3
10
60
-
https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/157740095afc258c0a555ee32ef4085f.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=fuSaQ5MPHRs5PvGLbAgSoXt1PqAB1z8vLU2yj0MXe4pAnI6Yhk-unrtfrd4kJPgKwt6a9MoakyUyTgv%7ESWHw7peetNg%7ErMrRXPvKuVzTXtrtZ%7ED3caMGOWtdc3C%7EkZpI20Fc7927LoGi3ArHWNvnL-h58Nfzbf3cj3IKnN1M7mqE8VKzm1YsAA0eKrpOObN4XFc-l5adw2wIKoPqDhWB3XKuE5-NlXKPrtZgwbrMZYbbGpHEVG013U4mwlTkKkj5pKqnZAIccZbomQr41EMJGBvyNsLynjv3ol4n-YkoNlwjtnZvcXURgBKXDvzgNNrmWsvxgVh9OLBAZwnMGPvYUQ__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
680877d78e76053136385bdb7e402938
PDF Text
Text
NATIONAL STCLTAR SOCIETY
[SECOND
EDITION
“ BREAKING
THE FETTERS.
A POWERFUL DISCOURSE ON RELIGION
PAST AND PRESENT, BY
(From a Photograph hy SARONY of New York).
COL’ONEL
INGERSOLL.
The great American Orator, Freethinker and Wit.
PRICE
TWOPENCE.
W. H. MORRISH, Bookseller, 18, Narrow Wine Street, Bristol
FREETHOUGHT PUBLISHING COMPANY, 28, Stonecutter-St, London:
TRUELOVE, 256. High Holborn, London;
CATTELL & Co., 84, Fleet Street, London;
HEYWOOD & SON, Manchester and London ;
The BOOKSTALL, 73. Humberstone Gate, Leicester;
BOOKSTALL, Freetheught Institute, Southampton ;
WHEELER, KING & CO., Edinburgh, &c.
�PUBLISHER'S NOTE.
This Lecture is not a reprint. The major portion has been
■specially reported, and is now published for the first time. It has been
Huly entered at Stationers Hall, and all rights are reserved.
IlSHOPSGATE INSTITUTE
REFERENCE LIBRARY
No.
2 1 NOV 1991
Classification
�B 2- b 4
BREAKING THE FETTERS,
A LECTURE BY
COLONEL INGERSOLL,
Precisely to the minute the Colonel walked on the stage, and experienced
his usual cordial reception from the densely packed audience. He
gracefully acknowleged the warmth of the greeting, and after a slight
pause proceeded as follows :—
Ladies and Gentlemen,
AM well aware that whoever attacks the prevailing religious
opinions of his time must, in his turn expect to be attacked.
We haven’t yet outgrown the barbarism that argument can be answered
by personal abuse. The religious world of to-day has not yet outgrown
the belief that you have to answer every argument not by showing that
it is bad, but by showing that the man who makes it is bad.
°
It makes no difference whether the maker of an arithmetic turned out
to be a rascal or not, we should still have to believe that ten times ten
is a hundred. (Applause).
I expected to be attacked and I have not been disappointed. I had
always supposed religion taught men to love their enemies, or, at least,
treat their friends decently; but I never knew of a minister who ever
loved me, or who could forgive me. In return I only want them to act
so that I won’t have to forgive them. I don’t pretend to love my
enemies for I find it hard work to love my friends, and if I have the
same feelings towards my enemies as towards my friends, I have no
humanity in me.
I deny that any man is under obligation to love his enemies. I believe
in returning good for good, and for evil the doctrine of Confucius_ exact
justice, without any admixture of revenge.
I have made up my mind to say my say, I £all do it kindly, distinctly,
but I am going to do it. I know there are thousands of men who sub
stantially agree with me, but who are not in a condition to express their
thoughts. I hey are poor ; they are in business; and they know that
I
�4
should they tell their honest thought, persons will refuse to patronise
them—to trade with them ; they wish to get bread for their little
children ; they wish to take care of their wives ; they wish to have
homes and the comforts of life. Every such person is a certificate of
the meanness of the community in which he resides. And yet I do not
blame these people for not expressing their thought. I say to them ;
“ keep your ideas to yourselves; feed and clothe the ones you love; I will
do your talking for you. The church cannot touch; cannot crush ; can
not starve; cannot stop or stay me; I will express your thoughts.”
(Loud cheers).
All I ask of the Christian world is simply to tell the truth, but that is
a good deal more than they will ever do. There was a time when
falsehood from the pulpit smote like a sword, but now it has become
almost an innocent amusement. Lying is now the last weapon left in
the arsenal of Theology. They say I am in favour of too much liberty,
but I am only in favour of justice, liberty, society.
You can’t make men good by slavery; there is no regeneration in
the chain. You can’t make a man honest by tying his hands behind
him. Good laws don’t make good people, but good people make good
laws. There is no reformation in force or in fear. You might scare a
man so that he would not do a thing, but you could not scare him so
that he would not want to do it. (Laughter.)
A few years ago the people were afraid to question the king, afraid
to question the priest, afraid to investigate a creed, afraid to denounce
a dogma, afraid to reason, afraid to think. Before wealth they bowed
to the very earth, and in the presence of titles they became abject,
All this is slowly but surely changing. We no longer bow to men
simply because they are rich. Our fathers worshipped the golden calf.
The worst you can say of an American now is, he worships the gold
of the calf. Even the calf is beginning to see this distinction.
It no longer satisfies the ambition of a great man to be king or
emperor. The last Napoleon was not satisfied with being the emperor
of the French. He was not satisfied with having a circlet of gold about
his head. He wanted some evidence that he had something of value
within his head. So he wrote the life of Julius Cmsar, that he might
become a member of the French Academy. The emperors, the kings,
the popes, no longer tower above their fellows. Compare King William
with the philosopher Haeckel. The king is one of the anointed by the
most high, as they claim—one upon whose head has been poured the
divine petroleum of authority. Compare this king with. Haeckel, who
towers an intellectual colossus above the crowned mediocrity. Compare
George Eliot with Queen Victoria. The queen is clothed in garments
given her by blind fortune and unreasoning chance, while George Eliot
wears robes of glory woven in the loom of her own genius. (Continued
applause.)
The world is beginning to pay homage to intellect, to genius.
There is no slavery but ignorance. Liberty is the child of intelligence.
The history of man is simply the history of slavery, of injustice and
brutality, together with the means by which he has, through the dead
and desolate years, slowly and painfully advanced, He has been the
�5
Sport and prey of priest and king, the food of superstition and cruel
might. Crowned force has governed ignorance through fear. Hypo
crisy and tyranny—two vultures—have fed upon the liberties of man;
Prom all these there has been, and is, but one means of escape—intellec
tual development. Upon the back of industry has been the whip. Upon
the brain have been the fetters of superstition. Nothing has been left
undone by the enemies of freedom. Every art and artifice, every cruelty
and outrage has been practised and perpetrated to destroy the rights of
man. In this great struggle every crime has been rewarded and every
virtue has been punished. Reading, writing, thinking and investigating
have all been crimes.
Every science has been an outcast.
All the altars and all the thrones united to arrest the forward march
of the human race. The king said that mankind must not work for
themselves. The priest said that mankind must not think for them
selves. One forged chains for the hands, the other for the soul. Under
this infamous regime the eagle of the human intellect was for ages
a slimy serpent of hypocrisy.
The human race was imprisoned. Through some of the prison bars
came a few struggling rays of light. Against these bars science pressed
its pale and thoughtful face, wooed by the holy dawn of human advance
ment. Bar after bar was broken away. A few grand men escaped and
devoted their lives to the liberation of their fellows.
Standing in the presence of the Unknown, all have the same right to
think, and all are equally interested in the great question of origin
and destiny. All I claim, all I plead for, is liberty of thought and ex
pression. That is all. I do not pretend to tell what is absolutely true,
but what I think is true. I do not pretend to tell all the truth.
I do not claim that I have floated level with the heights of thought,
or that I have descended to the very depths of things. I simply claim
that what ideas I have, I have a right to express ; and that any man
who denies that right to me is an intellectual thief and robber. That
is all. (Cheers).
Take those chains from the human soul. Break those fetters. If
I have no right to think, why have I a brain ? If I have no such right,
have three or four men, or any number, who may get together, and sign
a creed, and build a house, and put a steeple upon it, and a bell in it—
have they the right to think ? The good men, the good women, are
tired of the whip and lash in the realm of thought. They remember
the chain and faggot with a shudder. They are free, and they give
liberty to others. Whoever claims any right that he is unwilling to
accord to his fellow men is dishonest and infamous. (Great applause).
In the good old times, our fathers had the idea that they could make
people believe to suit them. Our ancestors, in the ages that are gone,
really believed that by force you could convince a man. You cannot
change the conclusions of the brain by torture; nor by social ostracism.
But I will tell you what you can do by these, and what you have done.
You can make hypocrites by the million. You can make a man say
he has changed his mind: but he remains of the same opinion still.
Rut fetter? all oyer him; crush his feet in iron boots; stretch him to the
�6
last gasp upon the body rack ; burn him, if you please, but his ashes will
be of the same opinion still.
I oppose the Church because she is the enemy of liberty ; because her
dogmas are infamous and cruel; because she humiliates and degrades
women ; because she teaches the doctrine of eternal torment and the
natural depravity of man ; because she insists upon the absurd the im
possible and senseless ; because she is arrogant and revengeful; because
she resorts to falsehood and slander; because she allows men to sin
on credit; because she discourages self-reliance, and laughs at good
works ; because she believes in vicarious virtue and vicarious vice—
vicarious punishment and vicarious reward ; because she regards repen
tance of more importance than restitution, and because she sacrifices
the world we have to one we know not of.
