegeben.
II. Natiirliche Schopfungsgeschichte ; Gemeinverstandliche wissenschaftliche Vortrage uber die Entwickelungslehre, 1868, Berlin,
G. Reimer. (Elfte Auflage 1908.) Mit 30 Tafeln.
III. Systematische Phylogenie. Entwurf eines natiirlichen
Systems der Organismen auf Grund ihrer Stammesgeschichte. 1894
bis 1896. Berlin, G. Reimer. 3 Bande.
IV. Anthropogenie; Entwicklungsgeschichte des Menschen.
Erster Teil: Keimesgeschichte. Zweiter Teil: Stammesgeschichte.
1874. Leipzig, W. Engelmann. (Sechste Auflage, 2 Bande, 1910.
Mit 30 Tafeln und 500 Holzschnitten.)
V. Gemeinverstandliche Vortrage uber Entwickelungslehre
1902. Bonn, Emil StrauB. 2 Bande.
VI. Der Monismus als Band zwischen Religion und Wissen
schaft. Glaubensbekenntnis eines Naturforschers, vorgetragen in
Altenburg 1892. — 15. Auflage, 1912. Leipzig, Alfred Kroner.
VII. Alte und neue Naturgeschichte. Festrede zur Ubergabe
des Phyletischen Museums an die Universitat Jena, 1908. (Mit
Verzeichnis der Druckschriften.) Jena, Gustav Fischer.
VIII. Unsere Ahnenreihe (Progonotaxis Hominis). Kritische
Studien fiber Phyletische Anthropologie. Festschrift. Mit 6 Tafeln.
Jena 1908, Gustav Fischer.
�Aahang.
Synoptische Tabellen
zum Verstandnis der Studien uber
Monistische Religion.
(Vergleiche die 4 Tabellen in der GroBen Ausgabe der „Weitratsel“, 1899;
und die 22 Tabellen in der GroBen Ausgabe der „Lebenswunder“, 1904.)
I. Tabelle: Monistische und Dualistische Religion.
Theophysik (Pantheos) und Theomystik (Ontheos).
,11. Tabelle: Hauptformen des Ontheisinus.
(Monotheismus, Amphitheismus, Triplotheismus, Polytheismus).
III. Tabelle: Trinitat der Substanz.
(Materie, Energie, Psychom).
IV. Tabelle: Drei Richtungen der Substanzlehre.
(Materialismus, Energetik, Psychomatik).
V. Tabelle: Eritik der Erkenntniswege.
Monistische und Dualistische Erkenntnistheorie.
VI. Tabelle: Grundrichtungen der Naturphilosophie.
Monistische und Dualistische Kosmologie.
VII. Tabelle: Ahnenreihe des Menschen,
Erste Halfte: Ohne fossile Urkunden.
will. Tabelle: Ahnenreihe des Menschen.
Zweite Halfte: Mit fossilen Urkunden.
�Erste Tabelle. Monistisehe und dualistische Religion.
Prinzipien der Theophysik.
Prinzipien der Theomystik.
Allgott. Pantheos.
„Deus intramundanus".
Uni ver sal-Gott.
Kosmischer Urgrund der Welt.
(Giordano Bruno, Spinoza, Goethe.)
Schulgott. Ontheos.
„Deus extramundanus“.
Personal-Gott.
Anthropistischer Urgrund der Welt.
(Jehovah, Christus, Allah.)
1. Gott ist die Natur selbst, ewig
und unverganglich wie diese.
1. Gott ist ewig und erzeugt als
Schopfer die vergangliche Natur.
2. Gott ist selbst das Naturgesetz,
unbewufit, unabanderlich („Universum perpetuum mobile11).
2. Gott bestimmt als Gesetzgeber
mit BewuBtsein die Naturgesetze und
kann sie beliebig abandem.
3. Gott besitzt keinen freien Willen
und keine Willkiir.
3. Gott besitzt unbeschrankte Frei
heit des Willens und ist „allmachtig“.
4. Gott ist an die „ewigen ehernen
Naturgesetze“ gebunden und kann
keine Wunder tun; es gibt keine
„ubernatiirlichen Wunder".
4. Gott kann jederzeit und iiberall
Wunder tun und die Naturgesetze
willkiirlich durchbrechen; es gibt wirkliche „iibematurliche Wunder“.
5. Gott als universale Substanz ist
iiberall und jederzeit an die Trinitat
der Attribute (Materie, Energie,
Psychom) gebunden; die Entwick
lung der zweckmaBigen Organisa
tion ist ein Produkt der Anpassung
und Auslese (Selection).
5. Gott hat als weiser und zweckmaBig handelnder Weltregent alle
Dinge mit Weisheit und Verstand
eingerichtet; als geschickter „Maschinen-Ingenieur“ hat er alle Ein
richtungen (im Anorgon und im Bios!)
planvoll geschaffen.
6. Gott als blindesSchicksal(Fatum)
ist an das universale, Alles beherrschende Kausalgesetz gebunden. Es
gibt in der Entwieklung des Univer
sum keine „gottliche Vorsehung",
keine „sittliche Weltordnung“.
7. Gott ist kein „allgerechter Rich
ter", kennt keinen Unterschied von
„Gut und Bose". Die Tugend belohnt sich selbst; die „Siinde“ be
straft sich selbst. Es gibt in Wirklichkeit kein „Jiingstes Weltgericht".
6. Gott als „liebender Vater“ ist
iiberall fur das Wohl seiner „Geschopfe" besorgt; behiitet sie als
„Vorsehung“ vor Gefahren und leitet
ihr Wohl umsichtig durch eine „sittliche Weltordnung".
7. Gott als „ strenger Richter" und
Weltregent wacht uber der Befolgung
seiner „Gebote“, belohnt die „Guten“
und bestraft die „Bbsen“. Am Ende
folgt (— fiir alle Lebewesen? —) ein
„ Jiingstes Weltgericht “.
Naturalistischer
Gottes-Begriff.
Transszendenter
Gottes-Begriff.
�65
Zweite Tabelle.
Ilauptformen des Ontlieismus.
Grundvorstellung: Gott ist eine individuelle Personlichkeit, welche als
Selbstandiges Subjekt auBerhalb der Welt besteht; Schopfer der Natur.
(Deus extramundanus = Schulgott = Personal-Gott.)
I. Monotheismus. Eingotterei.
I. Ein hochstes Wesen in einem
I. A. Naturalistischer Mono einzigen herrschenden Natur-Objekt
theismus.
verkorpert, beherrscht alles Ubrige.
A I. Solarismus(=Heliotheismus)
I, A. Die Sonne oder der Mond ist
Sonnen-Kultus.
das hochste Wesen, das Alles
A 2. Lunarismus (— Selenotheisschafft und belebt (Quelle
mus) Mondkultus.
aller Energie).
I. B. Anthropistischer Mono
I. B. Das hochste Wesen ist ein
theismus. (Anthropomoreinziger personlicher Gott und
pher Theismus).
menschenahnlich denkend.
B 1. Mosaismus (Jiidischer Mo
Bl. Moses: „Ich bin der Herr dein
notheismus: Jehovah (JaGott, du sollst nicht andere
veh) 1800 v. Chr.
Gotter haben neben mir“.
B 2. Christianismus (ChristB 2. Christus: Gott ist der Geist
licher Monotheismus).
der Liebe.
B 3. Islam (Mohammedan. Mo
B 3. Mohammed: „Gott ist der
notheismus : Allah) 600 n.Chr.
alleinige Gott“ (unsichtbar).
II. Amphitheismus. Zweigotterei.
II. Zwei hochste Wesen („Gott
und Teufel“ — „Gutes und boses
II. A. Altindische
Zweigotterei:
Wisehnu (= Erhalter) gegen Prinzip“) kampfen gegeneinander um
die Weltregierung.
Schiwa (= Zerstorer).
II. B. Altagyptische Zweigotterei:
Vom Standpunkt der reinen Ver
Osiris (gut) gegen Typhon.
nunft betrachtet erscheint der Amphi
II. C. Altpersische Zend-Religion:
theismus als die rationellste Form
Ormudz (Licht) gegen Ahri des Personal-Theismus; denn er erman (Finsternis).
klart den tatsachlich iiberall vorhanII. D. Althebraische Zweigotterei:
denen Kampf der Gegensatze.
Aschera gegen Moloch.
(Vergl. Kap. 15 der Weltratsel.)
III. Triplotheismus.
III. Drei hochste Wesen beherrschen die Welt: Der „Dreieinige Gott“
Dreigotterei
erscheint in drei verschiedenen (an= Trinitatslehre, Dreieinigkeit.
thropomorphen) Personen.
III. A. Altindische
Dreigotterei:'
Ill A. Brahma (Schopfer), WiAlte Bramahnen - Religion:
schnu(Erhalter) undSchiwa
Trimurti (= Drei-Einheit).
(Zerstorer).
III. B. Altchaldaische Trinitat: Ilu
IIIB. Anu(= Chaos, Weitsubstanz),
(■= Urquelle der Welt).
Bel (Ordner der Welt), Ao
(Weltgericht, himmlisch.Licht).
III. C. Christliche DreieinigkeitsIll C. Gottvater (Schopfer), Gotteslehre. Trinitat der drei
sohn (Jesus Christus), Heiliger
christlichen Personen.
Geist (?).
IV. Polytheismus. Vielgotterei.
IV. Viele hochste Wesen beherrDamonismus in *mannigfaltigster schen die Welt und leiten die GeGestalt.
schicke der Menschen.
Der monistische Pantheismus,
im Gegensatze zu alien obenstehenden Formen des Ontheismus (— der
jjSchulgotterei" oder des „Personal-Theismus“ —) findet iiberall
„Gott in der Natur“ (kein personliches hochstes Wesen).
5
�66
Dritte Tabelle.
Trinitat der Substanz.
tJbersicht uber die drei wesentlichen, untrennbar verknfipften Grundeigenschaften (>; Essential-Attribute “) aller Substanz (der anorgiscben
ebenso wie der organischen). — (Vgl. Kapitel 19 der „Lebenswunder“; daselbst Tabelle 19 in der groBen Ausgabe.)
A. Materie — Stoff
(Hyle oder Weltstoff = Prakriti der alten Inder.)
Alle Substanz (anorgische und organische) ist ausgedehnt („Extensum11) und daher raumerfiillend.
Einseitig betont vom monistischen Materialismus (Holbach,
Buchner) und von der modernen Mechanistik (der meisten Chemiker).
B. Energie = Kraft
(Dynamis oder Weltkraft = Karma der alten Inder.)
Alle Substanz (anorgische und organische) ist beweglich (kraftbegabt)
und daher wirksam.
Einseitig betont von der monistischen Energetik (Ostwald) und der
alteren Dynamik (Leibniz).
C. Psychom = Empfindung
(Asthesis oder Weltseele — Atman der alten Inder.)
Alle Substanz (anorgische und organische) ist empfindlich und reizbar
(— und also „belebt“ im weitesten Sinne! —).
Einseitig betont vom monistischen Psychomonismus (Ernst Mach,
Max Verworn) und dem alteren Idealismus (Platon, Berkeley).
Die fundamentalen Erscheinungen der Gravitation'oder Schwerkraft
in der Physik, der Affinitat oder „Wahlverwandtschaft“ in der Chemie,
finden ihre tiefere (panpsychistische) Erklarung durch die Annahme, daB
alle Materie (Masse und Ather) nicht nur Energie, sondern auch Ffihlung besitzt: die Gravitation beruht auf quantitativer, die Affinitat auf
qualitativer Unterscheidung der Umgebung.
NB. Die hier iibersichtlich dargestellte Theorie von der universalen
Trinitat der Substanz (— den drei untrennbaren Grundeigenschaften
aller anorgischen und organischen Korper —) ist zuerst in dem Buche fiber
die „Lebenswunder“ (1904) erschienen. Sie diirfte viele wichtige Pro
bleme (Gravitation, Wahlverwandtschaft) besser erklaren, als die
altere Theorie von der Binit at der Substanz (zwei Attribute: Einheit
von Materie und Energie), welche ich im AnschluB an Spinoza 1892 aufgestellt hatte (1. c.).
�67
Vierte Tabelle.
Drei Grundrichtungen der Substanzlehre.
(Drei Attribute der Substanz oder des „Kraftstoffes“.)
I. Materie
(= Stoff = Hyle)
II. Energie
(— Kraft = Arbeit)
III. Psychom
(= Urseele — Fiihlung)
Weltstoff.
Weltkraft.
Welts eele.
Materialistisches Prinzip
Dynamisches Prinzip
(Prakriti, Sankhya). (Karma, Buddhismus).
Materialismus
Energetik
(— Hylismus)
(= Energielehre)
(Ausdehnung).
(Wille).
Psychistisches Prinzip
(Atman im Veda)
Psyehomatik
(= Panpsychismus)
(Empfindung).
Raumerfiillendes
Wirkende Arbeit,
Unterscheidende
Substrat aller
Funktion aller
Fiihlung aller
Substanz
Substanz
Substanz
(Hypokeimenon)
(Energie)
(Asthesis)
(Zuriickfiihrung allesSeins (Zuriickfiihrung allesSeins (Zuriickfuhrung allesSeins
und Werdens auf Materie und Werdens auf Energie und Werdens auf Psyche
oder Stoff).
oder Kraft).
oder Seele).
Zwei Urzustande.
Zwei Urzustande.
Zwei Urzustande.
I. A. Ather
II. A. Spannkraft
III. A. Anziehung
(Weltather = Lichtather) Potentielle Energie
Attraktion, Neigung,
„gespannte Materie"
„Arbeitsfahigkeit“
„Liebe der Elemente"
Struktur kontinuierlich
(nicht atomistisch)
Ruhende Kraft
Lust-Gefiihl
Imponderable
Energie der Lage.
Positiver Tropismus.
Substanz.
I. B. Masse
„Verdichtete Materie"
Struktur atomistisch
(Diskrete Teilchen)
Ponderable
Substanz.
II. B. Triebkraft
Aktuelle Energie
„ Arb eitsleistung “
Lebendige Kraft
Wirkende Energie der
Bewegung.
III. B. Abstofiung
Repulsion, Widerstand,
„HaB der Elemente “
Unlust-Gef uhl
Negativer Tropis
mus.
Alle Substanz besitzt Aus Alle Substanz besitzt
Alle Substanz besitzt
dehnung (Extensio)
Kraft oder Energie und Fiihlung oder Empfindung
und fiillt Raum aus. wirkt auf ihre Umgebung.
fiir ihre Umgebung.
Konstanz der Materie
Konstanz der Energie Konstanz des Psychoms
Universalgesetz von der Universalgesetz von der Universalgesetz von der
„Erhaltung
„ Erhaltung
„ Erhaltung
des Stoffes".
der Kraft".
der Fuhlung".
5*
�68
Funfte Tabelle.
Kritik der Erkenntms-Wege.
Physikalische Erkenntnis-Theorie.
Monistischer Erkenntnisweg.
Grundlage: Erfahrung
(Empirie).
Metaphysische Erkenntnis-Theorie.
Duaiistischer Erkenntnisweg.
Grundlage: Offenbarung
(Revelation).
1. Die Erkenntnis der Wahrheit
ist ein natiirlicher Vorgang (ein
physikalischer oder genauer physiologischer ProzeB).
1. Die Erkenntnis der Wahrheit
ist ein iibernaturlicher Vorgang
(ein metaphy sischer oder transszendenter ProzeB).
2. Die Erkenntnis ist gleich alien
anderen Naturerscheinungen dem universalen Substanz-Gesetz (dem
kosmischen Konstanz-Prinzip) unterworfen. Vgl. Tabelle III. u. IV.
2. Die Erkenntnis ist nur zum Teil
eine Naturerscheinung und somit vom
Substanz-Gesetz abhangig; zum an
deren Teil ist sie ein autonomer
geistiger Vorgang.