The free and generous, the tender and affectionate, will understand
me. Those who have escaped from the grated cells of a creed will appre
ciate my motives.
Most of the clergy are, or seem to be, utterly incapable of discussing
anything in a fair and catholic spirit. .They appeal, not to reason, but
to prejudice ; not to facts but to passages of scripture. They can con
ceive of no goodness, of no spiritual exaltation beyond the horizon of
their creed. Whoever differs from them upon what they are pleased to
call “ fundamental truths,” is, in their opinion, a base and infamous
man. To re-enact the tragedies of the sixteenth century, they lack only
the power. Bigotry in all ages has been the same. Christianity simply
transferred the brutality of the Colosseum to the Inquisition. Foi the
murderous combat of the gladiators, the saints substituted the auto defe.
What has been called religion, is, after all, but the organization of the
wild beast in man. The perfumed blossom of arrogance is Heaven.
Hell is the consummation of revenge. The chief business of the clergy
has always been to destroy the joy of life, and multiply and magnify
the terrors and tortures of death and perdition. They have polluted
the heart and paralyzed the brain; and upon the ignorant altars of the
Past and the Dead, they have endeavoured to sacrifice the Present and
the Living.
. .
Nothing can exceed the mendacity of the religious press.. With one
or two exceptions I never knew an honest editor of a religious paper;
if truth was red-hot it would never scorch th&m. (Laughter).
I have had some little experience with political editors, and am forced
to say, that until I read the religious papers, I did not know what ma
licious and slimy falsehoods could be constructed from ordinary words.
The ingenuity with which the real and apparent meaning can be tortur
ed out of language, is simply amazing. The average religious editor
is intolerant and insolent; he knows nothing of affairs ; he has the
envy of failure, the malice of impotence, and always accounts for the
brave and generous actions of unbelievers, by low, base, and unworthy
motives.
• x n x r 4.1,
By this time, even the clergy should know that the intellect ot the
Nineteenth Century needs no guardian. They should cease to regard
themselves as shepherds defending flocks of weak, silly and timid sheep
from the claws and teeth of ravening wolves. By this time they should
�1
know that the religion of the ignorant and brutal Past no longer satisfies
the heart and brain ; that the miracles have become contemptible ; that
the “ evidences ” have ceased to convince; that the spirit of investiga
tion cannot be stopped or stayed ; that the church is losing her power ;
that the young are holding in a kind of tender contempt the sacred
follies of the old ; that the pulpit and pews no longer represent the cul
ture and morality of the world, and that the brand of intellectual
inferiority is upon the orthodox brain.
Men should be liberated from the aristocracy of the air. Every
chain of superstition should be broken. The rights of men and women
should be equal and sacred—marriage should be a perfect partnership
children should be governed by kindness,—every family should be a
republic—every fireside a democracy. (Loud applause).
The doctrine of eternal punishment has been taught in the name of
religion, in the name of universal forgiveness, in the name of love and
charity. Do not, I pray you, soil the minds of your children with this
dogma. Let them read for themselves ; let them think for themselves.
Jonathan Edwards the dear old soul, who, if his doctrine is true,, is
now in heaven rubbing his holy hands with glee as he hears the cries
of the damned, preached this doctrine ; and he said : “Can the believing
husband in heaven be happy, with his unbelieving wife in hell ? Can
the believing father in heaven be happy with the unbelieving children
in hell ? Can the loving wife in heaven be happy with her unbelieving
husband in hell?” And he replies: “I tell you, yea, such will be
their sense of justice, that it will increase rather than diminish their
bliss.” There is no wild beast in the jungles of Africa whose reputation
would not be tarnished by the expression of such a doctrine.
Where did that doctrine of eternal punishment for men and women and
children come from ? It came from the low and beastly skull of the
naked savage in the dug-out. Where did he get it ? It was a
souvenir from the animals. The doctrine of eternal punishment was
born in the glittering eyes of snakes—snakes that hung in fearful coils
watching for theii’ prey. It was born of the howl and bark and growl
of wild beasts. It was born of the grin of hyenas and of the depraved
chatter of unclean baboons. I despise it with every drop of my blood.
Tell me there is a God in the serene heavens that will damn his child
ren for ever for the expression of an honest belief! More men have
died in their sins, judged by your orthodox creeds, then there are leaves
on all the forests in the wide world ten thousand times over. Tell me
these men are in hell; that these men are in torment; that these chil
dren are in eternal pain, and that they are to be punished for ever and
ever and ever! I denounce this doctrine to night as the most infamous
of lies. (Great applause).
The human race has been guilty of almost countless crimes, but I
have some excuse for mankind. This world after all, is not very well
adapted to raising good people. In the first place nearly all of it is
water. It is much better adapted to fish culture than to the production
of folks. Of that portion which is land, not one eighth has suitable
soil and climate to produce great men and women. You cannot raise
men and women of genius without the proper soil and climate, any more
�8
than yoii can raise corn and wheat upon the icefields of the Arctic sea.
You must have the necessary conditions and surroundings. Man is a
product; you must have the soil and food. The obstacles presented by
nature must not be so great that man cannot by reasonable industry
and courage, overcome them. There is upon this world only a narrow
belt of land, circling zigzag the globe, upon which you can produce men
and women of talent. In the Southern Hemisphere the real climate
that man needs falls mostly upon the sea, and the result is that the sou
thern half of our world has never produced a man or woman of great
genius. In the far north there is no genius—it is too cold. In the far
south there is no genius—it is too warm. There must be winter and
there must be summer. In a country where man needs no coverlet
but a cloud, revolution is his normal condition. Winter is the mother of
industry and prudence. Above all, it is the mother of the family rela
tion. Winter holds in its icy arms the husband and wife and the sweet
children. If upon this earth we ever have a glimpse of heaven, it is
when we pass a home in winter, at night, and through the windows, the
curtains drawn aside, we see the family about the pleasant hearth ;
the old lady knitting ; the cat playing with the yarn ; the children wish
ing they had as many dolls as dollars or knives or somethings, as there
are sparks going out to join the roaring blast; the father reading and
smoking and the clouds rising like incense from the altar of domestic
joy. I never passed such a house without feeling 1 had received a bene
diction.
Civilization, liberty, justice, charity, intellectual advancement, are
all flowers that blossom in the drifted snow.
I do not know that I can better illustrate the great truth that only
part of the world is adapted to the production of great men and women
than by calling your attention to the difference between vegetation in
the valleys and upon the mountains In the valley you find the oak
and elm tossing their branches defiantly to the storm, and as you ad
vance up the mountain side the hemlock, the pine, the birch, the spruce,
the fir, and finally you come to little dwarfed trees, that look like other
trees seen through a telescope reversed—every limb twisted as though
in pain—getting a scanty subsistence from the miserly crevices of the
rocks. You go on and on, until at last the highest crag is freckled with
a kind of moss, and vegetation ends. Yrou might as well try to raise
oaks and elms where the mosses grow, as to raise great men and great
women where their surroundings are unfavorable. You must have the
proper climate and soil.
A few years ago we were talking about the annexation of Santo
Domingo to this country. I was in Washington at the time. I was
opposed to it. I was told that it was a most delicious climate ; that
the soil produced everything. But I said “ We don’t want it; it is
not the right kind of country to raise American citizens. Such a
climate would debauch us. You plight go there with five thousand
Congregational preachers; five thousand ruling elders ; five thousand
professors of Colleges; five thousand of the solid men of Boston and
their wives ; settle them all in Santo Domingo, and you will see the
second generation riding upon a mule, bareback no shoes, a grape vine
�9
bridle, hair sticking out of the tops of their hats, with a rooster under
each arm, going to a cock fight on Sunday. Such is the influence of
climate. (Laughter).
Science, however, is gradually widening the area within which men
of genius can be produced. We are conquering the north with houses,
clothing, food and fuel. We are in many ways overcoming the
south. If we attend to this world instead of another, we may in time
cover the land with men and women of genius.
I have still another excuse. I believe that man came from the
lower animals. I do not say this as a fact. I simply say I believe
it to be a fact. Upon that question I stand about eight to seven,
which for all practical purposes is very near a certainty.
When I first heard of that doctrine I did not like it. My heart
was filled with sympathy for those people who have nothing to be
proud of except their ancestors. I thought how terrible this will be
upon the nobility of the old world. Think of their being forced to
trace their ancestry back to the duke Orang-Outang, or to the princess
Chimpanzee ! (Roars of laughter).
After thinking it all over, I came to the conclusion that I liked that
doctrine. I became convinced in spite of myself. I read about the
rudimentary bones and muscles. I was told that everybody bad ru
dimentary muscles extending from the ear into the cheek. I asked
“ What are they ? ” I was told : “ They are the remains of muscles ;
that they became rudimentary from lack of use ; they went into bank
ruptcy. They are the muscles with which your ancestors used to flap
their ears.” (Laughter). I do not so much wonder that we once
had them as that we have outgrown them.
After all I had rather belong to a race that started from the skulless vertebrates in the dim Laurentian seas, vertebrates wiggling
without knowing why they wiggled, swimming without knowing
where they were going, but that in some way begun to develop, and
began to get a little higher and a little higher in the scale of existence;
that came up by degrees through millions of ages, through all the
animal world, through all that crawls and swims and floats and climbs
and walks, and finally produced the gentleman in the dug-out; and
then from this man, getting a little grander, and each one below call
ing every one who had made a little advance, an infidel or an atheist
—for in the history of this world, the man who is a-head has always
been called a heretic.
I would rather come up from a race that started from that skulless
vertebrate, and came up and up and up and finally produced Shakes
peare, the man who found the human intellect dwelling in a hut,
touched it with the wand of his genius, and it became a palace
domed and pinnacled. Shakespeare, who harvested all the fields of
dramatic thought, and from whose day to this, there have been only
gleaners of straw and chaff. I would rather belong to that race that
commenced a skulless vertebrate and produced Shakespeare, a race
that has before it an infinite future, with angels of progress leaning
from the far horizon, beckoning men forward, upward, and onward
for ever. I had rather belong to such a race, commencing there, pro-
�io
ducing this, and with that hope, than to have sprung from a perfect
pair upon which the Lord has lost every moment from that day to
this. (Applause).
Only a few years ago there was a great awakening of the human
mind. Men began to enquire by what right a crowned robber made
them work for him ? The man who asked this question was called
a traitor. Others asked by what right does a robed hypocrite rule
my thought? subh men were called infidels. The priest said,
and the king said, where is this spirit of investigation to stop ? They
said then, and they say now, that it is dangerous for man to be free.
I deny it. Out on the intellectual sea there is room for every sail.
In the intellectual air there is space enough for every wing.
The man who does not do his own thinking is a slave, and is a
traitor to himself and to his fellow man.
What would have become of the people five hundred years ago if
they had followed strictly the advice of the doctors ? They would all
have been dead. What would the people have been, if at any age of
the world they had followed implicitly the direction of the church ?
They would have all been idiots. It is a splendid thing that there is
always some grand man who will not mind, and who will think for
himself. (Cheers).
Every man should stand under the blue and stars, under the infinite
flag of nature, the peer of every other man.
I will tell you another thing—It is not necessary to be rich, or to be
great, or to be powerful, to be happy. The happy man is the success
ful man. Joy is wealth.
A little while ago, I stood by the grave of the old Napoleon—a magnificient tomb of gilt and gold, fit almost for a dead deity—and gazed
upon the sarcophagus of rare and nameless marble, where rest at last
the ashes of that restless man. I leaned over the balustrade and thought
about the career of the greatest soldier of the modern world.
I saw him walking upon the banks of the Seine, contemplating suicide.
I saw him at Toulon—I saw him putting down the mob in the streets of
Paris—I saw him at the head of the army of Italy—I saw him crossing
the bridge of Lodi with the tri-color in his hand—I saw him in Egypt
in the shadows of the pyramids—I saw Inm conquer the Alps and
mingle the eagles of France with the eagles of the crags. I saw him
at Marengo—at Ulm and Austerlitz. I saw him in Russia, where the
infantry of the snow and the cavalry of the wild blast scattered his
legions like winter’s withered leaves. I saw him at Leipsic in defeat
and disaster driven by a million bayonets back upon Paris—clutched
like a wild beast—banished to Elba. I saw him escape and retake an
empire by the force of his genius. I saw him on the frightful field of
Waterloo, where chance and fate combined to wreck the fortunes of
their former King. And I saw him a't St. Helena, gazing out upon the
sad and solemn sea.
I thought of the orphans and widows he had made—of the tears that,
had been shed for his glory, and of the only woman who ever loved
him, pushed from his breast by the cold hand of ambition. And I said
I would rather have been a French peasant and worn wooden shoes.
�1 would rather have lived in a hut with a vine growing over the door,
and the grapes growing purple in the kisses of the autumn sun. I would
rather have been that poor peasant with my loving wife by my side, knitt
ing as the day died out of the sky—with my children upon my kneesand
their arms about me—I would rather have been that man, and gone
down to the tongueless silence of the dreamless dust, than to have been
that imperial impersonation of force and murder. (Great applause).
It is not necessary to be great to be happy ; it is not necessary to be
rich to be just and generous. Free labor will give us wealth. Free
thought will give us truth.
Give me the storm and tempest of thought and action, rather than
the dead calm of ignorance and faith! Banish me from Eden when
you will; but first let me eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge !
As long as man believes the Bible to be infallible, that book is his
master. The civilization of this century is not the child of faith, but
of unbelief—the result of free thought. (Cheers).
As long as woman regards the bible as the charter of her rights, she
will be the slave of man. The bible was not written by a woman.
Within its lids there is nothing but humiliation and shame for her. She
is regarded as the property of man. She is as much below her husband
as her husband is below Christ. She is not allowed to speak. The
gospel is too pure to be spoken by her polluted lips. Women must learn
in silence.
In the bible will be found no description of a civilized home. The
free mother, surrounded by free and loving children, adored by a free
man, her husband, was unknown to the inspired writers of the bible
They did not believe in the democracy of home—in the republicanism of
the fireside.
If any orthodox clergyman will read to his congregation certain pas
sages in the bible that I will select, I will pay him one hundred dollars
in gold. There would’nt be a lady left in the church, and if a man
stayed, it would be to chastise the man for insulting the women.
Let us go back to the time when society was first formed a long
time ago. Blackstone and Locke have always taken the giound that
society was first formed by contract; that animals formed themselves
into flocks and herds by agreement. IIow did men originally come to
act together ? By contract ? No. By necessity ? Yes. When men
first formed themselves into society they were not equal to the beasts.
No man ever worshiped anything he did not believe to be his superior.
Let us get to the foundation of this idea of worship. When man
first looked upon a lion he saw an animal that had greater strength
than himself. When he saw the serpent climb without hands, run with
out feet, and live apparently without food, it struck him with awe, and
he felt the serpent was superior to him. When he saw the powerful
eagle flying against the storms, and gazing at the blazing sun, he saw
something that was superior to him. He didn’t know how they got
their living. He was filled with wonder and admiration, and the result
was he began to worship beasts, and made gods out of lions, snakes, and
eagles.
The story of the serpent in the garden, of Eden, and of the brazen
�12
shi’pent in the wilderness, are but reminisences of an old serpent wor
ship. Almost all kinds of animals were deified. The old Jews themselves
—including Moses—worshipped Jehovah in the form of a bull. That
accounts for “ the horns on the altar.”
They not only worshipped that God but many others. Even in the
time of Solomon and Jeroboam there were thirty temples in which
other gods were worshipped besides Jehovah. After men fouud out that
one animal by itself was not their superior, they began to make gods
composed of several animals. They took the lion for strength, the eagle
for swiftness, and the serpent for cunning or long life, making together
an animal that could not be killed.
Take the Mexican Indians. What is their name for God? Stone
Spirit. One who wore an armour of stone. Where did they get that
idea from? The Armadillo, that could not be pierced with their arrows;
something they could not kill. I want to convince you all, as we go
along, that we manufacture these gods ourselves, and every one of them
is a poor job. (Laughter).
After men got through worshipping beasts, simple and compound, they
begun worshipping man, the beastial qualities in man as well as the good
ones. The gods were first beasts, then men Right here let me tell
you that there is not a person in this house who can think of God only
in the form of a man. Why ? Because that is the highest intellectual
form you are acquainted with. (Applause).
You can’t think of God on four legs, or as a woman. Why ? Because
man made all the religions. We havn’t yet become civilized enough to
worship a principle. If we worshipped God as a woman, I should be apt
to join some church myself.
Now having traced the origin of god, the next question is, Does this
God interfere in the affairs of this world ? For upon this depends the
great question of human rights. The savage has always believed it.
When his poor hut was blown down he thought God was mad with him
or one of his neighbours. Just think of the infinite maker of every
shining world getting mad at this poor savage and pulling up his home!
I tell you this world has been mightily abused, and it almost makes
one die of pity to read its religious history.
When that train of railway cars went down recently in Scotland the
pulpit resounded with talk about divine judgments for violating the sab
bath. One of the passengers was a sailor coming home to see his
widowed mother, to take care of her in her declining years. Just think
of God killing that man for crossing a bridge on a Sunday. (Cheers).
Imagine some rosy-cheeked little boys in a boat on a Sunday fishing. At
the end of their lines are fastened pin hooks, and an infinite being de
scends and keels over their boat because it is a Sunday! Our fathers
had no idea of religious liberty in their time, and their descendants to
day have not. (Applause).
I can’t believe in a personal God in any land where there is injustice;
where innocence is not safe, where honest men toil and rogues ride in
carriages, 'where hypocricy is crowned and sincerity degraded. I can’t
conceive of this world being governed by an infinite being. If any
good has to be done man has got to do it. We must depend on our
�13
selves. We musn’t consider the lilies of the field—we must sow the
field and reap and harvest the crop ourselves.
I want to show you the extent to which the Church has gone. Reli
gion has never relied upon argument. Protestantism never gained an
inch of soil except at the mouth of the cannon or the point of the bay
onet. Religion of love has always been shot into nations. (Applause).
Who are the most warlike nations in the world to day ? Christian
nations. Does any one of you wish to be a millionaire and famous for
the rest of his life ? Then invent a cannon that will blow more Christtian brains into froth than the best cannon will, and your fortune is
made, and your name will become famous. In the last eight years the
national debts of Christendom have increased over six thousand million
dollars.
What Catholic nation is the most orthodox to day ? Spain. And is
there any meaner nation. What next ? Italy, the land covered with
brigands, every one of which carries an image of the A irgin Mary or
some favorite saint, and who crosses himself with holy water in the
cathedral before he starts on his brigand work. What next? Ireland,
poor Ireland, crushed beneath the heel of oppression for hundreds of
years. Why ? Simply because her oppressor was of a different re
ligion. It is religion which has reduced Spain to a guitar, Italy to a
hand organ, and Ireland to exile. (Immense applause).
Which is the most orthodox Protestant nation to day ? Scotland; and
in 1879 there were twelve thousand women arrested for drunkenness.
What nation is the most infidel to day ? France. And which is the
most prosperous country in Europe to day ? France.
There is another Christian nation, Russia. Go with me to Siberia.
Who are these poor creatures drawing wagons, on their hands and
knees Girls of sixteen, seventeen and eighteen or twenty; what are
they there for ? For having said a word in favour of human liberty.