3. Die Physiologie und Pathologie
der Erkenntnis zeigt, daB ihr anatomisches Werkzeug ein raumlich
begrenztes Gebiet der GroBhirnrinde
ist, das Denkorgan (Phronema).
3. Die Physiologie und Pathologie
der Erkenntnis lehrt, daB sie als
hohere „Geistestatigkeit“ von ihrem
anatomischen Organ, dem Phronema,
teilweise unabhangig ist.
4. DasErkenntnis-Organ(Phronema) umfaBt die Gesamtheit der
„Assozions-Zentren« und ist durch besonderen histologischen Bau von den
angrenzenden sensorischen und motorischen Zentren der GroBhirnrinde
verschieden.
4. DasErkenntnis-Organ(Phronema) hat als „Assozions-Zentrum“
bloB die Bedeutung eines Teiles des
„Geistes-Instrumentes“ und wird von
dem freien immateriellen Geiste selbstandig regiert (— unabhangig von
der histologischen Struktur).
5. Die zahlreichen Zellen, welche
das Phronema zusammensetzen — die
Phronetalzellen — sind die eigentlichen Elementar-Organelle des
Erkenntnis-Prozesses; auf ihrer normalen physikalischen Beschaffenheit
und chemischen Zusammensetzung
beruht dieMoglichkeit der Erkenntnis.
5. Die zahlreichen Phronetalzellen
(die mikroskopischen Elementarteile
des Phronema) sind zwar unentbehrliche Werkzeuge des ErkenntnisVorganges, aber nicht dessen reale
Faktoren; sie sind abhangig vom
immateriellen Geiste, bloB Bestandteile seines Instrumentes.
�69
Sechste Tabelle.
Grundrichtungen der Naturphilosophie.
Monistische Kosmologie.
Dualistische Kosmologie.
Theorie der einheitlichen Gesamtwelt. (Alles lebt.)
1. Natur allein ist Alles!
Theorieder zwei verschiedenen
Welten. (Lebende und tote Natur.)
1. Natur und Geist sind getrennt!
1. Monismus. Organische und an©rgische Natur sind zwei untrennbar
verbundene Gebiete des einheitlichen
Universum.
2. Mechanismus (Biologischer Mo
nismus). Die sogenannten Lebenserscheinungen werden durch dieselben
physikalischen und chemischen Krafte
bedingt, wie samtliche Vorgange in
der sogenannten leblosen oder anorgischen Natur.
3. Kausalitat. Die Ursachen aller
Erscheinungen sind mechanische (unbewuBte) Werkursachen (Causae
efficientes). Die zweckmaBigen Ein
richtungen in dem Organismus sind
die Folgen der Anpassung und Selektion im Kampf urns Dasein.
4. Die Physik (im weitesten Sinne,
mit EinschluB der Chemie als „ Physik
der Atome“) beherrscht das Gesamtgebiet der Natur; die Physiologie ist
nur ein Teilgebiet der Physik (Or
ganische Physik).
5. Das Plasma, welches als „Lebendige Substanz “ die besonderen
Lebenserscheinungen bewirkt, ist als
stickstoff haltige Kohlenstoff-Verbindung die einzige materielle Basis der
Lebenstatigkeit; das organischeLeben
ist nur eine besonders verwickelte
Form der Plasma-Physik.
6. Die Urzeugung (Archigonie),
als spontane Entstehung von lebendigem Plasma aus anorgischen Kohlenstoff-Verbindungen, wird durch die
Vergleichung der Moneren mit fliissigen Krystallen verstandlich.
1. Dualismus. Organische und anorgische Natur sind zwei wesentlich
getrennte Gebiete des zweiheitlichen
Universum.
2. Vitalismus (Biologischer Dualis
mus). Die Lebenserscheinungen wer
den durch eine besondere Lebenskraft
(Vis vitalis) geleitet, eine iibernaturliche Richtkraft, welche die physikalischen und chemischen Krafte
zielbewuBt dirigiert (Entelechie).
3. Teleologie (Finalitat). Die Ur
sachen der Lebenserscheinungen sind
nur zum Teil mechanische Werkur
sachen; zum anderen Teil sind sie
zielstrebige Zweckursachen (Causae
finales) von einer iibernaturlichen
kosmischen Intelligenz bestimmt.
4. Die Physik (mit EinschluB der
Chemie) ist nur in der Anorgik allmachtig; in der Biologie tritt ihr die
„Autonomie des Lebens“ entgegen;
daher ist die Physiologie nur zum
Teil der Physik unterworfen.
5. Das Plasma (als die universale
„Lebendige Substanz") ist zwar iiberall
in den Lebenserscheinungen tatig;
aber seine chemische Zusammensetzung ist nicht deren einzige Ursache; vielmehr ist ihre Funktion von
der Lebenskraft abhangig (= Kosmische Intelligenz).
6. Die Urzeugung (Archigonie)
hat niemals stattgefunden; denn
immer haben Organismen unabhangig
von den Anorganen existiert; oder
sie sind durch ein ubernatiirliches
Wunder erschaSen worden.
�70
Siebente Tabelle.
Ahnenreihe des Menschen.
Erste Halfte: Ohne fossile Urkunden, vor der Silurzeit.
Hauptstrecken der
Progonotaxis
I. Erste Strecke:
Protisten-Alinen
Einzellige Urwesen.
1. 2. Protoph yta.
Urpflanzen
(Plasmodom).
3.-5. Protozoa
Urtiere
(Plasmophag).
Stammgruppen
der Ahnenreihe
Lebende
Verwandte der Wichtigste Momente
der Stammesgeschichte
Gegenwart
1. Monera
1. Chromacea Plasmakornchen, durch
Kernlose Ur(Chroococcus) Urzeugung (Archigonie)
zellen
entstanden.
2. Algaria
2. Paulotomea Alteste Kernzellen, d.
Einzellige Algen (Protococcus)
Kernsonderung (Karyogonie) entstanden.
3. Lobosa
3. Amoebida AmoeboideZellen, durch
Amoebinen
(Leucocyta)
Metasitismus entstan
den.
4. Flagellata
4. Monadina GeiBelzellen mit FlimGeiBelinfusorien (Zoomonades) merbewegung.
5. Blastaeades
5. Catallacta Hohlkugeln, derenWand
Hohlkugeltiere
(Blastula)
eine einfache Zellschicht ist.
II. Zweite Strecke:
6. Gastrula
6. Gastraeades
Urdarmtiere (Pemmatodiscus
Hydra)
7. Platodaria 7. Cryptocoela
<
Wirbellose
Urplattentiere
(Convoluta)
Metazoen.
8. Turbellaria 8. Rhabdocoela
, Strudelwiirmer
(Vortex)
6.-8. Coelenteria
' 9. Provermalia 9. Gastrotricha
Niedertiere
(Ichthydium)
Urwurmtiere
(ohne Leibeshohle,
ohne After).
10. Frontonia
10. Enteropneusta
Kiemendarm•
9.—11. Vermalia
(Balanoglossus)
wiirmer
Wurmtiere
(mit Leibeshohle, mit ll.Prochordonia 11. Copelata
Urchordatiere
(Chordula)
After).
Becher, dessen Wand
2 Zellschichten bilden,
Urdarm und Urmund.
Bilaterale Symmetric
erscheint.
Ein Paar Nephridien
treten auf.
Darm mit 2 Offnungen:
Mund und After.
Kiemendarm tritt auf,
mit Kiemenspalten.
12. Prospondylia 12. Amphioxides
AmphioxusUrwirbeltiere
larven
13. Leptocardia 13. Amphioxus
Alteste, kieferlose Wir
Branchiostoma
Lanzelottiere
beltiere, mit unpaarer
Nase, ohne paarige
' 14. Archicrania 14. Ammocoetes
GliedmaBen.
Urschadeltiere (Prickenlarve)
12. 13. Acrania
Schadellose.
15. Marsipo- 15. Petromyzon
(Bdellostoma)
branchia.
14. 15. Cyclostoma
Kieferlose Schadeltiere. . Prickentiere
Innere Gliederung, Metamerie tritt auf. Ein
Paar Kiemenspalten.
Zahlreiche Kiemenspalspalten. Perichorda.
Gewebebau epithelial.
Einfache Hirnblase und
Urschadel tritt auf.
Gewebebau mesenchy
mal.
Gehirn gliedert sich in
drei Blasen.
liivertebratenAhnen.
III. Dritte Strecke:
Monori’IiinenAhnen.
Chorda erscheint und
sechs Primitiv-Organe.
�71
Achte Tabelle.
Ahnenreihe des Menschen.
Zweite Halite: Mit fossilen Urkunden, in der Silurzeit beginnend.
Hauptstrecken der
Progonotaxis
Stammgruppen
der Ahnenreihe
IV. Vierte Strecke:
16. Selachii
Urfische
Lebende
Verwandte der Wichtigste Momente
der Stammesgeschichte
Gegenwart
16. Notidanides
(Chlamydoselachus)
17. Polypterides
(Accipenserides)
18. Ceratodina
(Protopterus)
19. Perennibranchia
(Salamandrina)
20. Rhynchocephalia
(Ureidechsen)
Bildung von Hautknochen (Zahne, Fischschuppen).
Verknocherte Wirbelsaule.
Schwimmblase verwandelt sich in Lunge.
Ubergang vom Wasser
leben zum Landleben.
21. Monotrema
Gabeltiere
21. Ornitliodelphia
(Echidna)
22. Marsupialia 22. Didelphia
Beuteltiere
(Didelphys)
23. Mallotheria 23. Insectivora
Urzottentiere (Insektenfresser)
Haarkleid und Milchdriisen erscheinen.
Ovipara.
Milchzitzen und Peri
neum. Vivipara.
Placenta und Chorion
treten auf. Beutel wird
riickgebildet.
VI. Sechste Strecke: ' 24. Lemuravida
Halbaffen
Primaten25. Lemurogona
Ahnen.
Voraffen
Herrentiere.
- 26. Dysmopitheca
Saugetiere der TertiarWestaffen
zeit, mit Plazenta, lebendig gebarend, ohne 27. Cynopitheca
Ostaffen
Beutelknochen,
unit
Kletterbeinen und
28. Anthropoides
Greifhanden.
Menschenaffen
24. 25. Prosimiae
Halbaffen
29. Pithe
canthropi
26. 27. Simiae
Affenmenschen
Voll affen
24. Lemurides Verwandlung der Kral(Lemur, Stenops) len in Nagel.
25. Tarsiades Verwandlg. d. Mallopla(Tarsius)
centa in Discoplacenta.
26. Platyrrhinae Tympanicumringformig
(Nyctipithecus) Nasen-Septum breit.
Fischartige
Ahneii.
16.—18. Fische
(Pisces).
Mit 2 Paar vielstrahligen
S chwimmflossen.
19. 20. Tetrap oda.
Vierfiifiige und kaltbliitige. Mit 2 Paar
fiinfzehigen Kriechbeinen.
V. Fiinfte Strecke:
MammalienAhnen.
Niedere Saugetiere der
Sekundarzeit.
(Mesozoisch: 21. Trias,
22. Jura, 23. Kreide.)
28.—30. Anthropomorpha
Menschenaffen
<
<
17. Ganoides
Schmelzfische
18. Dipneusta
Lurchfische
19. Amphibia
Lurche
20. Reptilia
Schleicher
Oberhautverhornt. Am
nion und Allantois erscheinen.
27. Catarrhinae Tympanicum rohrfor(Cercopithecus) mig, Nasen-Septum
schmal.
28. Hylobatides Riickbildung d. Schwan(Gibbon)
zes.
Kreuzbein mit
5 Wirbeln.
29. Anthro- Verwandlung des Affenpitheca
gehirns in MenschenGorilla, Schimp., gehirn.
Orang-Utan)
30. Hominides 30. Weddales Ausbildung der artikuMenschen
(Wilde Natur- lierten Sprache.
menschen)
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Gott-Natur (Theophysis); Studien über monistische Religion
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Haeckel, Ernst Heinrich Philipp August [1834-1919]
Description
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Place of publication: Leipzig
Collation: 71, [1] p. ; 25 cm.
Notes: Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Signature on title page: 'Mr. Joseph McCabe (16 Elm Grove, Cricklewood) London N.W. Freundschaftlicht Ernst Haeckel'. Publisher's advertisements on unnumbered page at the end. Publisher's leaflet inserted loose at p. 25.
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[s.l.]
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1914
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N182
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Theology
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Monism
NSS
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https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/ee46a3293447f9ae4c5ddb99ca412b5a.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=NcMkho6RjDaio5GtIeTpEC7qg1kcQWl23%7E191npZblqdCld90pvSbauQnLsfTsqdxxY7yJVb9s3nRlUfLg7f262hjuLiwBEz44vCZ-2r%7EjZqYW3R-GnhaL85YnSxnSNAXypg2GZKWoI7a28D16%7EnT8vzGCsmWIk8epE9w02vrqcu61JBvejOkxobXNH5%7ED1xAzkk9SL%7EGJ1bxTdp02ubiVoUatV%7EqHeNTHX9siV0lvh8cqW0tdBSGTPV%7EC8hezYryRKPkM8fUWTE-RvuqwwSTs54GtDCY9oUVsredArlzJwMn5EfNgEdFxZthc2H5PVTZI6fCL%7E1MWffLn%7EJR7bEnA__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
759ee295be73e9dfdfbe30803c85d797
PDF Text
Text
DIALOGUES
CONCERNING NATURAL RELIGION,
DAVID HUME, Esq.
A new Edition, with a Preface and Notes, which bring the Subject
down to the present time.
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCOTT,
NO. 11, THE TERRACE, FARQUHAR ROAD,
UPPER NORWOOD, LONDON, S.E,
Price One Shilling.
��PREFACE.
“ Among the sayings of Homer mark well this one too and
improve upon it; he says :—A good messenger brings the great
est credit on every transaction.”—Pindar’s Pythian, iv. 277-78.'
TF ever Truth sent “a good messenger” to the human.
race, it was in the person of David Hume, who was
born at Edinburgh, on the 7th May 1711, N. S. But
Hume did not receive his message from Truth written,
as it were, on a sheet of paper. No : like Pindar’s
messenger of old, Hume had to acquire by labour and
care the knowledge which enabled him to learn and
deliver the message which he conveyed to mortals. '
Moreover, he was obstructed by two obstacles, which
few men, prosecuting such studies as he laboured in,.
succeed in surmounting.
His first obstacle was poverty.
In his delightful little autobiography, (“ My Own
Life,”) he informs us that his fortune was “very slender.”
How he surmounted this obstacle he tells us thus :—
“I resolved to make a very rigid frugality supply my
deficiency of fortune, to maintain unimpaired my inde
pendency, and to regard every object as contemptible,
except the improvement of my talents in literature.”
His second obstacle was Christianity.
It is not permitted to mortal man, in his present
state of existence, to be by nature free from the pre
judices which arise from his education, and the
prepossessions imperceptibly springing from it. These
adhered to Hume for a long time. He sent the manu
script of his “ Dialogues concerning Natural Beligion ’’
A
�2
Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
to his friend, Sir Gilbert Elliott, with whom he
corresponded on the subject. Writing to Sir Gilbert
Elliott in March 1751, Hume says, “The general pro
gress of my thoughts began with an anxious search after
arguments to confirm the common opinion—doubts stole
in—dissipated—returned—were again dissipated—re
turned again, and it was a perpetual struggle of a restless
imagination again st inclination—perhaps against reason.”
Most probably this is virtually the true inner history
of every honest thinker.
It was about the year 1730 that Hume commenced
his “ anxious search.” Before that time, the inductive
philosophy, or rather the logic of induction, first given
to the world in a scientific shape by Bacon in his
Novum Organum, 1620, had been applied solely to the
phenomena of the physical world, especially by
Elamsteed, James Gregory, Boyle, and Sir Isaac
Newton."' But the application of that logic to the
* It may be explained here that the Logic of induction consists
in dealing with facts, not words. Thus, to prove that John, or
any other man, is mortal, a disciple of Aristotle would say, “ All
men are mortal; John is a man ; therefore John is mortal.” To
this a disciple of Bacon would object that the mortality of all men
had been begged not proved. This objection is fatal to the argu
ment; for we cannot prove that all men are mortal. We may
believe that such is the case ; but all we can prove regarding it
amounts to this, namely, “ So well as we know all men preceding
those now alive have died; we do not know that any man now
living has any element of immortality in him ; therefore we infer
that all men are mortal—probably.” The truth is that this in
ference is grounded on instinct rather than on reason : in the words
of Hume, “ ’tis certain, that the most ignorant and stupid peasants,
nay infants, nay even brute beasts, improve by experience, and
learn the qualities of natural objects, by observing the effects which
result from them. When a child has felt the sensation of pain
from touching the flame of a candle, he will be careful not to put
his hand near any candle ; but will expect a similar effect from a
cause which is similar in its sensible qualities and appearance.”
That we cannot prove to demonstration any matter of fact is the
chief principle of Hume’s philosophy. If the reader will reflect on
the idea contained in the word probability he will thereby more
clearly perceive the value of the inductive logic, and the truth of
Hume’s philosophy, than by anything that can be written by the
editor.
�Preface.
3
so-called world of spirit had been scarcely thought of.
It is true, indeed, that Locke in his “ Essay concerning
Human Understanding,” and more particularly in his
subsequent letters in defence of that work, had main
tained that matter might possess the quality of thinking
power as well as the qualities of extension and solidity.
But that matter contained the principle of its order
within itself, and had of itself arranged the material
universe, was an idea which had long ceased to influence
the world of Thinkers: alas! a very small world indeed,
and possessing very few inhabitants. Even if before
Hume any of those “ happy few” entertained that idea,
it is very probable that he would have been deterred
from publishing it; for by so doing he ran the risk of
acquiring something more than fame from those
Christians who chose to prosecute him, under the
provisions contained in the mild “ Act of Toleration,”
and other “ tender mercies ” of the Christians ; and so,
when Hume began his “anxious search,” prudence
required him to shew its results primarily on objects
not generally calculated to excite suspicion.
So, his first effort was in his essay 11 Of the Idea of
Necessary Connexion.” In this essay he shews that
we cannot assign a cause to any single phenomenon
without having the opportunity of comparing it and its
cause with other similar phenomena. He shews also
that even when we perceive an instance of cause and
effect we cannot tell why or how the cause produces the
effect. Of course here he suppresses (although he
doubtless perceived) the further inference that since
Divine Providence never, for instance, was seen by any
man in the act of creating a planet like our own, we
have not sufficient proof, on even the ground of an
argument from cause and effect, to shew that this planet,
called the Earth, is not self-created.
But he hinted at this inference in his essay “ Of a
Particular Providence and of a Future State.” There
he says, “ I much doubt whether it be possible for a
�4
Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
cause to be known only by its effect, or to be of so
singular and particular a nature as to have no parallel,
and no similarity with any other cause or object, that
has ever fallen under our observation. ’Tis only when
two species of objects are found to be constantly con
joined, that we can infer the one from the other ; and
were an effect presented, which was entirely singular,,
and could not be comprehended under any known
species, I do not see that we could form any conjecture,
or inference at all concerning its cause. If experience
and observation and analogy be, indeed, the only guides
which we can reasonably follow in inferences of this
nature; both the effect and the cause must bear a
similarity and resemblance to other effects and causes
which we know, and which we have found, in many
instances, to be conjoined with each other. As the
antagonists of Epicurus always suppose the universe,
an effect quite singular and unparalleled, to be proof of
a Deity, a cause no less singular and unparalleled;
reasonings, upon that supposition, seem, at least, to
merit our attention. There is some difficulty, how we
can ever return from the cause to the effect, and, reason
ing from our ideas of the former, infer any alteration on
the latter, or any addition to it.”
To human beings this Earth is a singular performance.
We do not know anything of what goes on in the
other planets and stars. Consequently, from what we
know of our own planet we cannot logically infer
anything decided and definite regarding the other
heavenly bodies, or prove whether or not they even
shew marks of design.
In his “Dialogues concerning Natural Religion,”
Hume has brought forward almost every argument for
and against the existence of Divine Providence that has
been adduced on that subject from the days of
Anaxagoras to those of Professor Tyndall. Hume
says, “ all religious systems, it is confessed, are subject
to great and insuperable difficulties. Each disputant
�Preface.
5
triumphs in his turn; while he carries on an offensive
war, and exposes the absurdities, barbarities, and
pernicious tenets of his antagonist. But all of them,
on the whole, prepare a complete triumph for the
Sceptic, who tells them that no system ought ever
to be embraced with regard to such subjects; for
this plain reason,—that no absurdity ought ever to be
.assented to with regard to any subject. A total
suspense of judgment is here our only reasonable
resource.”
Nevertheless, so far as the human mind can judge,
the material universe probably shews traces of design.
But if so it is a design very different in its nature from
that shewn in human works of art. Consequently the
weight of probability is in favour of the supposition that
the present material universe has been arranged by
some Intelligence capable of the task, but who is in
all other respects utterly unknown to us, and, probably,
unknowable by us. In the words of Hume, “ The
whole of Natural Theology, as some people seem to
maintain, resolves itself into one simple, though some
what ambiguous, at least undefined proposition, that
the cause or causes of order in the universe probably
bear some remote analogy to human intelligence.”
One great merit of this doctrine is that it is consistent
with all the phenomena in the moral as well as in the
physical world. Instead of trying to force Philosophy to
fit into beds and boxes far too small for the purpose,
this doctrine leaves Philosophy free either to make or
find for herself a suitable resting-place. Moreover, by
shewing that all we can know is only a very small amount
of knowledge, this doctrine proves to demonstration the
uselessness and the immorality of bigotry and persecu
tion. It is melancholy to think that the masses of
mankind are nearly as ignorant of the practical worth
of this invaluable doctrine in the present day as they
were a century ago, in the days of Hume. Our object
is now to republish it in a form accessible to every one
�6
Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
able and willing to read and study it; and its
inestimable value to mankind justifies us in expecting
that its republication will receive the blessing of
Divine Providence.
Hume’s opinions excluded him from the professorships
in the universities of Scotland, and, in fact, from all
places in the state and in literature : just as they would
exclude any one who professed them in the present
day. He died at Edinburgh on Sunday the 25th
August 1776, after having triumphantly surmounted
all the miseries arising from both poverty and
Christianity.
The scope of this edition of the
“ Dialogues ” precludes the Editor from entering upon
the details of Hume’s life. These the reader will find
in Mr John H. Burton’s admirable work on that subject,
which will well repay its perusal. For the history of
David Hume affords a lesson of the utmost value, as
an example, to the courageous Student and Thinker in
this and probably many future ages.
�DIALOGUES
CONCERNING NATURAL RELIGION.
RAMPHILUS TO HERMIPPUS.
has been
Hermippus,
though
IT the ancientremarked, my conveyed mostthat their in
philosophers
of
struction in the form of dialogue, this method of
composition has been little practised in later ages, and
has seldom succeeded in the hands of those who have
attempted it. Accurate and regular argument, indeed,
such as is now expected of philosophical inquirers,
naturally throws a man into the methodical and
didactic manner ; where he can immediately, without
preparation, explain the point at which he aims; and
thence proceed, without interruption, to deduce the
proofs on which it is established. To deliver a system
in conversation, scarcely appears natural; and while
the dialogue-writer desires, by departing from the direct
style of composition, to give a freer air to his per
formance, and avoid the appearance of Author and
Reader, he is apt to run into a worse inconvenience, and
convey the image of Pedagogue and Pupil. Or if he
carries on the dispute in the natural spirit of good
company, by throwing in a variety of topics, and
preserving a proper balance among the speakers, he
often loses so much time in preparations and transitions,
that the reader will scarcely think himself compensated,
by all the graces of dialogue, for the order, brevity,
and precision, which are sacrificed to them.
�8
Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
There are some subjects, however, to which dialogue
writing is peculiarly adapted, and where it is still
preferable to the direct and simple method of com
position.
Any point of doctrine, which is so obvious that it
scarcely admits of dispute, but at the same time so import
ant that it cannot be too’often inculcated, seems to require
some such method of handling it; where the novelty
of the manner may compensate the triteness of the
subject; where the vivacity of conversation may
enforce the precept; and where the variety of lights,
presented by various personages and characters, may
appear neither tedious nor redundant.
Any question of philosophy, on the other hand,
which is so obscure and uncertain, that human reason
can reach no fixed determination with regard to it; if
it should be treated at all, seems to lead us naturally
into the style of dialogue and conversation. Reason
able men may be allowed to differ, where no one can
reasonably be positive: opposite sentiments, even
without any decision, afford an agreeable amusement :
and if the subject be curious and interesting, the book
carries us, in a manner, into company ; and unites the
two greatest and purest pleasures of human life, study
and society.
Happily, these circumstances are all to be found in
the subject of Natural Religion. What truth so obvious,
so certain, as the being of a God, which the most
ignorant ages have acknowledged, for which the most
refined geniuses have ambitiously striven to produce
new proofs and arguments ? What truth so important
as this, which is the ground of all our hopes, the surest
foundation of morality, the firmest support of society, and
the only principle which ought never to be a moment
absent from our thoughts and meditations ? But in
treating of this obvious and important truth ; what
obscure questions occur, concerning the nature of that
•divine Being; his attributes, his decrees, his plan of
�Part I.
9
providence ? These have been always subjected to the
■disputations of men : Concerning these, human reason
has not reached any certain determination : But these
are topics so interesting, that we cannot restrain our
restless inquiry with regard to them; though nothing
but doubt, uncertainty, and contradiction, have as yet
been the result of our most accurate researches.
This I had lately occasion to observe, while I passed,
as usual, part of the summer-season with Cleanthes, and
was present at those conversations of his with Philo
and Demea, of which I gave you lately some imperfect
account. Your curiosity, you then told me, was so
excited, that I must of necessity enter into a more exact
detail of their reasonings, and display those various
systems which they advanced with regard to so delicate
a subject as that of Natural Religion. The remarkable
contrast in their character still further raised your
-expectations ; while you opposed the accurate philo
sophical turn of Cleanthes to the careless scepticism of
Philo, or compared either of their dispositions with
the rigid inflexible orthodoxy of Demea. My youth
rendered me a mere auditor of their disputes ; and that
■curiosity, n atural to the early season of life, has so deeply
imprinted in my memory the whole chain and connection
of their arguments, that, I hope, I shall not omit or
confound any considerable part of them in the recital.
PART I.
After I joined the company, whom I found sitting in
Cleanthes’ library, Demea paid Cleanthes some compli
ments, on the great care which he took of my education,
and on his unwearied perseverance and constancy in all
his friendships. The father of Pamphilus, said he, was
your intimate friend : the son is your pupil ; and
may indeed be regarded as your adopted son, were we
to judge by the pains which you bestow in conveying
�io Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
to him every useful "branch, of literature and science.
You are no more wanting, I am persuaded, in prudence
than in industry. I shall, therefore, communicate to
you a maxim which I have observed with regard to
my own children, that I may learn how far it agrees
with your practice. The method I follow in their
education is founded on the saying of an ancient,
“ That students of philosophy ought first to learn Logics,
then Ethics, next Physics, last of all the Nature of
the Gods.”* This science of Natural Theology,
according to him, being the most profound, and
abstruse of any, required the maturest judgment in its
students ; and none but a mind, enriched with all the
other sciences, can safely be entrusted with it.
Are you so late, says Philo, in teaching your children
the principles of religion ? Is there no danger of their
neglecting, or rejecting altogether, those opinions, of
which they have heard so little during the whole
course of their education ? It is only as a science,
replied Demea, subjected to human reasoning and
disputation, that I postpone the study of Natural
Theology. To season their minds with early piety, is
my chief care ; and by continual precept and instruc
tion, and I hope too by example, I imprint deeply on
their tender minds an habitual reverence for all the
principles of religion. While they pass through every
other science, I still remark the uncertainty of each part ;
the eternal disputations of men ; the obscurity of all
philosophy; and the strange, ridiculous conclusions,
which some of the greatest geniuses have derived from
the principles of mere human reason. Having thus
tamed their mind to a proper submission and self
diffidence, I have no longer any scruple of opening to
them the greatest mysteries of religion ; nor appre
hend any danger from that assuming arrogance of
philosophy, which may lead them to reject the most
established doctrines and opinions.
* Chrysippus apud Plat de repug. Stoicorum.
�Part I.
ir
Your precaution, says Philo, of seasoning your
children’s minds early with piety, is certainly very
reasonable; and no more than is requisite in this
profane and irreligious age. But what I chiefly admire
in your plan of education, is your method of drawing
advantage from the very principles of philosophy and
learning, which, by inspiring pride and self-sufficiency,,
have commonly, in all ages, been found so destructive
to the principles of religion. The vulgar, indeed, we
may remark, who are unacquainted with science and
profound inquiry, observing the endless disputes of the
learned, have commonly a thorough contempt for
Philosophy; and rivet themselves the faster, by that
means, in the great points of theology which have
been taught them. Those who enter a little into
study and inquiry, finding many appearances of
evidence in doctrines the newest and most extra
ordinary, think nothing too difficult for human reason ;
and, presumptuously breaking through all fences,
profane the inmost sanctuaries of the temple. But
Cleanthes will, I' hope, agree with me, that, after we
have abandoned ignorance, the surest remedy, there is
still one expedient left to prevent this profane liberty.
Let Demea’s principles be improved and cultivated:
Let us become thoroughly sensible of the weakness,
blindness, and narrow limits, of human reason : Let us
duly consider its uncertainty and endless contrarieties,
even in subjects of common life and practice : Let the
errors and deceits of our very senses be set before us ;
the insuperable difficulties which attend first principles
in all systems; the contradictions which adhere to the
very ideas of matter, cause and effect, extension, space,
time, motion; and, in a word, quantity of all kinds,
the object of the only science that can fairly pretend toany certainty or evidence. When these topics are
displayed in their full light, as they are by some philo
sophers and almost all divines ; who can retain such
confidence in this frail faculty of reason as to pay any
�12 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
regard to its determinations in points so sublime, so
abstruse, so remote from common life and experience ?
When the coherence of the parts of a stone, or even
that composition of parts which renders it extended;
when these familiar objects, I say, are so inexplicable,
and contain circumstances so repugnant and contra
dictory ; with what assurance can we decide concerning
the origin of worlds, or trace their history from eternity
to eternity ?
While Philo pronounced these words, I could observe
a smile in the countenance both of Demea and Clean
thes. That of Demea seemed to imply an unreserved
satisfaction in the doctrines delivered : but in
Cleanthes’ features, I could distinguish an air of
finesse; as if he perceived some raillery or artificial
malice in the reasonings of Philo.
You propose then, Philo, said Cleanthes, to erect
religious faith on philosophical scepticism ; and
you think, that if certainty or evidence be expelled
from every other subject of inquiry, it will all retire
to these theological doctrines, and there acquire a
superior force and authority. Whether your scepticism
be as absolute and sincere as you pretend, we shall learn
by and by, when the company breaks up ; we shall then
see, whether you go out at the door or the window ; and
whether you really doubt, if your body has gravity, or
can be injured by its fall; according to popular opinion,
derived from our fallacious senses and more fallacious
experience. And this consideration, Demea, may, I
think, fairly serve to abate our ill-will to this humorous
sect of the sceptics. If they be thoroughly in earnest,
they will not long trouble the world with their doubts,
cavils and disputes : if they be only in jest, they are,
perhaps, bad raillers; but can never be very dangerous,
either to the state, to philosophy, or to religion.