That is all. Do you blame the lovers or the parents of these girls if
they endeavour to send a bullet to the heart of the Czar who allows
such brutality ? In such a case my sympathies are closest around the
point of the dagger. (Cheers.)
I tell you that when I think of how much this world has suffered ;
when I think of how long our fathers were slaves, of how they cringed
and crawled at the foot of the throne, and in the dust of the altar, of
how they abased themselves, of how abjectly they stood in the presence
of superstition robed and crowned, I am amazed.
This world has not been fit to live in fifty years. It was not until the
year 1808 that Great Britain abolished the slave trade. Up to that
time her judges, sitting upon the bench in the name of justice, her
priests occupying her pulpits in the name of universal love, owned stock
in the slave ships, and luxuriated upon the profits of piracy and murder.
It was not until the same year that the United States of America abolished the slave trade between this and other countries, but carefully
preserved it as between the States. It was not until the 27th day of
August, 1833 that Great Britain abolished slavery in her colonies ; and
it was not until the 1st day of January, 1863, that Abraham Lincoln,
sustained by the sublime and heroic North, rendered our flag pure as
�14
the sky in which it floats. (Immense applause).
Abraham Lincoln, was, in my judgment, in many respects, the grandest
man ever President of the United States. Upon his monument should
be written: li Here sleeps the only man in the history of the world,
who, having been clothed with almost absolute power, never abused
it, except upon the side of mercy.” (Loud cheers).
Think how long we clung to the institution of human slavery, how
long lashes upon the naked back were a legal tender for labor performed.
Think of it! The pulpit of this country deliberately and willingly, for a
hundred years, turned the cross of Christ into a whipping post.
The Americans founded the first secular government that was ever
founded in this world, recollect that. The first secular government!
the first government that said every church has exactly the same rights
and no more ; every religion has the same rights and no more. In
other words, our fathers were the first men who had the sense, had the
genius, to know that no church should be allowed to have a sword ;
that it should be allowed only to exert its moral influence.
No government should be united with religion. You might as well
have a government united by force with Art, or with Poetry, or with
Oratory, as with Religion. Religion should have the influence upon
mankind that its goodness, that its morality, its justice, its charity, its
reason, and its argument give it, and no more. (Cheers). The religion
that has to be supported by law is without value, not only, but a fraud
and a curse. rIhe religious argument that has to be supported by a
musket is hardly worth making. A prayer that has a cannon behind it
better never be uttered. Forgiveness ought not to go in partnership
with shot and shell. Love need not carry knives and revolvers.
So our fathers’ said: ‘We will form a secular government, and under
the flag with which we are going to enrich the air, we will allow every
man to worship God as he thinks best.” They said, “ Religion is an
individual thing between each man and his Creator, and he can wor
ship as he pleases and as he desires.”
And why did they do this ? The history of the world warned them
that the liberty of man was not safe in the clutch or grasp of any church.
They had read of and seen the thumb screws, the racks, and the dun
geons of the inquisition. They knew all about the hypocrisy of the olden
time. They knew that the church had stood side by side with the throne ;
that the high priests were hypocrites, and that the kings were robbers.
They also knew that if they gave to any church power, it would corrupt
the best church in the world. And so they said that power must not
reside in a church, nor in a sect, but power must be wherever humanity
is,—in the great body of the people. And the officers and servants of
the people must be responsible to them as they derived all their authority
from the people.
Thus they did away for ever with the theological idea of government.
I thank every one of them from the bottom of my heart for their
courage—for their patriotism—for their wisdom—for the splendid con
fidence in themselves and in the human race. I thank them for what
they did and for what we have received—for what they suffered, and
for what we enjoy. (Cheers/
�15
What would we have been if we had remained colonists and subjects.
What would we have been to-day? Nobodies,—ready to get down on
our hands and knees and crawl in the very dust at the sight of some
body that was supposed to have in him some drop of blood that flowed
in the veins of that mailed marauder, that royal robber, William the
Conqueror. (Loud applause).
.
They signed the declaration of independance although they knew it
would produce a long, terrible, and bloody war. They looked forwaid
and saw poverty, deprivation, gloom and death. But they also saw, on
the wrecked clouds of war, the beautiful bow of freedom.
These grand men were enthusiasts; and the world has only been
raised by enthusiasts. In every country there have been a few who
have given a national aspiration to the people. The enthusiasts of
1776 were the builders and framers of this great and splendid govern
ment ; and they were the men who saw, although others did not, the
golden fringe of the mantle of glory that will finally cover this world.
They knew, they felt, they believed that they would give a new con
stellation to the political heavens—that they would make the Americans
a grand people—grand as the continent upon which they lived. (Great
Applause).
,
. . . . ,
Seven long years of war—fighting for what? For the principle that
all men are created equal—a truth that nobody ever disputed except a
scoundrel ; nobody, nobody in the entire history of the world.. No man
ever denied that truth who was not a rascal, and at heart a thief ; never,
never, and never will. What else were they fighting for ? Simply that
in America every man should have a right to life, liberty,, and the pur
suit of happiness. Nobody ever denied that except a villain; never,
never. It has been denied by kings—they were theives. It has been
denied by statesmen—they were liars. It has been denied by priests., by
clergymen, by cardinals, by bishops, and by popes—they were hypocrites.
We must progress. We are just at the commencement of invention.
The steam engine—the telegraph— these are but the toys with which
science has been amused. Wait; there will be grander things ; there
will be wider and higher culture—a grander standard of character, of
literature, and art.
The history of civilization is the history of the slow and painful enfranchisement of the human race. In the olden times the family was a
monarchy, the father being the monarch, the mother and children were
the veriest slaves. The will of the father was the supreme law.. .He
had the power of life and death. It took thousands of years to civilize
the father, thousands of years to make the condition of wife and mother
and child even tolerable. A few families constituted a tribe ; the tribe
had a chief; the chief was a tyrant ; a few tribes formed a nation ; the
nation was governed by a king, who was also a tyrant. A strong nation
robbed, plundered, and took captive the weaker ones. This "was the
commencement of human slavery.
I say it took millions of years to come from the condition of abject
slavery up to the condition of marriage. Ladies, the ornaments you
wear upon your persons to-night are but the souvenirs of your mothers
bondage. The chains around your necks, and the bracelets clasped upon
�16
your white arms by the thrilled hand of love, have been changed by
the wand of civilization from iron to shining glittering gold.
°
J
I believe in marriage, and I hold in utter contempt the opinion of
those long haiied men and short haired women who denounce the insti
tution of marriage.
There is no success in life without love and marriage. You had better
be the emperor of one loving and tender heart, and she the empress of
yours than to be the king of the world. The man who has really won
the love of one good woman in the world, I do not care if he dies in
the ditch a beggar, his life has been a success.
It is not possible for the human imagination to conceive of the horlors of slavery. It has left no possible crime uncommitted, no pos
sible cruelty unperpetrated. It has been practised and defended by all
nations. It has been defended by nearly every pulpit. From the
profits derived from the slave trade churches have been built, cathedrals
real ed, and piiestspaid. Slavery has been blessed by bishop, by cardinal,
and by pope. It has received the sanction of statesmen, of kings, and
of queens. It has been defended by the throne, the pulpit, and the
bench. Monarchs have shared in the profits. Clergymen have taken
their part of the spoil, reciting passages of scripture in its defence at
the same time.
Only a few years ago our ancestors were slaves. They belonged to
the soil like coal under it and rocks on it. Only a few years agcTthey
were treated like beasts of burden, far worse than we treat our ani
mals at the present day. Only a few years ago it was a crime in Eng
land for a man to have a bible in his house, a crime for which men were
hanged, and their bodies afterwards burned. Only a few years ami
fathers could and did sell their children. Only a few years a°-o our
ancestors were not allowed to speak or write their thoughts—tha? bein°a ciime. To be honest, at least in the expression of your ideas, was a
felony. To do right was a capital offence; and in those days chains
and whips were the incentives to labor, and the preventative to thought.
Honesty was a vagrant, justice a fugitive, and liberty in chains. Only
a few years ago men were denounced because they doubted the inspira
tion of the bible—because they denied miracles and laughed at the
wonders recounted by the ancient Jews
Only a few years ago a man had to believe in the total depravity of
the human heart in order to be respectable. Only a few years ago peo
ple who thought God too good to punish in eternal flames an unbaptised
child were considered infamous.
As soon as our ancestors began to get free they began to enslave
others. With an inconsistency that defies explanation, they practiced
upon others the same outrages that had been perpetrated upon them.
As soon as white slavery began to be abolished, black slavery commenc
ed. In this infamous traffic nearly every nation in Europe embarked.
Fortunes were quickly realized; the avarice and cupidity of Europe
were excited; all ideas of justice were discarded ; pity fled from the hu
man breast; a few good, brave men recited the horrors of the trade,
but avarice was deaf ; religion refused to hear ; the trade went on ; the
governments of Europe upheld it in the name of commerce—in the
�17
name of civilization and religion.
With every drop of my blood I hate and execrate every form of
Slavery. I hate dictation. I love liberty. (Cheers).
What do I mean by liberty ? By physical liberty I mean the right
to do anything which does not interfere with the happiness of another.
By intellectual liberty I mean the right to think right and the right to
think wrong. Thought is the means by which we endeavour to arrive
at truth. If we know the truth already we need not think. All that
can be required is honesty of purpose. You ask my opinion about any
thing ; I examine it honestly, and when my mind is made up, what
should I tell you? Should I tell you my real thought ? What should
I do ? Here is a book put into my hands. I am told it is the Koran ;
that it was written by inspiration. I read it, and when I get through,
suppose that I think in my heart and in my brain, that it is utterly un
true, and you then ask me, ‘What do you think ?” Now supposing that I
live in Turkey, and have no chance to get any office unless I am on the
side of the Koran, what should I say ? Should I make a clean breast
and say that upon my honor I do not believe it ? What would you
think then of my fellow citizens if they said : “ That man is dangerous,
he is dishonest.”