In reality, Philo, continued he, it seems certain,
that though a man, in a flush of humour, after intense
reflection on the many contradictions and imperfections
�Part I.
of human reason, may -entirely renounce all belief'
and opinion; it is impossible for him to persevere
in this total scepticism, or make it appear in his conduct
for a few hours. External objects press in upon him :
passions solicit him : his philosophical melancholy dis
sipates ; and even the utmost violence upon his own
temper will not be able, during any time, to preserve the
poor appearance of scepticism. And for what reason im
pose on himself such a violence ? This a point in which
it will be impossible for him ever to satisfy himself,
consistently with his sceptical principles : so that upon
the whole nothing could be more ridiculous than the
principles of the ancient Pyrrhonians ; if in reality they
endeavoured, as is pretended, to extend, throughout, the
same scepticism, which they had learned from the de
clamations of their schools, and which they ought to have
confined to them.
In this view, there appears a great resemblance
between the sects of the Stoics and Pyrrhonians
though perpetual antagonists : and both of them seem
founded on this erroneous maxim, That what a man
can perform sometimes, and in some dispositions, he
can perform always, and in every disposition. When
the mind, by Stoical reflections, is elevated into a
sublime enthusiasm of virtue, and strongly smit with
any species of honour or public good, the utmost
bodily pain and sufferings will not prevail over such a
high sense of duty; and it is possible, perhaps, by its
means, even to smile and exult in the midst of tortures.
If this sometimes may be the case in fact and reality,,
much more may a philosopher, in his school, or even
in his closet, work himself up to such an enthusiasm,,
and support in imagination the acutest pain or most
calamitous event which he can possibly conceive. But
how shall he support this enthusiasm itself ? The
bent of his mind relaxes, and cannot be recalled at
pleasure: avocations lead him astray: misfortunes
attack him unawares : and the philosopher sinks by
degrees into the plebeian.
�14 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
I allow of your comparison between the Stoics and
Sceptics, replied Philo. But you may observe, at the
same time, that though the mind cannot, in stoicism,
support the highest flights of philosophy; yet, even
when it sinks lower, it still retains somewhat of its
former disposition; and the effects of the Stoic’s
reasoning will appear in his conduct in common life, and
through the whole tenor of his actions. The ancient
schools, particularly that of Zeno, produced examples
of virtue and constancy which seem astonishing to
present times.
Vain wisdom all and false philosophy.
Yet with a pleasing sorcery could charm
Pain, for a while, or anguish ; and excite
Fallacious Hope, or arm the obdurate breast
With stubborn patience, as with triple steel. *
In like manner, if a man has accustomed himself to
sceptical considerations on the uncertainty and narrow
limits of reason, he will not entirely forget them when
he turns his reflection on other subjects; but in all his
philosophical principles and reasoning, I dare not say
in his common conduct, he will be found different
from those, who either never formed any opinions in
the case, or have entertained sentiments more favour
able to human reason.
To whatever length any one may push his speculative
principles of scepticism, he must act, I own, and live,
and converse, like other men ; and for this conduct he
is not obliged to give any other reason, than the
absolute necessity he lies under of so doing. If he
ever carries his speculations farther than this necessity
constrains him, and philosophises either on natural or
moral subjects, he is allured by a certain pleasure and
satisfaction which he finds in employing himself after
that manner. He considers, besides, that every one,
even in common life, is constrained to have more or
less of this philosophy ; that from our earliest infancy
we make continual advances in forming more general
* “ Paradise Lost.” ii., 565.
�Part I.
»5
principles of conduct and reasoning; that the larger
experience we acquire, and the stronger reason we are
endued with, we always render our principles the more
general and comprehensive; and that what we call
philosophy is nothing but a more regular and
methodical operation of the same kind. To philo
sophise on such subjects is nothing essentially different
from reasoning on common life ; and we may only
expect greater stability, if not greater truth, from our
philosophy, on account of its exacter and more scrupu
lous method of proceeding.
But when we look beyond human affairs and the pro
perties of the surrounding bodies : when we carry our
speculations into the two eternities, before and after
the present state of things; into the creation and
formation of the universe; the existence and properties
of spirits ; the powers and operations of one universal
Spirit, existing without beginning and without end;
omnipotent, omniscient, immutable, infinite, and in
comprehensible : we must be far removed from the
smallest tendency to scepticism not to be apprehensive
that we have here got quite beyond the reach of
our faculties. So long as we confine our speculations
to trade, or morals, or politics, or criticism, we make
appeals, every moment, to common sense and ex
perience, which strengthen our philosophical con
clusions, and remove (at least, in part) the suspicion
which we so justly entertain with regard to every
reasoning that is very subtle and refined. But, in
theological reasonings, we have not this advantage;
while at the same time we are employed upon objects,
which, we must be sensible, are too large for our grasp,
and, of all others, require most to be familiarised to
our apprehension. We are like foreigners in a strange
country, to whom every thing must seem suspicious,
and who are in danger every moment of transgressing
against the laws and customs of the people with whom
they live and converse. We know not how far we
�16 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
ought to trust our vulgar methods of reasoning in such
a subject; since, even in common life, and in that
province which is peculiarly appropriated to them, we
cannot account for them, and are entirely guided by a
kind of instinct or necessity in employing them.
All sceptics pretend, that, if reason be considered
in an abstract view, it furnishes invincible arguments
against itself; and that we could never retain any con
viction or assurance, on any subject, were not the
sceptical reasonings so refined and subtile, that they
are not able to counterpoise the more solid and more
natural arguments derived from the senses and ex
perience. But it is evident, whenever our arguments
lose this advantage, and run wide of common life, that
the most refined scepticism comes to be upon a footing
with them, and is able to oppose and counterbalance
them. The one has no more weight than the other.
The mind must remain in suspense between them ; and
it is that very suspense or balance, which is the
triumph of scepticism.
But I observe, says Cleanthes, with regard to you,
Philo, and all speculative sceptics, that your doctrine
and practice are as much at variance in the most
abstruse points of theory as in the conduct of common
life. Wherever evidence discovers itself, you adhere
to it, notwithstanding your pretended scepticism ; and
I can observe, too, some of your sect to be as decisive as
those who make greater professions of certainty and
assurance. In reality, would not a man be ridiculous,
who pretended to reject Newton’s explication of the
wonderful phenomenon of the rainbow, because that
explication gives a minute anatomy of the rays of
light; a subject, forsooth, too refined for human com
prehension ? And what would you say to one, who
having nothing particular to object to the arguments
of Copernicus and Galileo for the motion of the earth,
should withhold his assent, on that general principle,
that these subjects were too magnificent and remote to
�Part I.
l7
be explained by the narrow and fallacious reason of
mankind ?
There is indeed a kind of brutish, and ignorant
scepticism, as you well observed, which gives the vulgar
a general prejudice against what they do not easily
■understand, and makes them reject every principle
which requires elaborate reasoning to prove and esta
blish it. This species of scepticism is fatal to knowledge,
not to religion; since we find, that those who make
greatest profession of it, give often their assent, not
only to the great truths of Theism and natural theology,
but even to the most absurd tenets which a traditional
superstition has recommended to them. They firmly
believe in witches; though they will not believe nor
attend to the most simple proposition of Euclid. But
the refined and philosophical sceptics fall into an incon
sistence of an opposite nature. They push their
researches into the most abstruse corners of science;
.and their assent attends them in every step, proportioned
to the evidence which they meet with. They are even
obliged to acknowledge, that the most abstruse and
remote objects are those which are best explained by
philosophy. Light is in reality anatomized : The true
system of the heavenly bodies is discovered and ascer
tained. But the nourishment of bodies by food is still
an inexplicable mystery : the cohesion of the parts of
matter is still incomprehensible. These sceptics, there
fore, are obliged, in every question, to consider each
particular evidence apart, and proportion their assent to
the precise degree of evidence which occurs. This is
their practice in all natural, mathematical, moral, and
political science. And why not the same, I ask, in the
theological and religious? Why must conclusions of
this nature be alone rej ected on the general presumption
of the insufficiency of human reason, without any parti
cular discussion of the evidence? Is not such an unequal
•conduct a plain proof of prejudice and passion ?
Our senses, you say, are fallacious; our understandB
�18 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
ing erroneous; our ideas even of the most familiar
objects, extension, duration, motion, full of absurdities
and contradictions. You defy me to solve the diffi
culties, or reconcile the repugnancies, which you discover
in them. I have not capacity for so great an undertak
ing : I have not leisure for it: I perceive it to be
superfluous. Your own conduct, in every circumstance,
refutes your principles; and shows the firmest reliance
on all the received maxims of science, morals, prudence,
and behaviour.
I shall never assent to so harsh an opinion as that of
a celebrated writer*, who says, that the sceptics are not
a sect of philosophers, they are only a sect of liars. I
may, however, affirm, (I hope, without offence) that they
are a sect of jesters or railers. But for my part, when
ever I find myself disposed to mirth and amusement, I
shall certainly choose my entertainment of a less
perplexing and abstruse nature. A comedy, a novel, or
at most a history, seems a more natural recreation than
such metaphysical subtleties and abstractions.
In vain would the sceptic make a distinction between
science and common life, or between one science'and
another. The arguments employed in all, if just, are
of a similar nature, and contain the same force and
evidence. Or if there be any difference among them,,
the advantage lies entirely on the side of theology and
natural religion. Many principles of mechanics are
founded on very abstruse reasoning; yet no man who
has any pretensions to science, even no speculative
sceptic, pretends to entertain the least doubt wtth regard
to them. The Copernican system contains the most
surprising paradox, and the most contrary to our natural
conceptions, to appearances, and to our very senses : yet
even monks and inquisitors are now constrained to
withdraw their opposition to it. And shall Philo, a.
man of so liberal a genius, and extensive knowledge,
entertain any general undistinguished scruples with
*L’art de perser.
�Part I.
J9
regard to the religious hypothesis, which is founded on
the simplest and most obvious arguments, and, unless
it meets with artificial obstacles, has such easy access
and admission into the mind of man ?
And here we may observe, continued he, turning
himself towards Demea, a pretty curious circumstance
in the history of the sciences. After the union of
philosophy with the popular religion, upon the first
establishment of Christianity, nothing was more usual,
among all religious teachers, than declamations against
reason, against the senses, against every principle derived
merely from human research and inquiry. All the
topics of the ancient Academics were adopted by the
lathers ; and thence propagated for several ages in
every school and pulpit throughout Christendom. The
Reformers embraced the same principles of reasoning,
or rather declamation; and all panegyrics on the excel
lency of faith were sure to be interlarded with some
severe strokes of satire against natural reason. A cele
brated prelate too *, of the Romish communion, a man
of the most extensive learning, who wrote a demonstra
tion of Christianity, has also composed a treatise, which
contains all the cavils of the boldest and most determined
Pyrrhonism. Locke seems to have been the first
Christian, who ventured openly to assert, that faith
was nothing but a species of reason; that religion was
only a branch of philosophy; and that a chain of argu
ments, similar to that which established any truth in
morals, politics, or physics, was always employed in
discovering all the principles of theology, natural and
revealed. The ill use which Rayle and other libertines
made of the philosophical scepticism of the fathers and
first reformers, still farther propagated the judicious
sentiment of Mr Locke: And it is now, in a manner,
avowed, by all pretenders to reasoning and philosophy,
that Atheist and Sceptic are almost synonymous. And
as it is certain, that no man is in earnest when he
*Mons. Huet.
�20 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
professes the latter principle ; I would fain hope, that
there are as few who seriously maintain the former.
Don’t you remember, said Philo, the excellent saying
of Lord Bacon on this head i That a little philosophy,
replied Cleanthes, makes a man an Atheist: a great
deal converts him to religion. That is a very judicious
remark too, said Philo. But what I have in my eye is
another passage, where, having mentioned David’s fool,
who said in his heart there is no God, this great philo
sopher observes, that the Atheists now-a-days have a
double share of folly : for they are not contented to say
in their hearts there is no God, but they also utter that
impiety with their lips; and are thereby guilty of multi
plied indiscretion and imprudence. Such people, though
they were ever so much in earnest, cannot, methinks, be
very formidable.
But though you should rank me in this class of fools,
I cannot forbear communicating a remark that occurs
to me from the history of the religious and irreli
gious scepticism 'with which you have entertained us.
It appears to me, that there are strong symptoms of
priestcraft in the whole progress of this affair. During
ignorant ages, such as those which followed the dis
solution of the ancient schools, the priests perceived, that
Atheism, Deism, or heresy of any kind, could only pro
ceed from the presumptuous questioning of received
opinions, and from a belief that human reason was equal
to every thing. Education had then a mighty influence
over the minds of men, and was almost equal in force to
those suggestions of the senses and common understand
ing, by which the most determined sceptic must allow
himself to be governed. But at present, when the influ
ence of education is much diminished, and men, from a
more open commerce of the world, have learned to com
pare the popular principles of different nations and ages,
our sagacious divines have changed their whole system
of philosophy, and talk the language of Stoics, Platonists, and Peripatetics, not that of Pyrrhonians and Acad
�Part II.
21
emics. If we distrust human reason, we have now no
other principle to lead us into religion. Thus, sceptics
in one age, dogmatists in another; whichever system
best suits the purpose of these reverend gentlemen, in
giving them an ascendant over mankind, they are sure
to make it their favourite principle, and established
tenet.
It is very natural, said Cleanthes, for men to embrace
those principles, by which they find they can best defend
their doctrines; nor need we have any recourse to priest
craft to account for so reasonable an expedient. And
surely, nothing can afford a stronger presumption, that
any set of principles are true, and ought to be embraced,
than to observe that they tend to the confirmation of
true religion, and serve to confound the cavils of Atheists,
Libertines; and Freethinkers of all denominations.
PART II.
I must own, Cleanthes, said Demea, that nothing can
more surprise me, than the light in which you have all
along put this argument. By the whole tenor of your
discourse, one would imagine that you were maintaining
the Being of a God, against the cavils of Atheists and
Infidels: and were necessitated to become a champion
for that fundamental principle of all religion. But
this, I hope, is not, by any means, a question among us.
No man; no man, at least, of common sense, I am per
suaded, ever entertained a serious doubt with regard to
a truth so certain and self-evident. The question is not
concerning the Being, but the Nature, of God. This I
affirm, from the infirmities of human understanding, to
be altogether incomprehensible and unknown to us. The
essence of that Supreme Mind, his attributes, the manner
of his existence, the very nature of his duration; these,
and every particular which regards so divine a Being,
�'ll Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
are mysterious to men. Finite, weak, and blind crea
tures, we ought to humble ourselves in his august
presence; and, conscious of our frailties, adore in silence
Iris infinite perfections, which eye hath not seen, ear
hath not heard, neither hath it entered into the heart
of man to conceive. They are covered in a deep cloud
from human curiosity: it is profaneness to attempt
penetrating through these sacred obscurities : and next
to the impiety of denying his existence, is the temerity
of prying into his nature and essence, decrees and attri
butes.
But lest you should think, that my piety has here
got the better of my philosophy, I shall support my
opinion, if it needs any support, by a very great authority.
I might cite all the divines, almost, from the foundation
of Christianity, who have ever treated of this or any
other theological subject: but I shall confine myself,
at present, to one equally celebrated for piety and philo
sophy. It is Father Malebranche, who, I remember,
thus expresses himself: * “ One ought not so much
(says he) to call God a spirit, in order to express posi
tively what he is, as in order to signify that he is not
matter. He is a Being infinitely perfect: Of this we
cannot doubt. But in the same manner as we ought
not to imagine, even supposing him corporeal, that he
is clothed with a human body, as the Anthropomorphites
asserted, under colour that that figure was the most
perfect of any • so neither ought we to imagine, that
the Spirit of God has human ideas, or bears any resem
blance to our spirit; under colour that we know nothing
more perfect than a human mind. We ought rather to
believe, that as he comprehends the perfections of mat
ter without being material .... he comprehends
also the perfections of created spirits, without being spi
rit, in the manner we conceive spirit: That his true
name is, He that is; or, in other words, Being without
restriction, All Being, the Being infinite and universal.”
* Recherche de la Verite, liv. 3. cap. 9.
�Part II.
23
After so great an authority, Demea, replied Philo, as
that which you have produced, and a thousand more
which you might produce, it would appear ridiculous in
me to add my sentiment, or express my approbation of
your doctrine. But surely, where reasonable men
treat these subjects, the questions can never be con
cerning the Being, but only the Nature, of the Deity.
The former truth, as you well observe, is unquestion
able and self-evident. Nothing exists without a cause;
and the original cause of this universe (whatever it be)
we call God; and piously ascribe to him every species
of perfection. Whoever scruples this fundamental
truth, deserves every punishment which can be inflicted
among philosophers, to wit, the greatest ridicule, con
tempt, and disapprobation. But as all perfection is
entirely relative, we ought never to imagine that we
comprehend the attributes of this divine Being, or to
suppose that his perfections have analogy or likeness to
the perfections of a human creature.
Wisdom,
Thought, Design, Knowledge; these we justly ascribe
to him; because these words are honourable among
men, and we have no other language or other concep
tions by which we can express our adoration of him.
But let us beware, lest we think, that our ideas any wise
correspond to his perfections, or that his attributes have
any resemblance to these qualities among men. He is
infinitely superior to our limited view and compre
hension; and is more the object of worship in the
temple, than of disputation in the schools.
In reality, Cleanthes, continued he, there is no need
of having recourse to that affected scepticism, so dis
pleasing to you, in order to come at this determination.
Our ideas reach no further than our experience: We
have no experience of divine attributes and operations :
I need not conclude my syllogism : you can draw the
inference yourself. And it is a pleasure to me (and I
hope to you too) that just reasoning and sound piety
here concur in the same conclusion, and both of them
�24 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
establish the adorably mysterious and incomprehensiblenature of the Supreme Being.
Not to lose any time in circumlocutions, said
Cleanthes, addressing himself to Demea, much less in.
replying to the pious declamations of Philo; I shall
briefly explain how I conceive this matter. Look round
the world : contemplate the whole and every part of it:
you will find it to be nothing but one great machine,
subdivided into an infinite number of lesser machines,
which again admit of subdivisions to a degree beyond,
what human senses and faculties can trace and explain.
All these various machines, and even their most minute
parts, are adjusted to each other with an accuracy,,
which ravishes into admiration all men who have ever
contemplated them. The curious adapting of means to
ends, throughout all nature, resembles exactly, though
it much exceeds, the productions of human contrivance ;
of human design, thought, wisdom, and intelligence.
Since therefore the effects resemble each other, we are
led to infer, by all the rules of analogy, that the causesalso resemble : and that the Author of Nature is some
what similar to the mind of man ; though possessed of
much larger faculties, proportioned to the. grandeur of
the work which he has executed. By this argument
a posterion, and by this argument alone, do we prove
at once th’e existence of a Deity, and his similarity tn
human mind and intelligence.
I shall be so free, Cleanthes, said Demea, as to tell'
you, that from the beginning I could not approve of
your conclusion concerning the similarity of the Deity
to men; still less can I approve of the mediums by
which you endeavour to establish it. What! No
demonstration of the Being of God! No abstract argu
ments ! No proofs a priori ! Are these, which have
hitherto been so much insisted on by philosophers, all
fallacy, all sophism ? . Can we reach no further in this
subject than experience and probability ? I will not
say, that this is betraying the cause of a Deity : But
�Part II.
surely, by this affected candour, you give advantages to
Atheists, which they never could obtain by the mere
dint of argument and reasoning.
What I chiefly scruple in this subject, said Philo, is
not so much that all religious arguments are by Cleanthes
reduced to experience, as that they appear not to be
even the most certain and irrefragable of that inferior
kind. That a stone will fall, that fire will burn, that
the earth has solidity, we have observed a thousand
and a thousand times ; and when any new instance of
this nature is presented, we draw without hesitation the
accustomed inference. The exact similarity of the
cases gives us a perfect assurance of a similar event; and
a stronger evidence is never desired nor sought after.
But wherever you depart, in the least, from the
similarity of the cases, you diminish proportionably the
evidence; and may at last bring it to a very weak
analogy, which is confessedly liable to error and
uncertainty. After having experienced the circulation
of the blood in human creatures, we make no doubt
that it takes place in Titius and Msevius: but from
its circulation in frogs and fishes, it is only a presumption,,
though a strong one, from analogy, that it takes place in
men and other animals. The analogical reasoning is
much weaker when we infer the circulation of the sap in
vegetables from our experience that the blood circulates
in animals; and those, who hastily followed that
imperfect analogy, are found, by more accurate experi
ments, to have been mistaken.
If we see a house, Cleanthes, we conclude, with
the greatest certainty, that it had an architect or
builder; because this is precisely that species of
effect which we have experienced to proceed from that
species of cause. But surely you will not affirm, that
the universe bears such a resemblance to a house, that
we can with the same certainty infer a similar cause,
or that the analogy is here entire and perfect. The
dissimilitude is so striking that the utmost you can
�2 6 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
here pretend to is a guess, a conjecture, a presumption
concerning a similar cause; and how that pretension
will be received in the world, I leave you to consider.
It would surely be very ill received, replied
Cleanthes ; and I should be deservedly blamed and
detested, did I allow that the proofs of a Deity
amounted to no more than a guess or conjecture. But
is the whole adjustment of means to ends in a house
and in the universe so slight a resemblance ? The
economy of final causes ? The order, proportion and
arrangement of every part? Steps of a stair are
plainly contrived, that human legs may use them in
mounting; and this inference is certain and infallible.
Human legs are also contrived for walking and mount
ing ; and this inference, I allow, is not altogether so
certain, because of the dissimilarity which you
remark; but does it, therefore, deserve the name only
of presumption or conjecture?
Interrupting him, Demea cried, where are we ?
Zealous defenders of religion allow that the proofs of a
Deity fall short of perfect evidence! And you, Philo,
on whose assistance I depended in proving the adorable
mysteriousness of the Divine Nature, do you assent to
all these extravagant1 opinions of Cleanthes ? For
what other name can I give them ? Or why spare my
censure, when such principles are advanced, supported
by such an authority, before so young a man as Pamphilus ?
You seem not to apprehend, replied Philo, that I argue
with Cleanthes in his own way ; and by showing him
the dangerous consequences of his tenets, hope at last
to reduce him to our opinion. But what sticks most
with you, I observe, is the representation which
Cleanthes has made of the argument a posteriori ; and
finding that that argument is likely to escape your hold
and vanish into air, you think it so disguised that you
can scarcely believe it to be set in its true light. Now,
however much I may dissent, in other respects, from
�Part II.
the dangerous principles of Cleanthes, I must allow,
that he has fairly represented that argument; and I
shall endeavour so to state the matter to you,
that you will entertain no further scruples with regard
to it.
Were a man to abstract from every thing which he
knows or has seen, he would be altogether incapable,
merely from his own ideas, to determine what kind of
scene the universe must be, or to give the preference to
one state or situation of things above another. For
as nothing which he clearly conceives could be esteemed
impossible or implying a contradiction, every chimera
of his fancy would be upon an equal footing; nor could
he assign any just reason why he adheres to one idea
or system, and rejects the others which are equally
possible.
Again; after he opens his eyes, and contemplates the
world as it really is, it would be impossible for him, at
first, to assign the cause of any one event, much less
of the whole of things or of the universe. He might
set his fancy a rambling ; and she might bring him in
an infinite variety of reports and representations.
These would all be possible; but being all equally
possible, he would never, of himself, give a satisfactory
account for his preferring one of them to the rest.
Experience alone can point out to him the true cause of
any phenomenon.
Now, according to this method of reasoning, Demea,
it follows (and is, indeed, tacitly allowed by Cleanthes
himself), that order, arrangement, or the adjustment of
final causes, is not, of itself, any proof of design; but
only so far as it has been experienced to proceed from
that principle. For aught we can know a priori,
matter may contain the source or spring of order,
originally, within itself as well as mind does; and
there is no more difficulty in conceiving, that the
several elements from an internal unknown cause,
may fall into the most exquisite arrangement, than to
■conceive that their ideas, in the great universal mind
�28 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
from a like internal unknown cause, fall into that
arrangement.
The equal possibility of both these
suppositions is allowed. But by experience we find,
(according to Cleanthes), that there is a difference
between them. Throw several pieces of steel together,
without shape or form; they will never arrange them
selves so as to compose a watch. Stone, and mortar,
and wood, without an architect, never erect a house.
But the ideas in a human mind, we see, by an
unknown, inexplicable economy, arrange themselves so
as to form the plan of a watch or house. Experience,
therefore, proves that there is an original principle of
order in mind, not in matter. From similar effects we
infer similar causes. The adjustment of means to ends
is alike in the universe, as in a machine of human
contrivance. The causes, therefore, must be resem
bling.
I was from the beginning scandalised, I must own,
with this resemblance, which is asserted, between the
Deity and human creatures ; and must conceive it to
imply such a degradation of the Supreme Being as no
sound Theist could endure. With your assistance,
therefore, Demea, I shall endeavour to defend what
you justly call the adorable mysteriousness of the
Divine Nature, and shall refute this reasoning of Clean
thes ; provided he allows, that I have made a fair
representation of it.
When Cleanthes had assented, Philo, after a short
pause, proceeded in the following manner.
That all inferences, .Cleanthes, concerning fact,
are founded on experience ; and that all experimental
reasonings are founded on the supposition that
similar causes prove similar effects, and similar
effects similar causes; I shall not, at present, much
dispute with you. But observe, I entreat you, with
what extreme caution all just reasoners proceed in
the transferring of experiments to similar cases.
Unless the cases be exactly similar, they repose no
�Part IL
29
perfect confidence in applying their past observation
to any particular phenomenon. Every alteration of
circumstances occasions a doubt concerning the event;
and it requires new experiments to prove certainly,
that the new circumstances are of no moment or
importance. A change in bulk, situation, arrangement,
age, disposition of the air, or surrounding bodies; any
of these particulars, may be attended with the most
unexpected consequences: and unless the objects be
quite familiar to us, it is the highest temerity to ex
pect with assurance, after any of these changes, an event
similar to that which before fell under observation.
The slow and deliberate steps of philosophers, here,
if anywhere, are distinguished from the precipitate
march of the vulgar, who, hurried on by the smallest
similitude, are incapable of all discernment or con
sideration.
But can you think, Cleanthes, that your usual phlegm
and philosophy have been preserved in so wide a step
as you have taken, when you compared to the universe,
houses, ships, furniture, machines : and from their
similarity in some circumstances inferred a similarity
in their causes ? Thought, design, intelligence, such as
we discover in men and other animals, is no more than
one of the springs and principles of the universe, as
well as heat or cold, attraction or repulsion, and a
hundred others which fall under daily observation.
It is an active cause, by which some particular parts
of nature, we find, produce alterations on other parts.
But can a conclusion, with any propriety, be transferred
from parts to the whole ? Does not the great dispro
portion bar all comparison and inference ? From
observing the growth of a hair, can we learn anything
concerning the generation of a man ? Would the \
manner of a leaf’s blowing, even though perfectly )
known, afford us any instruction concerning the
vegetation of a tree ?
But allowing that we were to take the operations of
one ■ part of nature upon another for the foundation of
�30 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
our judgement concerning the origin of the whole,
(which never can be admitted); yet why select
so minute, so weak, so bounded a principle as the
reason and design of animals is found to be upon this
planet ? What peculiar privilege has this little
agitation of the brain which we call thought, that we
must thus make it the model of the whole universe ?
Our partiality in our own favour does indeed present
it on all occasions; but sound philosophy ought
carefully to guard against so natural an illusion.
So far from admitting, continued Philo, that the
operations of a part can afford us any just conclusion
concerning the origin of the whole, I will not allow
any one part to form a rule for another part, if the
latter be very remote from the former. Is there any
reasonable ground to conclude, that the inhabitants
of other planets possess thought, intelligence, reason,
or anything similar to these faculties in men ? When
nature has so extremely diversified her manner of
operation in this small globe ; can we imagine, that
she incessantly copies herself throughout so immense
a universe ? And if thought, as we may well suppose,
be confined merely to this narrow corner, and has
even there so limited a sphere of action; with what
propriety can we assign it for the original cause of
all things? The narrow views of a peasant, who
makes his domestic economy the rule for the gov
ernment of kingdoms, is in comparison a pardonable
sophism.
But were we ever so much assured, that a thought
and reason, resembling the human, were to be found
throughout the whole universe, and were its activity else
where vastly greater and more commanding than it ap
pears in this globe ; yet I cannot see why the operations
of a world constituted, arranged, adjusted, can with any
propriety be extended to a world which is in its
embryo-state, and is advancing towards that con
stitution and arrangement. By observation, we know
somewhat of the economy, action, and nourishment of
�Part IL
31
a finished animal; but we must transfer with great
caution that observation to the growth of a foetus
in the womb, and still more to the formation of an
animalcule in the loins of its male parent. Nature, we
find, even from our limited experience, possesses an
infinite number of springs and principles, which
incessantly discover themselves on every change of her
position and situation. And what new and unknown
principles would actuate her in so new and unknown
a situation as that of the formation of a universe we can
not, without the utmost temerity, pretend to determine.
A very small part of this great system, during a very
short time, is very imperfectly discovered to us; and
do we thence pronounce decisively concerning the
origin of the whole ?
Admirable conclusion! Stone, wood, brick, iron,
brass, have not, at this time, in this minute globe of
earth, an order or arrangement without human art and
contrivance: therefore the universe could not originally
attain its order and arrangement, without something
similar to human art. But is a part of nature a rule for
another part very wide of the former ? Is it a rule for
the whole ? Is a very small part a rule for the universe ?
Is nature in one situation, a certain rule for nature in
another situation vastly different from the former ?
And can you blame me, Cleanthes, if I here imitate
the prudent reserve of Simonides, who, according to the
noted story, being asked by Hiero, What God was ?
desired a day to think of it, and then two days more;
and after that manner continually prolonged the term,
without ever ‘bringing in his definition or description 1
Could you even blame me, if I had answered at first,
that I did not know, and was sensible that this subject
lay vastly beyond the reach of my faculties? You
might cry out sceptic and railer, as much as you
pleased : but having found, in so many other subjects
much more familiar, the imperfections and even con
tradictions of human reason, I never should expect any
�32 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
success from its feeble conjectures, in a subject so
sublime, and so remote from the sphere of our observa
tion. When two species of objects have always been
observed to be conjoined together, I can infer, by
custom, the existence of one wherever I see the exist
ence of the other : and this I call an argument from
experience. But how this argument can have place,
where the objects, as in the present case, are single,
individual, without parallel, or specific resemblance,
may be difficult to explain. And will any man tell me
with a serious countenance, that an orderly universe
must arise from some thought and art, like the human;
because we have experience of it ? To ascertain this
■masoning, it were requisite, that we had experience of
the origin of worlds; and it is not sufficient, surely,
that we have seen ships and cities arise from human art
and contrivance.