Suppose I read the book called the Bible, and when I get through I
make up my mind that it was written by men, a minister asks me “ Did
you read the Bible ?” I answer that I did. “ Do you think it divinely
inspired?” What should I reply ? Should I say to myself, “If I deny
the inspiration of the scriptures, the people will never clothe me with
power.” What ought I to answer ? Ought I not to say like a man :
“ I have read it; I do not believe it.” Should I not give the real trans
cript of my mind ? Or should I turn hypocrite and pretend what I do
not feel, and hate myself for ever after for being a cringing coward.
For my part I would rather a man would tell me what he honestly
thinks. I would rather he would preserve his manhood. I had a thou
sand times rather be a manly unbeliever than an unmanly believer. And
if there is a judgment day, a time when all will stand before some su
preme being, I believe I will stand higher, and have a better chance of
getting my case decided in my favor, than any man sneaking through
life pretending to believe what he does not. (Loud cheers).
As an excuse for tyranny, as a justification of slavery the church has ■
taught that man is totally depraved. Of the truth of that doctrine the
church has furnished the only evidence there is. (Laughter). The
truth is, we are both good and bad. The worst are capable of some
good deeds, and the best are capable of bad. The lowest can rise, and
the highest may fall. That mankind may be divided into two great
classes, sinners and saints, is an utter falsehood.
In times of great disaster, called it may be, by the despairing voices of
Women, men, denounced by the church as totally depraved, rush to death
as to a festival By such men deeds are done so filled with self sacrifice
and generous daring, that millions pay them the tribute, not only of
admiration but of tears. Above all creeds, above all religions, after all
is that divine thing,—Humanity; and now and then in shipwreck on
the wide, wild sea, or ’mid the rocks and breakers of some cruel shore,
�18
oi where the serpents of flame writhe and hiss, some glorious heart,
some chivalric soul does a deed that glitters like a star, and gives the
lie to all the dogmas of superstition. All these frightful doctrines have
been used to degrade and to enslave mankind.
Away, for ever away with the creeds and books and laws and relio-ions
that take from the soul liberty and reason. Down with the idea°that
thought is dangerous! Perish the infamous doctrine that man can
have property in man, Let us resent with indignation every effort to
put a chain upon our minds. If there is no God, certainly we should
not bow and cringe and crawl. If there is a God, there should be no
slaves !
. [As the Colonel left the stage, the audience rose en masse, and
waving their hats and handkerchiefs “ applauded to the echo that app
lauds again,” and as he returned and bowed his acknowledgments, he
was greeted with renewed enthusiasm.]
A Collection of Colonel Ingersoll’s Orations, including the
“ Oration on the Gods,” “ Thomas Paine,” “ Heretics and Heresies,”
“Humboldt,” and “Arraignment of the Church,” in neatly bound
limp cloth volume, price 1/6, or mailed to any address for 1/7, can be
had of W. H. Mobrish, Bookseller, 18, Narrow Wine Street, Bristol.
BWmpsgate Institut»
�REFOBMER'S LIBRARY
Voltaire’s Philosophical Dictionary, reprinted from the edition in Six
volumes with Memoir and Two Portraits. Two Vols., nearly 1300
Pages, post free,
VoltaIM’s Philosophical Tales and Romances, complete with Portrait
VolneT’s Ruins of Empires : and Law of Nature. Handsome Binding
Paine’s Complete Political and Miscellaneous Works, with Full Report of
his Trial for writing the “Rights of Man.” with Portrait
Paine’s Theological Works, including “Age of Reason,” Portrait
Rights of Man, with Trial, complete ...
Age of Reason, Portrait ..
...
...
..............
The Prophet of Nazareth, by E. P. Meredith, published at 12s 6d
The StBMENTS of Social Science : an Exposition of the Cause and Cure of
th© three primary Social Evils—Poverty—Prostitution—and Celibacy
2s 6d., or in Cloth
Mazzini. Life by Madam Venturi. The Duties of Man. Democracy.
Two Autotype Portraits and Apendix—published at 5s...
The Aristocracy of England, the Anatomy of Rank by William Howitt
published at 5s.
Analysis of the influence of natural religion on the happiness of man
kind, by Geo. Grote ...
Rabelais. The Works of. With a Life of the Author by W. Maccall,
Two Volumes...
...
...
...
•••
•••
•••
••• • •••
.New Religious Thoughts by D. Campbell, published at 5s.
Robert Owen’s Lectures on Marriage ...
•••
..
...
..............
Robert Owen’s Lectures on Socialism
Half-Hours with the Freethinkers, containing the Lives of 48 Freethink
ers, by Chas« Bradlaugh and John Watts ..
...
...
...
...
s.
8
2
2
d.
O
6
6
5
3
1
1
7
O
0
0
0
6
3 0
3 0
2 6
1 0
4
2
0
2
0
6
8
0
3 0
Published by E. TRUELOVE,
256, HIGH HOLBORN, LONDON.
READ THE NEW SATIRE
“A
SUPERHUMAN VIEW
OF MANKIND.”
Price 2d.,post free from the Secular Bookstore.
75, HUMBERSTONE GATE, LEICESTER.
�COLONEL INGERSOLL’S WORKS..
“The Religion of the Future,” 2d.
Post Free, 2^d., or Six Copies for 1/(An immense Success). Eighth Edition Now Ready.
A brilliant example of the Colonel’s marvellous powers of word painting;,
combining passages of great beauty, mingled with scathing satire, and frequent
flashes of humor.
“Breaking the Fetters,” 2d.
Post Free, 2±d., or Six Copies for Is.
“Full of gems.” “ Equal to anything he has said or written.” etc.
(vide Press).
“ Farm Life in America-” Id.
Posi free l^d., or Six Copies for 7d.
“Delightfully fresh and vigorous.” “Interesting as a novel.”—Secular Review.
“ What shall I do to be saved.?” 3d..
Single Copy by post 3^d.
“ The Ghosts.’’
4d.
Post Free, f(d.
“ The Christian Religion.”
3d.
Post Free, 3fl.
“ Mistakes of Moses.”
3d.
Post Free, 3\d.
Col. Ingersoll’s Photograph. 6d.
Post Free, 7d.
Any of the above securely packed and posted to any address ©n
receipt of stamps, by
W. H. MORRISH, Bookseller, 18, Narrow Wine Street, Bristol.
THE FEEETHINKEB,
An Infidel Weekly.
Edited by G. W. FOOTE.
Trenchant Articles, Racy Paragraphs, Good Jokes, Interesting Matter all round. Price One Penny. Order with your Reformer,—
Freethought Publishing Co., 28, Stonecutter Street, E.C.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Breaking the fetters : a powerful discourse on religion past and present
Description
An account of the resource
Edition: 2nd ed.
Place of publication: Bristol
Collation: 18 p. : ill. (front. port.) ; 21 cm.
Notes: (Sold by:) Freethought Publishing Company (London); Truelove (London); Cattell & Co. (London); Heywood & Son (Manchester); The Bookstall (73 Humberstone Gate, Leicester); Bookstall, Freethought Institute (Southampton); Wheeler, King & Co, (Edinburgh &c.). "This lecture is not a reprint. The major portion has been specially reported, and is now published for the first time."--Publisher's note, p.[2]. Publisher's list "Reformer's library" (E. Truelove, 256 High Holborn) inside back cover. "Colonel Ingersoll's works" available from W.H. Morrish (Bristol) listed on back cover. Stamp on p.[2]: Bishopsgate Institute Reference Library, 21 Nov 1991. No. A1 in Stein checklist (not identified or located by him). Part of the NSS pamphlet collection.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Ingersoll, Robert Green [1833-1899]
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
W.H. Morrish
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
[n.d.]
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
N335
Subject
The topic of the resource
Religion
Free thought
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Breaking the fetters : a powerful discourse on religion past and present), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Free Thought
NSS
Religion
-
https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/00921a226c52f44cb558de27a679103d.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=W131uwKd3hMfN4iqDmjkMYS-8mVlV%7EABwRCLVQZxEBjtSf4AihQc82MHQQ07i0m5mBQG4tddfXxhRknrc1AEPV70iebV4eWtutQSGUPeIUPEjfr34K9kr0q7amqWvf1%7EmhWFN9RD%7EeZWN12fIPhNlQnjBS633ta-IU06dPLREYsqOFebYsDadGJSOpYu8ajp6ZnzO%7EGUFY2Wc6MFGg4kIfZkfWrczzRm5SrfGS8eQVcvoihLxm42z5PNCrHAQe%7EQ-uyqG%7Ea5y7RqhcF-2BeEM7iPwGTHJMrVIERK9whedTEW8Rm1KIcHeum-Mr5-YuEoRspu1jup-72ynC9L8hOOZA__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
0fc84ca232a9106a8e5229be9d8f6573
PDF Text
Text
��������
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Supernatural and rational morality
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Bradlaugh, Charles
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 8 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Printed by Annie Besant and Charles Bradlaugh,63, Fleet St., E. C. - 1886 (p. 8).
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Annie Besant and Charles Bradlaugh
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1886
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
G903
Subject
The topic of the resource
Rationalism
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Supernatural and rational morality), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Free Thought
Morality
Rationalism
Religion
Supernatural
-
https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/f0588452304781cebddb0dce8e1387a0.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=pEcJZ%7EnLc1EISkfOpcO4HbM7h0d81oec69Vujae2w3KOOcFaFinTmcZTPLvIYwVyhsbYFav5Xd8Ry2CDbkOOGKv7bpKZagqbB9fe4KqGrB7wwO%7E9rFM1gy6X51aglpC%7EsxDvH-kdJ%7E7VzKdqRyZUMD35Zg41cZRpK%7E-Jng98ScADTAxg3PXgqvvcaQtPbZHti357qPgyVhKk8HMjlCl34CaiS8LsXAKAMeLptjT7wxiMA2UyeFjXwyoTM4LweZ1YIWFnrKUUC7j2TX%7EsiVVZkmbhIh3AHXvZC-HYsXyvSUeiV5LNmq82eNmK9ltAOaqmNkC3Tm59tGg1U7d9w3beFQ__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
44a41f48a87b7f8c7d3bca3987e44bbd
PDF Text
Text
JOHN STUART MH
(photographed, by permission,
from the statue on
bankmenT)
W
17, JOHNSON"
£.C.
�THE
RATIONALIST PRESS ASSOCIATION
[Founded 1899.]
(Limited).
Chairman—GEORGE JACOB HOLYOAKE.
Honorary Associates:
M. Berthelot
Paul Carus, Ph.D.
Edward Clodd
Stanton Coit, Ph.D.
W. C. Coupland, D.Sc., M.A.
F. J. Furnivall, M.A., Ph.D., D.Litt.
F. J. Gould
Prof. Ernst Haeckel
/
Leonard Huxley
Prof. W. C. van Manen
Eden Phillpotts
J. M. Robertson
W. R. Washington Sullivan
Prof. Ed. A. Westermarck
Thomas Whittaker
Bankers:
The London City and Midland Bank, Ltd., Blackfriars Branch, London, S.E.
A tiditors:
Messrs. Woodburn Kirby, Page, & Co., Chartered Accountants, I, Laurence Pountney Hill,
London, E.C.
Secretary and Registered Offices:
Charles E. Hooper, 5 and 6, Johnson’s Court, Fleet Street, London, E.C.
All who approve of the publication, in a cheap and popular form, of works
such as the present Reprint can help to produce them, and can join in a systematic
propaganda for encouraging free inquiry and sober reflection, and repudiating
irrational authority.
These are the objects of the R. P. A. (The Rationalist Press
Association, Ltd.).
The Members of this Association have banded themselves
\ together, not with any view to commercial gain, but solely to promote sound
masoning and the growth of reasoned truth, as essential to the welfare and
•ess of humanity.
Should these aims commend themselves to your judgment,
quid apply at once for full particulars to
The Secretary,
R. P. A., Ltd.,
5 and 6, Johnson’s Court, Fleet Street,
London, E.C.
�gV>58
bJMS
NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY
NATURE
THE
UTILITY OF RELIGION
AND
THEISM
BY
JOHN STUART MILL
[issued for the rationalist press association, limited]
WATTS & CO.,
17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.
1904
��INTRODUCTORY NOTICE
The three following Essays on Religion
were written at considerable intervals of
time, without any intention of forming a
consecutive series, and must not there
fore be regarded as a connected body of
thought, excepting in so far as they
exhibit the Author’s deliberate and ex
haustive treatment of the topics under
consideration.
The two first of these three Essays
were written between the years 1850 and
1858, during the period which intervened
between the publication of the Princi
ples of Political Economy and that of
the work on Liberty; during which
interval three other Essays—on Justice,
on Utility, and on Liberty—were also
composed. Of the five Essays written
at that time, three have already been
given to the public by the Author.
That on Liberty was expanded into the
now well-known work bearing the same
title. Those on Justice and Utility were
afterwards incorporated, with some altera
tions and additions, into one, and pub
lished under the name of Utilitarianism.
The remaining two—on Nature and on
the Utility of Religion—are now given
to the public, with the addition of a third
—on Theism—which was produced at a
much later period.
In these two first
Essays indications may easily be found I
of the date at which they were composed;
among which indications may be noted
the absence of any mention of the works
of Mr. Darwin and Sir Henry Maine in
passages where there is coincidence of
thought with those writers, or where
subjects are treated which they have
since discussed in a manner to which
the Author of these Essays would cer
tainly have referred had their works been
published before these were written.
The last Essay in the present volume
belongs to a different epoch; it was
written between the years 1868 and
1870, but it was not designed as a sequel
to the two Essays which now appear
along with it, nor were they intended to
appear all together. On the other hand,
it is certain that the Author considered
the opinions expressed in these different
Essays as fundamentally consistent.
The evidence of this lies in the fact that
in the year 1873, after he had completed
his Essay on Theism, it was his intention
to have published the Essay on Nature
at once, with only such slight revision as
might be judged necessary in preparing
it for the press, but substantially in its
present form. From this it is apparent
that his manner of thinking had under
gone no substantial change. Whatever
discrepancies, therefore, may seem to
�4
INTRODUCTORY NOTICE
remain, after a really careful comparison
between different passages, may be set
down either to the fact that the last
Essay had not undergone the many
revisions which it was the Author’s habit
to make peculiarly searching and
thorough ; or to that difference of tone,
and of apparent estimate of the relative
weight of different considerations, which
results from taking a wider view, and
including a larger number of considera
tions in the estimate of the subject as a
whole, than in dealing with parts of it
only.
The fact that the Author intended to
publish the Essay on Nature in 1873 is
sufficient evidence, if any is needed,
that the volume now given to the public
was not withheld by him on account of
reluctance to encounter whatever odium
might result from the free expression of
his opinions on religion. That he did
not purpose to publish the other two
Essays at the same time was in accord
with the Author’s habit in regard to the
public utterance of his religious opinions.
For at the same time that he was pecu
liarly deliberate and slow in forming
opinions, he had a special dislike to the
utterance of half-formed opinions. He
declined altogether to be hurried into
premature decision on any point to which
he did not think he had given sufficient
time and labour to have exhausted it to
the utmost limit of his own thinking
powers. And, in the same way, even
after he had arrived at definite conclu
sions, he refused to allow the curiosity
of others to force him to the expression
of them before he had bestowed all the
elaboration in his power upon their
adequate expression, and before, there
fore, he had subjected to the test of
time, not only the conclusions them
selves, but also the form into which he
had thrown them. The same reasons,
therefore, that made him cautious in the
spoken utterance of his opinion in pro
portion as it was necessary to be at once
precise and comprehensive in order to
be properly understood, which in his
judgment was pre-eminently the case in
religious speculation, were the reasons
that made him abstain from publishing
his Essay on Nature for upwards of
fifteen years, and might have led him
still to withhold the others which now
appear in the same volume.
From this point of view it will be seen
that the Essay on Theism has both
greater value and less than any other of
the Author’s works. The last consider
able work which he completed, it shows
the latest state of the Author’s mind, the
carefully balanced result of the delibera
tions of a lifetime. On the other hand,
there had not been time for it to undergo
the revision to which from time to time
he subjected most of his writings before
making them public. Not only there
fore is the style less polished than that of
any other of his published works, but
even the matter itself, at least in the
exact shape it here assumes, has never
undergone the repeated examination
which it certainly would have passed
through before he would himself have
given it to the world.
Helen Taylor.
�CONTENTS
PAGE
-
-
-
•
•
7
UTILITY OF RELIGION
-
-
•
•
-
34
THEISM
-
-
-
•
-
57
•
- •
-
-
•
5«
61
-
-
62
NATURE -
-
-
-
PART I.
57
INTRODUCTION
THEISM
THE EVIDENCES OF THEISM
-
•
ARGUMENT FOR A FIRST CAUSE
-
-
-
67
70
THE ARGUMENT FROM MARKS OF DESIGN IN NATURE -
72
ARGUMENT FROM THE GENERAL CONSENT OF MANKIND
THE ARGUMENT FROM CONSCIOUSNESS
-
-
PART II.
ATTRIBUTES -
-
-
-
■
•
•
75
•
•
-
83
-
•
•
9°
PART III.
IMMORTALITY
-
-
■
PART IV.
REVELATION
-
-
-
PART V.
GENERAL RESULT
102
��NATURE
“Nature,” “natural,” and the group of
words derived from them, or allied to them
in etymology, have at all times filled a
great place in the thoughts and taken a
strong hold on the feelings of mankind.
That they should have done so is not sur
prising when we consider what the words,
in their primitive and most obvious
signification, represent; but it is unfor
tunate that a set of terms which play so
great a part in moral and metaphysical
speculation should have acquired many
meanings different from the primary
one, yet sufficiently allied to it to admit
of confusion. The words have thus
become entangled in so many foreign
associations, mostly of a very powerful
and tenacious character, that they have
come to excite, and to be the symbols
of, feelings which their original meaning
will by no means justify, and which
have made them one of the most copious
sources of false taste, false philosophy,
false morality, and even bad law.
The most important application of the
Socratic Elenchus, as exhibited and im
proved by Plato, consists in dissecting
large abstractions of this description;
fixing down to a precise definition the
meaning which as popularly used they
merely shadow forth, and questioning
and testing the common maxims and
opinions in which they bear a part. It
is to be regretted that among the
instructive specimens of this kind of
investigation which Plato has left,
and to which subsequent times have
been so much indebted for whatever
intellectural clearness they have attained,
he has not enriched posterity with a dia
logue irepi <f>v(r€(D<s. If the idea denoted
by the word had been subjected to his
searching analysis, and the popular
commonplaces in which it figures had
been submitted to the ordeal of his
powerful dialectics, his successors pro
bably would not have rushed, as they
speedily did, into modes of thinking and
reasoning of which the fallacious use of
that word formed the cornerstone; a
kind of fallacy from which he was him
self singularly free.