Philo was proceeding in this vehement manner, some
what between jest and earnest, as it appeared to me ;
when he observed some signs of impatience in Cleanthes,
and then immediately stopped short. What I had to
suggest, said Cleanthes, is only that you would not
abuse terms, or make use of popular expressions to
subvert philosophical reasonings. You know, that the
.vulgar often distinguish reason from experience, even
where the question relates only to matter of fact and
existence; though it is found, where that reason is
properly analyzed, that it is nothing but a species of
experience. To prove by experience the origin of the
universe from mind, is not more contrary to common
speech, than to prove the motion of the earth from the
same principle. And a caviller might raise all the same
objections to the Copernican system, which you have
urged against my reasonings. Have you other earths,
might he say, which you have seen to move ?
Have ....
Yes ! cried Philo, interrupting him, we have other
earths. Is not the moon another earth, which we see
�Part II.
33
to turn round its centre ? Is not Venus another earth,
where we observe the same phenomenon ? Are not the
revolutions of the sun also a confirmation, from analogy,
of the same theory? All the planets, are they not
earths, which revolve about the sun? Are not the
satellites moons, which move round Jupiter and Saturn,
and along with these primary planets round the sun ?
These analogies and resemblances, with others which I
have not mentioned, are the sole proofs of the Coper
nican system: and to you it belongs to consider,
whether you have any analogies of the same kind to
support your theory.
In reality, Cleanthes, continued he, the modern
system of astronomy is now so - much received by all
inquirers, and has become so essential a part even of
our earliest education, that we are not commonly very
scrupulous in examining the reasons upon which it is
founded. It is now become a matter of mere curiosity
to study the first writers on that subject, who had the
full force of prejudice to encounter, and were obliged
to turn their arguments on every side in order to render
them popular and convincing. But if we peruse
Galileo’s famous Dialogues concerning-the system of the
world, we shall find, that that great genius, one of the
sublimest that ever existed, first bent all his endeavours
to prove, that there was no foundation for the distinction
commonly made between elementary and celestial
substances. The schools, proceeding from the illusions
of sense, had carried this distinction very far; and had
established the latter substances to be ingenerable,
incorruptible, unalterable, impassible ; and had assigned
all the opposite qualities to the former. But Galileo,
beginning with the moon, proved its similarity in every
particular to the earth; its convex figure, its natural
darkness when not illuminated, its density, its distinc
tion into solid and liquid, the variations of its phases,
the mutual illuminations of the earth and moon, their
mutual eclipses, the inequalities of the lunar surface,
C
�34 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
&c. After many instances of this kind, with regard to
all the planets, men plainly saw that these bodies
became proper objects of experience; and that the
similarity of their nature enabled us to extend the same
arguments and phenomena from one to the other.
In this cautious proceeding of the astronomers, you
may read your own condemnation, Cleanthes; or rather
may see, that the subject in which you are engaged
exceeds all human reason and enquiry. Can you pre
tend to show any such similarity between the fabric of
a house, and the generation of a universe? Have you
ever seen Nature in any such situation as resembles the
first arrangement of the elements ? Have worlds ever
been formed under your eye; and have you had
leisure to observe the whole progress of the phenomenon,
from the first appearance of order to its final consumma
tion? If you have, then cite your experience, and
deliver your theory.
PAET III.
How the most absurd argument, replied Cleanthes, in
the hands of a man of ingenuity and invention, may
acquire an air of probability! Are you not aware, Philo,
that it became necessary for Copernicus and his first
disciples to prove the similarity of the terrestrial and
celestial matter; because several philosophers, blinded
by old systems, and supported by some sensible appear
ances, had denied this similarity ? but that it is by no
means necessary, that Theists should prove the similarity
of the works of Nature to those of Art; because this
similarity is self-evident and undeniable ? The same
matter, a like form : what more is requisite. to show an
analogy between their causes, and to ascertain the origin
of all things from a divine purpose and intention? Your
objections, I must freely tell you, are no better than the
�Part III.
35
abstruse cavils of those philosophers who denied motion ;
and ought to be refuted in the same manner, by
illustrations, examples, and instances, rather than by
serious argument and philosophy.
Suppose, therefore, that an articulate voice were heard
in the clouds, much louder and more melodious than
any which human art could ever reach : suppose, that
this voice were extended in the same instant over all
nations, and spoke to each nation in its own language
and dialect: suppose, that the words delivered not only
contain a just sense and meaning, but convey some in
struction altogether worthy of a benevolent Being,
superior to mankind: could you possibly hesitate a
moment concerning the cause of this voice 1 and must
you not instantly ascribe it to some design or purpose ?
Yet I cannot see but all the same objections (if they
merit that appellation) which lie against the system of
Theism, may also be produced against this inference.
Might you not say, that all conclusions concerning
fact were founded on experience : that when we hear
an articulate voice in the dark, and thence infer a man,
it is only the resemblance of the effects which leads us
to conclude that there is a like resemblance in the cause:
but that this extraordinary voice, by its loudness, extent,
and flexibility to all languages, bears so little analogy
to any human voice, that we have no reason to suppose
any analogy in their causes : and consequently, that a ra
tional, wise, coherent speech proceeded, you knew not
whence, from some accidental whistling of the winds,
not from any divine reason or intelligence ? You see
clearly your own objections in these cavils ; and I hope
too, you see clearly, that they cannot possibly have more
force in the one case than in the other.
But to bring the case still nearer the present one of
the universe, I shall make two suppositions, which imply
not any absurdity or impossibility. Suppose, that there
is a natural, universal, invariable language, common to
every individual of the human race; and that books are
�36 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
natural productions, which, perpetuate themselves in the
same manner with animals and vegetables, by descent
and propagation. Several expressions of our passions
contain a universal language: all brute animals have a
natural speech, which, however limited, is very intelli
gible to their own species. And as there are infinitely
fewer parts and less contrivance in the finest composition
of eloquence, than in the coarsest organized body, the
propagation of an Iliad or JEneid is an easier supposition
than that of any plant or animal.
Suppose, therefore, that you enter into your library,
thus peopled by natural volumes, containing the most
refined reason and most exquisite beauty : could you
possibly open one of them, and doubt that its original
cause bore the strongest analogy to mind and intelli
gence? When it reasons and discourses; when it expostu
lates, argues, and enforces its views and topics; when it
applies sometimes to the pure intellect, sometimes to the
affections ; when it collects, disposes, and adorns every
consideration suited to the subject: could you persist in
asserting, that all this, at the bottom, had really no
meaning; and that the first formation of this volume in
the loins of its original parent proceeded not from thought
and design? Your obstinacy, I know, reaches not that
degree of firmness: even your sceptical play and wanton
ness would be abashed at so glaring an absurdity.
.
But if there be any difference, Philo,, between, this
supposed case and the real one of the universe, it is all
to the advantage of the latter. The anatomy of an
animal affords many stronger instances of design than
the perusal of Livy or Tacitus: and any objection which
you start in the former case, by carrying me back to. so
unusual and extraordinary a scene as the first formation
of worlds, the same objection has place on the supposi
tion of our vegetating library. Choose, then, your party,
Philo, without ambiguity or evasion : assert either that
a rational volume is no proof of a rational cause, or
admit of a similar cause to all the works of nature.
�Part III.
37
Let me here observe, too, continued Cleanthes, that
this religious argument, instead of being weakened by
that scepticism so much affected by you, rather
acquires force from it, and becomes more firm and
undisputed. To exclude all argument or reasoning of
every kind, is either affectation or madness. The
declared profession of every reasonable sceptic is only
to reject abstruse, remote, and refined arguments; to
adhere to common sense and the plain instincts of
nature; and to assent, wherever any reasons strike him
with so full a force, that he cannot, without the
greatest violence, prevent it. Now the arguments for
natural religion are plainly of this kind ; and nothing
but the most perverse, obstinate metaphysics can reject
them.
Consider, anatomize the eye; survey its
structure and contrivance ; and tell me, from your own
feeling, if the idea of a contriver does not immediately
flow in upon you with a force like that of sensation.
The most obvious conclusion, surely, is in favour of
design; and it requires time, reflection, and study, to
summon up those frivolous, though abstruse objections,
which can support Infidelity. Who can behold the
male and female of each species, the correspondence of
their parts and instincts, their passions, and whole
course of life before and after generation, but must be
sensible, that the propagation of the species is
intended by Nature ? Millions and millions of such
instances present themselves through every part of the
universe; and no language can convey a more intelli
gible, irresistible meaning, than the curious adjustment
of final causes. To what degree, therefore, of blind
dogmatism must one have attained, to reject such
natural and such convincing arguments ?
Some beauties in writing we may meet with, which
seem contrary to rules, and which gain the affections,
and animate the imagination, in opposition to all the
precepts of criticism, and to the authority of the
established masters of art. And if the argument for
�38
Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
Theism be, as you pretend,. contradictory to the
principles of logic j its universal, its irresistible
influence proves clearly, that there may be arguments
of a like irregular nature. Whatever cavils may be
urged; an orderly world, as well as a coherent,
articulate speech, will still be received as an incontest
able proof of design and intention.
It sometimes happens, I own, that the religious
arguments have not their due influence on an ignorant
savage and barbarian j not because they are obscure
and difficult, but because he never asks himself any
question with regard to them. Whence arises the
curious structure of an animal ? From the copulation
of its parents. And these whence? From their
parents ? A few removes set the objects at such a
distance, that to him they are lost in darkness and
confusion j nor is he actuated by any curiosity to trace
them farther. But this is neither. dogmatism nor
scepticism, but stupidity; a state of mind very different
from your sifting, inquisitive disposition, my ingenious
friend. You can trace causes from effects : you can
compare the most distant and remote objects: and
your greatest errors proceed not from barrenness of
thought and invention; but from too luxuriant a
fertility, which suppresses your natural good sense, by
a profusion of unnecessary scruples and objections.
Here I could observe, Hermippus, that Philo was a
little embarrassed and confounded: but while he
hesitated in delivering an answer, luckily for him,
Demea broke in upon the dis,course, and saved his
countenance.
.
Your instance, Cleanthes, said he, drawn from books
and language, being familiar, has, I confess, so much
more force on that account: but is there not. some
danger too in this very circumstance ; and. may it not
render us presumptuous, by making us imagine we
comprehend the Deity, and have some adequate idea Ox
his nature and attributes ? When I read a volume, 1
�Part III.
39
enter into the mind and intention of the author: I
become him, in a manner, for the instant; and have
an immediate feeling and conception of those ideas
which revolved in his imagination while employed in
that composition. But so near an approach we never
surely can make to the Deity. His ways are not our
ways. His attributes are perfect, but incomprehensible.
And this volume of Nature contains a great and in
explicable riddle, more than any intelligible discourse
or reasoning.
The ancient Platonists, you know, were the most
religious and devout of all the Pagan philosophers ;
yet many of them, particularly Plotinus, expressly
declare, that intellect or understanding is not to be
•ascribed to the Deity; and that our most perfect
worship of him consists, not in acts of veneration,
reverence, gratitude, or love; but in a certain mysterious
self-annihilation, or total extinction of all our faculties.
These ideas are, perhaps, too far stretched ; but still it
must be acknowledged, that, by representing the Deity
as so intelligible and comprehensible, and so familiar to
a human mind, we are guilty of the grossest and most
narrow partiality, and make ourselves the model of the
whole universe.
All the sentiments of the human mind, gratitude,
resentment, love, friendship, approbation, blame, pity,
emulation, envy, have a plain reference to the state
and situation of man, and are calculated for preserving
the existence and promoting the activity of such a
being in such circumstances. It seems, therefore,
unreasonable to transfer such sentiments to a supreme
existence, or to suppose him actuated by them; and
the phenomena, besides, of the universe will not
support us in such a theory. All our ideas derived
from the senses are confessedly false and illusive : and
cannot, therefore, be supposed to have place in a
supreme intelligence: and as the ideas of internal
sentiment, added to those of the external senses,
�40 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
compose the whole furniture of human understanding,
we may conclude, that none of the materials of thought
are in any respect similar in the human and in the
divine intelligence. Now as to the manner of think
ing; how can we make any comparison between
them, or suppose them any wise resembling? Our
thought is fluctuating, uncertain, fleeting, successive,
and compounded; and were we to remove these
circumstances, we absolutely annihilate its essence,
and it would in such a case be an abuse of terms to
apply to it the name of thought or reason. At least,
if it appear more pious and respectful (as it really is)
still to retain these terms, when we mention the
Supreme Being; we ought to acknowledge, that their
meaning, in that case, is totally incomprehensible ; and
that the infirmities of our nature do not permit us to
reach any ideas which in the least correspond to the
ineffable sublimity of the divine attributes.
PART IV.
It seems strange to me, said Cleanthes, that. you,
Demea, who are so sincere in the cause of religion,
should still maintain the mysterious,, incomprehensible
nature of the Deity, and should insist so strenuously
that he has no manner of likeness or resemblance to
human creatures. The Deity, I can readily, allow,
possesses many powers and attributes, of. which we
can have no comprehension: but if our ideas, so far
as they go, be not just, and adequate, and cor
respondent to his real nature, I . know not what there
is in this subject worth insisting on. Is the name,
without any meaning, of such mighty importance?
Or how do you IMystics, who maintain the absolute
incomprehensibility of the Deity, differ from Sceptics
or Atheists, who assert, that the first cause of all is
�Part IV.
4i
unknown and unintelligible ? Their temerity must
be very great, if, after rejecting the production by a mind,
I mean a mind resembling the human, (for I know of no
other), they pretend to assign, with certainty, any
other specific intelligible cause : and their conscience
must be very scrupulous indeed, if they refuse to call
the universal, unknown cause a God or Deity; and to
bestow on him as many sublime eulogies and un
meaning epithets as you shall please to require of
them.
Who could imagine, replied Demea, that Cleanthes,
the calm, philosophical Cleanthes, would attempt to
refute his antagonists, by affixing a nickname to them ;
and, like the common bigots and inquisitors of the
age, have recourse to invective and declamation,
instead of reasoning ? Or does he not perceive, that
these topics are easily retorted, and that Anthropomorphite is an appellation as invidious, and implies as
dangerous consequences, as the epithet of Mystic, with
which he has honoured us ? In reality, Cleanthes, con
sider what it is you assert when you represent the
Deity as similar to a human mind and understanding.
What is the soul of man ? A composition of various
faculties, passions, sentiments, ideas ; united, indeed,
into one self or person, but still distinct from each
other. When it reasons, the ideas, which are the
parts of its discourse, arrange themselves in a certain
form or order ; which is not preserved entire for a
moment, but immediately gives place to another
arrangement. New opinions, new passions, new affec
tions, new feelings arise, which continually diversify
the mental scene, and produce in it the greatest variety
and most rapid succession imaginable. How is this
compatible with that perfect immutability and simplicity
which all true Theists ascribe to the Deity 1 By the
same act, say they, he sees past, present and future :
His love and hatred, his mercy and justice, are one
individual operation : He is entire in every point of
�42 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
space ; and complete in every instant of duration.
No succession, no change, no acquisition, no diminution.
What he is implies not in it any shadow of distinction
-or diversity. And what he is, this moment, he ever
has been, and ever will he, without any new judgment,
sentiment, or operation.
He stands fixed in one
simple, perfect state : nor can you ever say, with any
propriety, that this act of his is different from that
•other; or that this judgment or idea has been lately
formed, and will give place, hy succession, to any
-different judgment or idea.
I can readily allow, said Cleanthes, that those who
maintain the perfect simplicity of the Supreme Being,
to the extent in which you have explained it, are
complete Mystics, and chargeable with all the con
sequences which I have drawn from their opinion.
They are, in a word, Atheists, without knowing it.
For though it be allowed, that the Deity possesses
attributes of which we have no comprehension; yet
ought we never to ascribe to him any attributes which
are absolutely incompatible with that intelligent nature
essential to him. A mind, whose acts and sentiments
and ideas are not distinct and successive ; one, that is
wholly simple, and totally immutable; is a .mind,
which has no thought, no reason, no will, no. sentiment,
no love, no hatred ; or in a word, is no mind at. all.
It is an abuse of terms to give it that appellation;
and we may as well speak of limited extension without
figure, or of number without composition.
Pray consider, said Philo, whom you are at .present
inveighing against. You are honouring with . the
appellation of Atheist all the sound, orthodox divines,
almost, who have treated of this subject; and you will
at last be, yourself, found, according to your reckoning,
the only sound Theist in the world. But if idolaters
be Atheists, as, I think, may justly be asserted, and
Christian Theologians the same ; what becomes of the
argument, so much celebrated, derived from the
universal consent of mankind ?
�Part IV.
43
But because I know you are not much swayed by
names and authorities, I shall endeavour to show you,
a little more distinctly, the inconveniencies of that
Anthropomorphism, which you have embraced; and
shall prove, that there is no ground to suppose a plan
of the world to be formed in the divine mind, con
sisting of distinct ideas, differently arranged; in the
same manner as an architect forms in his head the plan
of a house which he intends to execute.
It is not easy, I own, to see what is gained by this
supposition, whether we judge of the matter by Reason
or by Experience. We are still obliged to mount
higher, in order to find the cause of this cause, which
you had assigned as satisfactory and conclusive.
If reason (I mean abstract reason, derived from
inquiries a priori) be not alike mute with regard to all
questions concerning cause and effect; this sentence at
least it will venture to pronounce, That a mental world,
or universe of ideas, requires a cause as much as does
a material world, or universe of objects; and, if
si mil ar in its arrangement, must require a similar cause.
For what is there in this subject, which should occa
sion a different conclusion or inference ? In an abstract
view, they are entirely alike ; and no difficulty attends
the one supposition, which is not common to both of
them.
Again, when we will needs force Experience to pro
nounce some sentence even on these subjects, which lie
beyond her sphere; neither can she perceive any
material difference in this particular, between these two
kinds of worlds; but finds them to be governed by
similar principles, and to depend upon an equal variety
of causes in their operations. We have specimens in
miniature of both of them. Our own mind resembles the
one: a vegetable or animal body the other. Let
Experience, therefore, judge from these samples. Noth
ing seems more delicate, with regard to its causes, than
thought; and as these causes never operate in two
�44 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
persons after the same manner, so we never find two
persons who think exactly alike. Nor indeed does
the same person think exactly alike at any two different
periods of time. A difference of age, of the disposition
of his body, of weather, of food, of company, of books,
of passions; any of these particulars, or others more
minute, are sufficient to alter the curious machinery of
thought, and communicate to it very different move
ments and operations. As far as we can judge,
vegetables and animal bodies are not more delicate in
their motions, nor depend upon a greater variety or more
curious adjustment of springs and principles.
How therefore shall we satisfy ourselves concerning
the cause of that Being, whom you suppose the Author
of Nature, or, according to your system of Anthro
pomorphism, the ideal world, into which you trace the
material ? Have we not the same reason to trace that
ideal world into another ideal world, or new intelligent
principle ? But if we stop, and go no further ; why go
so far ? Why not stop at the material world 1 How
can we satisfy ourselves without going on in infinitum ?
And after all, what satisfaction is there in that infinite
progression ? Let us remember the story of the Indian
philosopher and his elephant. It was never more
applicable than to the present subject. If the material
world rests upon a similar ideal world, this ideal world
must, rest upon some other j and so on, without end.
It were better, therefore, never to look beyond the
present material world. By supposing it to contain the
principle of its order within itself, we really assert it to
be God; and the sooner we arrive at that divine Being,
so much the better. When you go one step beyond
the mundane system, you only excite an inquisitive
humour, which it is impossible ever to satisfy.
* So long ago as about B.C. 450, the doctrine that the material
universe contains the principle of its order within itself had been
preached, at Athens, by Anaxagoras, from whom the tragic poet,
Euripides, learned it, and embodied it m the fine lines, which
have been preserved in the “ Stromata of Clemens Alexandrmus,
�Part IV.
45
To say, that the different ideas, which compose the
reason of the Supreme Being, fall into order, of them
selves, and by their own nature, is really to talk with
out any precise meaning. If it has a meaning, I would
fain know, why it is not as good sense to say, that the
opas rov wpov rov8’ tiireipov al'Srbpa
Kai yqv irbpi^ fy-Oifo’ iiypais1 ev dyKaXais;
tovtov vipufe Zrjva, tov8’ 7)yov 'S-ebv.
“Do you see on high this boundless ether and holding the Earth
in its soft arms ? Consider this to be Zeus, and regard this to be
God.”
This doctrine was held by Epicurus and other ancient philo
sophers. It was celebrated by Euripides, Lucretius, Virgil and
Shelley. After lying in obscurity during many centuries Hume
gave it fair play in his “Dialogues.” Little if any notice was
taken of it. The clerics had utterly failed in their attempts to
refute the reasoning contained in Hume’s essay “of Miracles.”
This may have deterred them from attacking the “Dialogues,”
or, more probably, the clerics were unable to understand the
arguments contained in the “ Dialogues. ”
Be that as it may : so matters remained until at a meeting of
the British Association for the Advancement of Science, held at
Belfast on the 19th August 1874, Professor Tyndall, in his
inaugural address, republished this doctrine. The circumstances
under which it was thus ushered into the world rendered it almost
impossible that the clerics could safely remain silent and entrust
their various and conflicting forms of Christianity to the healing
effects of time. On the other hand, as a body, the clerics were
wholly ignorant of Hume’s arguments. Very few of them had
even read his “Dialogues.” So, on their part it was dangerous to
attempt in public the refutation of a doctrine which rested on
arguments with which the clerics were wholly unacquainted. But
the doctrine had been published and was ringing in the ears of the
lay Christians as well as in the ears of the clerics ; and it could not
be snuffed out with an exclamation of “Pooh! Pooh!” the
favourite rhetoric of Divines. The clerics resolved to do their best
—and bad was their best. To an unconcerned observer their con
duct was ridiculous in the extreme. On the next Sunday (23d
August,) during the morning, noon and evening, the pulpits of
Belfast reverberated with the screams of the clerics, not one of
whom showed that he understood Mr Tyndall’s argument. They
shrieked and screamed, and roared and shouted, and ranted and
raved about clocks and watches, and stars and planets, and trees
and flowers, and
“ babbled of green fields ; ”
but not one of them touched on Mr Tyndall’s argument, or gave
the slightest “ outward and visible sign ” of knowing what it was.
�46 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
parts of the material world fall into order of themselves
and by their own nature. Can the one opinion be
intelligible, while the other is not so ?
Indeed, on that bright and genial Sunday the Belfast clerics
furnished a definite illustration of those who are
“worse than worst
Of those, that lawless and incertain thoughts
Imagine howling.”
Collaterally with this screaming business, almost all the lay and
clerical journals in England, Ireland and Scotland, headed by the
“ Times, ” denounced Mr Tyndall “ by bell, book and candlebut
not one of the writers in those journals gave the slightest indica
tion that he understood Mr Tyndall’s argument.
But although the clerics throughout these three kingdoms do
not appear to have grasped Mr Tyndall’s process of reasoning, they
showed a keen, instinctive “ anticipated precognition ” of what his
conclusion was likely to be. They suspected that the result would
be “the deification of matter. ” And they knew that if this should
be effected, not only this our craft is in danger to be set at
nought; but also that the temple of the great Trinity should be
despised, and his magnificence should be destroyed, whom all
Asia and the world worshippeth. Consequently, like their worthy
predecessors, (Acts xix, 27, 28) the Christians “ were full of
wrath. ” Not being able to refute Mr Tyndall, they reviled him
in every possible style. A characteristic element in the sermons
preached on that Sunday was an utter disregard of Truth. _ Not
one of the preachers even pretended to consider whether it was
possible that the material universe did really contain within itself
the principle of its own order. All they attempted was to vilify
that doctrine and to insult Mr Tyndall. Since the burning of Dr
Prestley’s house, in Birmingham, 14th July 1791, the history_ of
England does not record such a blind and disgraceful persecution
as that contained in the insults hurled at Mr Tyndall on that
Aristotle (“Ethics” x. 9,) says, “He who exercises himself in the
wav of thought, and does his best to improve it, and has the best
mental disposition, seems also to be the most beloved by the gods.
Commenting on this passage, an eminent scholar says
A very
noble and consoling sentiment to those who care little for popular
notions, but everything for Truth. It is humiliating to think how
immeasurably the Greek philosophers surpassed us of the present
dav in this best and holiest of all virtues, love of Truth.
While waiting for a settlement of this question, it may be
observed that the supposition that matter contains the principle of
its own order within itself, and that the present material universe has
been arranged by that Principle, is not in the least more difficult to
understand than the supposition that the material universe has
been created and arranged by a so-called Spirit, infinite m wisdom,
power and goodness, of whom we do not know anything,
through the medium of his limited and imperfect works. Both
suppositions are only hypotheses.
�Part IP.
47
We have, indeed, experience of ideas, which fall into
order of themselves, and without any known cause :
But, I am sure, we have a much larger experience of
matter, which does the same; as in all instances of
generation and vegetation, where the accurate analysis
of the cause exceeds all human comprehension. We
have also experience of particular systems of thought
and of matter, which have no order : of the first, in
madness; of the second, in corruption. Why then
should we think, that order is more essential to on©
than the other 1 And if it requires a cause in both,
what do we gain by your system, in tracing the
universe of objects into a similar universe of ideas?
The first step, which we make, leads us on for ever. Itwere, therefore, wise in us, to limit all our inquiries to
the present world, without looking farther. No satis
faction can ever be attained by these speculations, which
so far exceed the narrow bounds of human under
standing.
It was usual with the Peripatetics, you know, Clean
thes, when the cause of any phenomenon was demanded,
to have recourse to their faculties or occult qualities;
and to say, for instance, that bread nourished by
its nutritive faculty, and senna purged by its purgative:
but it has been discovered, that this subterfuge was
nothing but the disguise of ignorance ; and that these
philosophers, though less ingenuous, really said the
same thing with the sceptics or the vulgar, who fairly
confessed that they knew not the cause of these
phenomena. In like manner, when it is asked, what
cause produces order in the ideas of the Supreme Being;
can any other reason be assigned by you, Anthropomorphites, than that it is a rational faculty, and that such
is the nature of the Deity ? But why a similar answer
will not be equally satisfactory in accounting for theorder of the world, without having recourse to any such
intelligent creator as you insist on, may be difficult to
determine. It is only to say, that such is the nature.
�48
Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
of material objects, and that they are all originally
possessed of a faculty of order and proportion. These
are only more learned and elaborate ways of confessing
our ignorance; nor has the one hypothesis any real
advantage above the other, except in its greater
conformity to vulgar prejudices.
You have displayed this argument with great
emphasis, replied Cleanthes: you seem not sensible
how easy it is to answer it. Even in common life, if I
assign a cause for any event, is it any objection, Philo,
that I cannot assign the cause of that cause, and
answer every new question which may incessantly
be started? And what philosophers could possibly
submit to so rigid a rule? philosophers who confess
ultimate causes to be totally unknown, and are
sensible that the most refined principles into which
they trace the phenomena, are still to them as inexpli
cable as these phenomena themselves are to the vulgar.
The order and arrangement of nature, the curious
adjustment of final causes, the plain use and intention
of every part and organ; all these bespeak in the
clearest language an intelligent cause or author. The
heavens and the earth join in the same testimony :
the whole chorus of Nature raises one hymn to the
praises of its Creator: you alone, or almost alone,
disturb this general harmony. You start abstruse
doubts, cavils, and objections : you ask me, what is the
cause of this cause ? I know not; I care not; that
concerns not me. I have found a Deity; and here I
stop my enquiry. Let those go further, who are wiser
or more enterprising.
I pretend to be neither, replied Philo : and for that
very reason, I should never, perhaps, have. attempted
to go so far; especially when I am sensible that 1
must at last be contented to sit down with the same
answer, which, without further trouble, might have
satisfied me from the beginning. If I am still to
remain in utter ignorance of causes, and can absolutely
�Part V.
49
give an explication of nothing, I shall never esteem it
any advantage to shove off for a moment a difficulty
which, you acknowledge, must immediately, in its full
force, recur upon me. Naturalists indeed very justly
explain particular effects by more general causes• though
these general causes themselves should remain in the end
totally inexplicable : but they never surely thought it
satisfactory to explain a particular effect by a particular
cause, which was no more to be accounted for than the
effect itself. An ideal system, arranged of itself, without
a precedent design, is not a whit more explicable than a
material one, which attains its order in a like manner;
nor is there any more difficulty in the latter supposition
than in the former.
PART V.
But to show you still more inconveniencies, continued
Philo, in your Anthropomorphism; please to take a
new survey of your principles. Like effects prove like
causes. This is the experimental argument; and this,
you say, too, is the sole theological argument. Now it
is certain, that the liker the effects are which are seen,
and the liker the causes which are inferred, the
stronger is the argument. Every departure on either
side diminishes the probability, and renders the
experiment less conclusive. You cannot doubt of the
principle: neither ought you to reject its conse
quences.
All the new discoveries in astronomy, which prove
the immense grandeur and magnificence of the works of
Nature, are so many additional arguments for a Deity,
according to the true system of Theism : but, accord
ing to your hypothesis of experimental Theism,
they become so many objections, by removing the
effect still further from all resemblance to the effects
of human art and contrivance.
For if Lucretius,
D
�50 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
even, following the old system of the world, could
exclaim,
Quis regere immensi summam, quis habere profundi
Indu manu validas potis est moderanter habenas ?
Quis pariter ccelos omnes convertere ? et omnes
Ignibus setheriis terras suffire feraces ?
Omnibus inque locis esse omni tempore prtesto ? *
If Cicero esteemed this reasoning so natural as to put
it into the mouth of his Epicurean : Quibus enim oculis
animi intueri potuit wester Plato fabricam illarn tanti
operis, qua construi a Deo atque cedificarl mundum
facit? quoemolitio? quae ferramenta 1 quivectes? quat
machines ? qui ministri tanti muneris fuerunt ? quernadmodum, autern obedire et parere voluntati architect
aer, ignis, aqua, terra potuerunt If If this argument,
I say, had any force in former ages ; how much greater
must it have at present; when the bounds of Nature
are so infinately enlarged, and such a magnificent scene
is opened to us ? It -is still more unreasonable to form
our idea of so unlimited a cause from our experience of
the narrow productions of human design and invention.
The discoveries by microscopes, as they open a new
universe in miniature, are still objections, according to
you, arguments, according to me. The farther we push
our researches of this kind, we are still led to infer the
universal cause of all to be vastly different from man
kind, or from any object of human experience and
observation.
* Bk. ii. 1094.—“ Who is able to rule"the whole of this immen
sity ? Who can hold in his hand, with power to guide them, thestrong reins of this unlimited expanse ? Who can, at the same
time, turn round all the heavens, and warm all the Earth with
ethereal fires ? or, who can be, at the same moment, present in all
places. ”
+ De nat. Deor. lib. i.
.
“ With what mental vision could your Plato behold that fabric
involving so much labour, by which he represents the world to
have been arranged and erected by Divine Providence ? What
contrivance was there ? What iron instruments ? What levers .
What engines ? What servants were there in so great a work.
Besides, in what way could fire, air, earth and water be caused to
obey and submit to the will of the architect ? ”
�Part K.
51
And what say you to the discoveries in anatomy,
chemistry, botany ? . . . . These surely are no objec
tions, replied Cleanthes: they only discover new in
stances of art and contrivance. It is still the image of
mind reflected on us from innumerable objects. Add,
a mind like the human, said Philo. I know of no
other, replied Cleanthes. And the liker the better,
insisted Philo. To be sure, said Cleanthes.