According to the Platonic method,
which is still the best type of such in
vestigations, the first thing to be done
with so vague a term is to ascertain
precisely what it means. It is also a
rule of the same method that the mean
ing of an abstraction is best sought for
in the concrete—of an universal in the
particular. Adopting this course with
the word “ nature,” the first question
must be, what is meant by the “ nature ”
of a particular object, as of fire, of
water, or of some individual plant or
animal? Evidently the ensemble or
aggregate of its powers or properties :
the modes in which it acts on other
things (counting among those things the
senses of the observer), and the modes
in which other things act upon it; to
which, in the case of a sentient being,
�8
NATURE
must be added its own capacities of
feeling, or being conscious. The nature
of the thing means all this; means its
entire capacity of exhibiting phenomena.
And since the phenomena which a thing
exhibits, however much they vary in
different circumstances, are always the
same in the same circumstances, they
admit of being described in general
forms of words, which are called the
laws of the thing’s nature. Thus it is a
law of the nature of water that, under
the mean pressure of the atmosphere
at the level of the sea, it boils at 2120
Fahrenheit.
As the nature of any given thing is
the aggregate of its powers and pro
perties, so Nature in the abstract is the
aggregage of the powers and properties
of all things. Nature means the sum of
all phenomena, together with the causes
which produce them; including not only
all that happens, but all that is capable
of happening; the unused capabilities
of causes being as much a part of the
idea of Nature as those which take
effect. Since all phenomena which have
been sufficiently examined are found to
take place with regularity, each having
certain fixed conditions, positive and
negative, on the occurrence of which it
invariably happens, mankind have been
able to ascertain, either by direct
observation or by reasoning processes
grounded on it, the conditions of the
occurrence of many phenomena; and
the progress of science mainly consists
in ascertaining those conditions. When
discovered they can be expressed in
general propositions, which are called
laws of the particular phenomenon, and
also, more generally, Laws of Nature.
Thus the truth, that all material objects
tend towards one another with a force
directly as their masses and inversely as
the square of their distance, is a law of
nature. The proposition, that air and
food are necessary to animal life, if it be,
as we have good reason to believe, true
without exception, is also a law of
nature, though the phenomenon of
which it is the law is special, and not,
like gravitation, universal.
Nature, then, in this, its simplest,
acceptation, is a collective name for all
facts, actual and possible; or (to speak
more accurately) a name for the mode,
partly known to us and partly unknown,
in which all things take place. For the
word suggests, not so much the multi
tudinous detail of the phenomena, as
the conception which might be formed
of their manner of existence as a mental
whole, by a mind possessing a complete
knowledge of them : to which concep
tion it is the aim of science to raise
itself, by successive steps of generalisa
tion from experience.
Such, then, is a correct definition of
the word “ nature.” But this definition
corresponds only to one of the senses
of that ambiguous term. It is evidently
inapplicable to some of the modes in
which the word is familiarly employed.
For example, it entirely conflicts with
the common form of speech by which
Nature is opposed to Art, and natural
to artificial. For, in the sense of the
word “nature” which has just been
defined, and which is the true scientific
sense, Art is as much Nature as any
thing else; and everything which is
artificial is natural—Art has no inde
pendent powers of its own : Art is but
the employment of the powers of Nature
for an end. Phenomena produced by
human agency, no less than those which
as far as we are concerned are spon
taneous, depend on the properties of the
elementary forces, or of the elementary
�NATURE
substances and their compounds. The
united powers of the whole human race
could not create a new property of
matter in general, or of any one of its
species. We can only take advantage
for our purposes of the properties which
we find. A ship floats by the same laws
of specific gravity and equilibrium as a
tree uprooted by the wind and blown
into the water. The corn which men
raise for food grows and produces its
grain by the same laws of vegetation by
which the wild rose and the mountain
strawberry bring forth their flowers and
fruit. A house stands and holds to
gether by the natural properties, the
weight and cohesion of the materials
which compose it: a steam engine works
by the natural expansive force of steam,
exerting a pressure upon one part of a
system of arrangements, which pressure,
by the mechanical properties of the
lever, is transferred from that to another
part where it raises the weight or removes
the obstacle brought into connection with
it. In these and all other artificial opera
tions the office of man is, as has often
been remarked, a very limited one : it
consists in moving things into certain
places. We move objects, and, by doing
this, bring some things into contact
which were separate, or separate others
which were in contact; and, by this
simple change of place, natural forces
previously dormant are called into action,
and produce the desired effect. Even
the volition which designs, the intelli
gence which contrives, and the muscular
force which executes these movements,
are themselves powers of Nature.
It thus appears that we must recognise
at least two principal meanings in the
word “ nature.” In one sense, it means
all the powers existing in either the outer
or the inner world and everything which
9
takes place by means of those powers.
In another sense, it means, not everything
which happens, but only what takes
place without the agency, or without the
voluntary and intentional agency, of man.
This distinction is far from exhausting
the ambiguities of the word ; but it is
the key to most of those on which im
portant consequences depend.
Such, then, being the two principal
senses of the word “nature,” in which of
these is it taken, or is it taken in either,
when the word and its derivatives are
used to convey ideas of commendation,
approval, and even moral obligation ?
It has conveyed such ideas in all
ages. Naturum sequi was the funda
mental principle of morals in many of
the most admired schools of philosophy.
Among the ancients, especially in the
declining period of ancient intellect and
thought, it was the test to which all
ethical doctrines were brought. The
Stoics and the Epicureans, however irre
concilable in the rest of their systems,
agreed in holding themselves bound to
prove that their respective maxims of
conduct were the dictates of nature.
Under their influence the Roman jurists,
when attempting to systematise jurispru
dence, placed in the front of their expo
sition a certain Jus Naturale, “quod
natura,” as Justinian declares in the
Institutes, “ omnia animalia docuit
and as the modern systematic writers,
not only on law but on moral philosophy,
have generally taken the Roman jurists
for their models, treatises on the so-called
Law of Nature have abounded; and
references to this Law as a supreme rule
and ultimate standard have pervaded
literature. The writers on International
Law have done more than any others to
give currency to this style of ethical
speculation; inasmuch as, having no
�io
NATURE
positive law to write about, and yet
being anxious to invest the most ap
proved opinions respecting international
morality with as much as they could of
the authority of law, they endeavoured
to find such an authority in Nature’s
imaginary code. The Christian theology
during the period of its greatest ascen
dancy opposed some, though not a com
plete, hindrance to the modes of thought
which erected Nature into the criterion
of morals, inasmuch as, according to the
creed of most denominations of Chris
tians (though assuredly not of Christ),
man is by nature wicked. But this very
doctrine, by the reaction which it pro
voked, has made the deistical moralists
almost unanimous in proclaiming the
divinity of Nature, and setting up its
fancied dictates as an authoritative rule
of action. A reference to that supposed
standard is the predominant ingredient
in the vein of thought and feeling which
was opened by Rousseau, and which has
infiltrated itself most widely into the
modern mind, not excepting that portion
of it which calls itself Christian. The
doctrines of Christianity have in every
age been largely accommodated to the
philosophy which happened to be pre
valent, and the Christianity of our day
has borrowed a considerable part of its
colour and flavour from sentimental
deism. At the present time it cannot
be said that Nature, or any other
standard, is applied as it was wont to
be, to deduce rules of action with
juridical precision, and with an attempt
to make its application co-extensive with
all human agency. The people of this
generation do not commonly apply prin
ciples with any such studious exactness,
nor own such binding allegiance to any
standard, but live in a kind of confusion
of many standards ; a condition not pro
pitious to the formation of steady moral
convictions, but convenient enough to
those whose moral opinions sit lightly on
them, since it gives them a much wider
range of arguments for defending the
doctrine of the moment. But though
perhaps no one could now be found who,
like the institutional writers of former
times, adopts the so-called Law of
Nature as the foundation of ethics, and
endeavours consistently to reason from
it, the word and its cognates must still
be counted among those which carry
great weight in moral argumentation.
That any mode of thinking, feeling, or
acting, is “ according to nature ” isusually accepted as a strong argument
for its goodness. If it can be said witb
any plausibility that “ nature enjoins ”
anything, the propriety of obeying the
injunction is by most people considered
to be made out; • and, conversely, the
imputation of being contrary to nature
is thought to bar the door against any
pretension, on the part of the thing so*
designated, to be tolerated or excused;
and the word “ unnatural ” has not ceased
to be one of the most vituperative
epithets in the language. Those whodeal in these expressions may avoid
making themselves responsible for any
fundamental theorem respecting the
standard of moral obligation, but they
do not the less imply such a theorem,
and one which must be the same in sub
stance with that on which the more
logical thinkers of a more laborious age
grounded their systematic treatises on
Natural Law.
Is it necessary to recognise in these
forms of speech another distinct mean
ing of the word “nature”? Or can they
be connected, by any rational bond of
union, with either of the two meanings
already treated of? At first it may
�NATURE
seem that we have no option but to
admit another ambiguity in the term.
All inquiries are either into what is or
into what ought to be: science and
history belonging to the first division ;
art, morals, and politics to the second.
But the two senses of the word “ nature ”
first pointed out agree in referring only
to what is. In the first meaning, Nature
is a collective name for everything which
is. In the second, it is a name for
everything which is of itself, without
voluntary human intervention. But the
employment of the word “nature ” as a
term of ethics seems to disclose a third
meaning, in which Nature does not
stand for what is, but for what ought to
be, or for the rule or standard of what
ought to be. A little consideration, how
ever, will show that this is not a case of
ambiguity; there is not here a third
sense of the word. Those who set up
Nature as a standard of action do not
intend a merely verbal proposition;
they do not mean that the standard,
whatever it be should be called Nature;
they think they are giving some informa
tion as to what the standard of action
really is. Those who say that we ought
to act according to Nature do not mean
the mere identical proposition that we
ought to do what we ought to do. They
think that the word “nature” affords some
external criterion of what we should do;
and if they lay down as a rule for what
ought to be, a word which in its proper
signification denotes what is, they do so
because they have a notion, either clearly
or confusedly, that what is constitutes
the rule and standard of what ought
to be.