Now, Cleanthes, said Philo, with an air of alacrity
and triumph, mark the consequences. First, By this
method of reasoning, you renounce all claim to infinity
in any of the attributes of the Deity. For as the cause
ought only to be proportioned to the effect; and the
effect, so far as it falls under our cognizance, is not in
finite ; what pretensions, have we, upon your supposi
tions, to ascribe that attribute to the divine Being?
You will still insist, that, by removing him so much
from all similarity to human creatures, we give in to the
most arbitrary hypothesis, and at the same time weaken
all proofs of his existence.
Secondly, You have no reason, on your theory, for
ascribing perfection to the Deity, even in his finite
capacity; or for supposing him free from every error,
mistake, or incoherence, in his undertakings. There
are many inexplicable difficulties in the works of Nature,
which, if we allow a perfect author to be proved a priori,
are easily solved, and become only seeming difficulties,
from the narrow capacity of man, who cannot trace in
finite relations. But according to your method of
reasoning, these difficulties become all real; and perhaps
will be insisted on, as new instances of likeness to human
art and contrivance. At least, you must acknowledge,
that it is impossible for us to tell, from our limited views,
whether this system contains any great faults, or
deserves any considerable praise, if compared to other
possible, and even real systems. Could a peasant, if
the JEneid were read to him, pronounce that poem to
be absolutely faultless, or even assign to it its proper
�52 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
among the productions of human wit; he, who
had never seen any other production ?
But were this world ever so perfect a production, it
must still remain uncertain, whether all the excellencies
of the work can justly be ascribed to the workman. If
we survey a ship, what an exalted idea must we form
of the ingenuity of the carpenter who framed so com
plicated, useful, and beautiful a machine?. And what
surprise must we feel, when we find him a stupid
mechanic, who imitated others, and copied an art, which,
through a long succession of ages, after multiplied trials,
mistakes, corrections, deliberations, and controversies
had been gradually improving? Many worlds might
have been botched and bungled, throughout an eternity,
ere this system wTas struck out; much labour lost; many
fruitless trials made; and a slow, but continued improve
ment carried on during infinite ages in the art of world
making. In such subjects, who can determine, where
the truth; nay, who can conjecture where the probability,
lies • amidst a great number of hypotheses which may
be proposed, and a still greater number which may be
imagined ?
.
™ ...
And what shadow of an argument, continued Philo,
can you produce, from your hypothesis, to prove the
unity of the Deity? A great number of men join, m
building a house or ship, in rearing a city, in framing
a commonwealth : why may not several deities combine
in contriving and framing a world ? This is only so much
greater similarity to human affairs By sharing the
work among several, we may so much farther.limit t e
attributes of each, and get rid of that extensive power
and knowledge, which must be supposed in one deity,
and which, according to you, can only serve to weaken
the proof of his existence. And if such, foolish, such
vicious creatures as man, can yet often unite m framing
and executing one plan; how much more those deities
or daemons, whom we may suppose several degrees more
perfect ?
�Part V.
53
To multiply causes, without necessity, is indeed con
trary to true philosophy : but this principle applies not
to the present case. Were one deity antecedently
proved by your theory, who were possessed of every
attribute requisite to the production of the universe ; it
would be needless, I own, (though not absurd), to
suppose any other deity existent. But while it is still
a question, whether all these attributes are united in
one subject, or dispersed among several independent
beings ; by what phenomena in nature can we pretend
to decide the controversy ? Where we see a body
raised in a scale, we are sure that there is in the opposite
scale, however concealed from sight, some counterpoising
weight equal to it: but it is still allowed to doubt,
whether that weight be an aggregate of several distinct
bodies, or one uniform united mass. And if the weight
requisite very much exceeds anything which we have
ever seen conjoined in any single body, the former
supposition becomes still more probable and natural.
An intelligent being of such vast power and capacity
as is necessary to produce the universe, or, to speak in
the language of ancient philosophy, so prodigious an
animal, exceeds all analogy, and even comprehension.
But further: Cleanthes, men are mortal, and renew
their species by generation; and this is common to all
living creatures. The two great sexes of male and
female, says Milton, animate the world. Why must
this circumstance, so universal, so essential, be excluded
from those numerous and limited deities ? Behold, then,
the theogony of ancient times brought back upon us.
And why not become a perfect Anthropomorphite ?
Why not assert the deity or deities to be corporeal, and
to have eyes, a nose, mouth, ears, &c. 1 Epicurus main
tained, that no man had ever seen reason but in a hu
man figure; therefore the gods must have a human
figure. And this argument, which is deservedly somuch ridiculed by Cicero, becomes, according to you,,
solid and philosophical.
�54 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
In a word, Cleanthes, a man, who follows your
hypothesis, is able, perhaps, to assert, or conjecture,
that the universe, sometime, arose from something like
design: but beyond that position he cannot ascertain
one single circumstance; and is left afterwards to fix
every point of his theology, by the utmost licence of
fancy and hypothesis. This world, for aught he knows,
is very faulty and imperfect, compared to a superior
standard; and was only the first rude essay of some
infant deity, who afterwards, abandoned it, ashamed of
his lame performance: it is the work only of some
dependent, inferior deity, and is the object of derision
to his superiors : it is the production of old age and
dotage in some superannuated deity; and ever since
his death, has run on at adventures, from the first im
pulse and active force which it received from him. You
justly give signs of horror, Demea, at these strange
suppositions j but these, and a thousand more of the
same kind, are Cleanthes’s suppositions, not mine. From
the moment the attributes of the Deity are supposed
finite, all these have place. And I cannot, for my part,
thiuk, that so wild and unsettled a system of theology
is, in any respect, preferable to none at all.
These suppositions I absolutely disown, cried Clean
thes : they strike me, however, with no horror;
especially, when proposed in that rambling way in
which they drop from you. On the contrary, they
give me pleasure, when I see, that, by the utmost in
dulgence of your imagination, you never get rid of the
hypothesis of design in the universe; but are obliged
at every turn to have recourse to it. To this concession
I adhere steadily ; and this I regard as a sufficient
foundation for religion.
�Part VI.
55
PART VI.
It must be a slight fabric, indeed, said Demea, which
can be erected on so tottering a foundation. While we
are uncertain, whether there is one deity or many;
whether the deity or deities, to whom we owe our
existence, be perfect or imperfect, subordinate or
supreme, dead or alive; what trust or confidence can
we repose in them ? What devotion or worship address
to them ? What veneration or obedience pay them ?
To all the purposes of life, the theory of religion be
comes altogether useless : and even with regard to
speculative consequences, its uncertainty, according to
you, must render it totally precarious and unsatisfactory.
To render it still more unsatisfactory, said Philo,
there occurs to me another hypothesis, which must
acquire an air of probability from the method of rea
soning so much insisted on by Cleanthes. That like
effects arise from like causes : this principle he supposes
the foundation of all religion. But there is another
principle of the same kind, no less certain, and derived
from the same source of experience; that where several
known circumstances are observed to be similar, the un
known will also be found similar. Thus, if we see
the limbs of a human body, we conclude, that it is also
attended with a human head, though hid from us.
Thus, if we see, through a chink in a wall, a small part
of the sun, we conclude, that, were the wall removed,
we should see the whole body. In short, this method
of reasoning is so obvious and familiar, that no scruple
can ever be made with regard to its solidity.
Now if we survey the universe, so far as it falls
under our knowledge, it bears a great resemblance to
an animal or organized body, and seems actuated with
a like principle of life and motion. A continual cir
culation of matter in it produces no disorder : a contin
�56 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
•
ual waste in every part is incessantly repaired : the
closest sympathy is perceived throughout the entire
system: and each part or member, in performing its
proper offices, operates both to its own preservation and
to that of the whole. The world, therefore, I infer, is
an animal; and the Deity is the soul of the world,
actuating it and actuated by it.
You have too much learning, Cleanthes, to be at all
surprised at this opinion, which, you know, was main
tained by almost all the Theistsof antiquity, and chiefly
prevails in their discourses and reasonings. For though
sometimes the ancient philosophers reason from final
causes, as if they thought the world the workmanship
of God; yet it appears rather their favourite notion to
consider it as his body, whose organization renders it
subservient to him. And it must be confessed, that as
the universe resembles more a human body than it does
the works of human art and contrivance ; if our limited
analogy could ever, with any propriety, be extended to
the whole of nature, the inference seems juster in favour
of the ancient than the modern theory.
There are many other advantages, too, in the former
theory, which recommended it to the ancient theolo
gians. Nothing more repugnant to all their notions,
because nothing more repugnant to common experience,
than mind without body; a mere spiritual substance,
which fell not under their senses nor comprehension,,
and of which they had not observed one single instance
throughout all nature. Mind and body they knew,
because they felt both : an order, arrangement, organi
zation, or internal machinery, in both, they likewise
knew, after the same manner: and it could not but
seem reasonable to transfer this experience to the
universe; and to suppose the divine mind and body tobe also coeval, and to have, both of them, order and
arrangement naturally inherent in them, and insepar
able from them.
Here, therefore, is a new species of Anthropomor
�Part VI.
57
phism, Cleanthes, on which you may deliberate; and
a theory which seems not liable to any considerable
difficulties. You are too much superior, surely, to
systematical prejudices, to find any more difficulty in.
supposing an animal body to be, originally, of itself,
or from unknown causes, possessed of order and
organization, than in supposing a similar order to
belong to mind. But the vulgar prejudice, that body
and mind ought always to accompany each other, ought
not, one should think, to be entirely neglected; since
it is founded on vulgar experience, the only guide
which you profess to follow in all these theological
inquiries. And if you assert that our limited experi
ence is an unequal standard, by which to judge of the
unlimited extent of nature, you entirely abandon
your own hypothesis, and must thenceforward adopt
our Mysticism, as you call it, and admit of the absolute
incomprehensibility of the Divine Nature.
This theory, I own, replied Cleanthes, has never
before occurred to me, though, a pretty natural one;
and I cannot readily, upon so short an examination
and reflection, deliver any opinion with regard to it.
You are very scrupulous, indeed, said Philo : were I
to examine any system of yours, I should not have
acted with half that caution and reserve, in starting
objections and difficulties to it. However, if anything
occur to you, you will oblige us by proposing it.
Why then, replied Cleanthes, it seems to me, that,
though the world does, in many circumstances, re
semble an animal body; yet is the analogy also
defective in many circumstances, the most material :
no organs of sense ; no seat of thought or reason; no
one precise origin of motion and action. In short, it
seems to bear a stronger resemblance to a vegetable
than to an animal, and your inference would be so far
inconclusive in favour of the soul of the world.
But in the next place, your theory seems to imply
the eternity of the world; and that is a principle,.
�58 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
which, I think, can be refuted by the strongest reasons
and probabilities. I shall suggest an argument to this
purpose, which, I believe, has not been insisted on by
any writer. Those who reason from the late origin of
arts and sciences, though their inference wants not
force, may perhaps be refuted by considerations derived
from the nature of human society, which is in continual
revolution, between ignorance and knowledge, liberty
and slavery, riches and poverty ; so that it is impossible
for us, from our limited experience, to foretell with
assurance what events may or may not be expected.
Ancient learning and history seem to have been in
great danger of entirely perishing after the inundation
of the barbarous nations ; and had these convulsions
■continued a little longer, or been a little more violent,
we should not probably have now known what passed
in the world a few centuries before us. Nay, were it
not for the superstition of the Popes, who preserved a
little jargon of Latin, in order to support the appearance
of an ancient and universal church, that tongue must
have been utterly lost: in which case, the western
world, being totally barbarous, would not have been
in a fit disposition for receiving the Greek language
and learning, which was conveyed to them after the
sacking of Constantinople. When learning and books
had been extinguished, even the mechanical arts would
have fallen considerably to decay; and it is easily
imagined, that fable or tradition might ascribe to them
a much later origin than the true one. This vulgar
argument, therefore, against the eternity of the world,
seems a little precarious.
But here appears to be the foundation of a better
argument. Lucullus was the first that brought cherrytrees from Asia to Europe ; though that tree thrives so
well in many European climates, that it grows in the
woods without any culture. Is it possible, that,
throughout a whole eternity, no European had ever
passed into Asia, and thought of transplanting so
�Part VI.
59
delicious a fruit into his own country ? Or if the tree
was once transplanted and propagated, how could it
ever afterwards perish ? Empires may rise and fall;
liberty and slavery succeed alternately; ignorance and
knowledge give place to each other; but the cherrytree will still remain in the woods of Greece, Spain,
and Italy, and will never be affected by the revolutions
of human society.
It is not two thousand years since vines were trans
planted into France ; though there is no climate in the
world more favourable to them. It is not three centuries
since horses, cows, sheep, swine, dogs, corn, were known
in America. Is it possible, that, during the revolutions
of a whole eternity, there never arose a Columbus, who
might open the communication between Europe and
that continent ? We may as well imagine, that all
men would wear stockings for ten thousand years, and
never have the sense to think of garters to tie them.
All these seem convincing proofs of the youth, or
rather infancy, of the world ; as being founded on the
operation of principles more constant and steady than
those by which human society is governed and directed.
Nothing less than a total convulsion of the elements
will ever destroy all the European animals and
vegetables which are now to be found in the Western
world.
And what argument have you against such convul
sions, replied Philo. Strong and’ almost incontestible
proofs may be traced over the whole earth, that every
part of this globe has continued for many ages entirely
covered with water. And though order were supposed
inseparable from matter, and inherent in it; yet may
matter be susceptible of many and great revolutions,
through the endless periods of eternal duration. The
incessant changes, to which every part of it is subject,
seem to intimate some such general transformations ;
though at the same time it is observable, that all the
-changes and corruptions of which We have ever had
�60 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
experience, are but passages from one state of order to
another; nor can matter ever rest in total deformity
and confusion. What we see in the parts, we may
infer in the whole ; at least, that is the method of
reasoning on which you rest your whole theory. And
were I obliged to defend- any particular system of thisnature (which I never willingly should do), I esteem
none more plausible than that which ascribes an eternal
inherent principle of order to the world; though
attended with great and continual revolutions; and
alterations. This at once solves all difficulties; and
if the solution, by being so general, is not entirely com
plete and satisfactory, it is at least a theory that we
must, sooner or later, have recourse to, whatever
system we embrace. How could things have been as
they are, were there not an original, inherent principle
of order somewhere, in thought or in matter ? And it
is very indifferent to which of these we give the pre
ference. Chance has no place, on any hypothesis,
sceptical or religious. Everything is surely governed
by steady, inviolable laws. And were the inmost
essence of things laid open to us, we should then
discover a scene, of which, at present, we can have no
idea. Instead of admiring the order of natural beings,
we should clearly see, that it was absolutely impossible
for them, in the smallest article, ever to admit of any
other disposition.
Were any one inclined to revive the ancient Pagan
Theology, which maintained, as. we learn from Hesiod,
that this globe was governed by 30,000 deities, who
arose from the unknown powers of nature : you would
naturally object, Cleanthes, that nothing is gained by
this hypothesis ; and that it is as easy to suppose all
men and animals, beings more numerous, but less
perfect, to have sprung immediately from a like origin.
Push the same inference a step farther ; and you will
find a numerous! society of deities as explicable as one
universal deity, who possesses, within himself, the
�Part VI.
61
powers and perfections of the whole society. All these
systems, then, of Scepticism, Polytheism, and Theism,
you must allow, on your principles, to be on a like
footing, and that no one of them has any advantage
over the others. You may thence learn the fallacy of
your principles.
TURNBULL AND SPEARS, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH.
�
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Dialogues concerning natural religion
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Edition: New ed.
Place of publication: London
Collation: 61 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. 'A new Edition, with a Preface and Notes, which bring the Subject down to the present time'. [Title page]. Printed by Turnbull and Spears, Edinburgh.
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Hume, David [1711-1776]
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Thomas Scott
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[1875]
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CT210
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Theology
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Conway Tracts
Natural Theology
Religion-Philosophy