The examination of this notion is the
object of the present Essay. It is pro
posed to inquire into the truth of the
doctrines which make Nature a test of
11
right and wrong, good and evil, or which
in any mode or degree attach merit or
approval to following, imitating, or obey
ing Nature. To this inquiry the fore
going discussion respecting the meaning
of terms was an indispensable introduc
tion. Language is, as it were, the
atmosphere of philosophical investiga
tion, which must be made transparent
before anything can be seen through it
in the true figure and position. In the
present case it is necessary to guard
against a further ambiguity, which, though
abundantly obvious, has sometimes mis
led even sagacious minds, and of which
it is well to take distinct note before pro
ceeding further. No word is more
commonly associated with the word
“nature” than “law”; and this last word
has distinctly two meanings, in one of
which it denotes some definite portion
of what is, in the other of what ought to
be. We speak of the law of gravitation,
the three laws of motion, the law of
definite proportions in chemical combi
nation, the vital laws of organised beings.
All these are portions of what is. We
also speak of the criminal law, the civil
law, the law of honour, the law of
veracity, the law of justice ; all of which
are portions of what ought to be, or of
somebody’s suppositions, feelings, or
commands respecting what ought to be.
The first kind of laws, such as the laws
of motion and of gravitation, are neither
more nor less than the observed uni
formities in the occurrence of pheno
mena ; partly uniformities of antecedence
and sequence, partly of concomitance.
These are what, in science, and even in
ordinary parlance, are meant by laws of
nature. Laws in the other sense are the
laws of the land, the law of nations, or
moral laws ; among which, as already
noticed, is dragged in, by jurists and
�12
NATURE
publicists, something which they think ■ modes of acting are so in exactly the
proper to call the Law of Nature. Of , same degree. Every action is the
the liability of these two meanings of i exertion of some natural power, and its
the word to be confounded there can be : effects of all sorts are so many pheno
no better example than the first chapter mena of nature, produced by the powers
of Montesquieu, where he remarks that and properties of some of the objects of
the material world has its laws, the nature, in exact obedience to some law
inferior animals have their laws, and or laws of nature. When I voluntarily
man has his laws; and calls attention to use my organs to take in food, the act,
the much greater strictness with which and its consequences, take place accord
the first two sets of laws are observed ing to laws of nature : if instead of food
than the last; as if it were an inconsis I swallow poison, the case is exactly the
tency, and a paradox, that things always same. To bid people conform to the
are what they are, but men not always laws of nature when they have no power
what they ought to be. A similar con but what the laws of nature give them—
fusion of ideas pervades the writings of when it is a physical impossibility for
Mr. George Combe, from whence it has them to do the smallest thing otherwise
overflowed into a large region of popular than through some law of nature, is an
literature, and we are now continually absurdity. The thing they need to be
reading injunctions to obey the physical told is what particular law of nature they
laws of the universe, as being obligatory should make use of in a particular case.
in the same sense and manner as the When, for example, a person is crossing
moral. The conception which the a river by a narrow bridge to which there
ethical use of the word “nature ” implies, is no parapet, he will do well to regulate
of a close relation if not absolute iden his proceedings by the laws of equilib
tity between what is and what ought to rium in moving bodies, instead of con
be, certainly derives part of its hold on forming only to the law of gravitation
the mind from the custom of designat and falling into the river.
ing what is by the expression “ laws of
Yet, idle as it is to exhort people to
nature,”while the same word “law” is also do what they cannot avoid doing, and
used, and even more familiarly and em absurd as it is to prescribe as a rule of
phatically, to express what ought to be.
right conduct what agrees exactly as
When it is asserted, or implied, that well with wrong, nevertheless a rational
Nature, or the laws of Nature, should be rule of conduct may be constructed out
conformed to, is the Nature which is of the relation which it ought to bear
meant Nature in the first sense of the to the laws of nature in this widest
term, meaning all which is—the powers acceptation of the term. Man neces
and properties of all things? But in sarily obeys the laws of nature, or in
this signification there is no need of a other words the properties of things ; but
recommendation to act according to he does not necessarily guide himself by
nature, since it is what nobody can them. Though all conduct is in con
possibly help doing, and equally whether formity to laws of nature, all conduct is
he acts well or ill. There is no mode not grounded on knowledge of them,
of acting which is not conformable to and intelligently directed to the attain
Nature in this sense of the term, and all ment of purposes by means of them.
�Though we cannot emancipate ourselves
from the laws of nature as a whole, we
can escape from any particular law of
nature, if we are able to withdraw our
selves from the circumstances in which
it acts. Though we can do nothing
except through laws of nature, we can
use one law to counteract another.
According to Bacon’s maxim, we can
obey nature in such a manner as to
command it. Every alteration of cir
cumstances alters more or less the laws
of nature under which we act; and by
every choice which we make either of
ends or of means we place ourselves to a
greater or less extent under one set of
laws of nature instead of another. If,
therefore, the useless precept to follow
nature were changed into a precept to
study nature; to know and take heed of
the properties of the things we have
to deal with, so far as these properties
are capable of forwarding or obstructing
any given purpose; we should have
arrived at the first principle of all intelli
gent action, or rather at the definition of
intelligent action itself. And a confused
notion of this true principle is, I doubt
not, in the minds of many of those who
set up the unmeaning doctrine which
superficially resembles it. They per
ceive that the essential difference
between wise and foolish conduct con
sists in attending, or not attending, to
the particular laws of nature on which
some important result depends. And
they think that a person who attends to
a law of nature in order to shape his
conduct by it may be said to obey
it, while a person who practically dis
regards it, and acts as if no such law
existed, may be said to disobey it: the
circumstance being overlooked, that
what is thus called disobedience to a law
of nature is obedience to some other,
or perhaps to the very law itself,
example, a person who goes into
powder-magazine either not knowing, or
carelessly omitting to think of, the ex
plosive force of gunpowder, is likely to
do some act which will cause him to be
blown to atoms in obedience to the very
law which he has disregarded.
But, however much of its authority the
“ Naturam sequi ” doctrine may owe to
its being confounded with the rational pre
cept “Naturum observare,” its favourers
and promoters unquestionably intend
much more by it than that precept. To
acquire knowledge of the properties of
things, and make use of the knowledge
for guidance, is a rule of prudence, for
the adaptation of means to ends ; for
giving effect to our wishes and intentions,
whatever they may be. But the maxim
of obedience to Nature, or conformity to
Nature, is held up not as a simply pruden
tial but as an ethical maxim; and by
those who talk of jus natura, even as a
law, fit to be administered by tribunals
and enforced by sanctions. Right action
must mean something more and other
than merely intelligent action; yet no
precept beyond this last can be con
nected with the word “ nature ” in the
wider and more philosophical of its
acceptations. We must try it, therefore,
in the other sense, that in which Nature
stands distinguished from Art, and de
notes, not the whole course of the pheno
mena which come under our observation,
but only their spontaneous course.
Let us, then, consider whether we can
attach any meaning to the supposed
practical maxim of following Nature, in
this second sense of the word, in which
Nature stands for that which takes place
without human intervention. In Nature
as thus understood is the spontaneous
course of things, when left to themselves,
�14
NA TURE
the rule to be followed in endeavouring
to adapt things to our use ? But it is
evident at once that the maxim, taken in
this sense, is not merely, as it is in the
other sense, superfluous and unmeaning,
but palpably absurd and self-contradic
tory. For while human action cannot
help conforming to Nature in the one
meaning of the term, the very aim and
object of action is to alter and improve
Nature in the other meaning. If the
natural course of things were perfectly
right and satisfactory, to act at all would
be a gratuitous meddling, which, as it
could not make things better, must make
them worse. Or if action at all could be
justified, it would only be when in direct
obedience to instincts, since these might
perhaps be accounted part of the spon
taneous order of Nature; but to do any
thing with forethought and purpose
would be a violation of that perfect
order. If the artificial is not better than
the natural, to what end are all the arts
of life? To dig, to plough, to build, to
wear clothes, are direct infringements of
the injunction to follow nature.
Accordingly it would be said by every
one, even of those most under the in
fluence of the feelings which prompt the
injunction, that to apply it to such cases
as those just spoken of would be to
push it too far. Everybody professes to
approve and admire many great triumphs
of Art over Nature: the junction by
bridges of shores which Nature had
made separate, the draining of Nature’s
marshes, the excavation of her wells, the
dragging to light of what she has buried
at immense depths in the earth; the
turning away of her thunderbolts by
lightning rods, of her inundations by
embankments, of her ocean by break
waters. But to commend these and
similar feats is to acknowledge that the
ways of Nature are to be conquered, not
obeyed; that her powers are often
towards man in the position of enemies,
from whom he must wrest, by force and
ingenuity, what little he can for his own
use, and deserves to be applauded when
that little is rather more than might be
expected from his physical weakness in
comparison to those gigantic powers.
All piaise of Civilisation, or Art, or Con
trivance, is so much dispraise of Nature ;
an admission of imperfection which it is
man’s business and merit to be always
endeavouring to correct or mitigate.
The consciousness that whatever man
does to improve his condition is in so
much a censure and a thwarting of the
spontaneous order of Nature, has in all
ages caused new and unprecedented
attempts at improvement to be generally
at first under a shade of religious sus
picion ; as being in any case uncompli
mentary, and very probably offensive to
the powerful beings (or, when polytheism
gave place to monotheism, to the allpowerful Being) supposed to govern the
various phenomena of the universe, and
of whose will the course of nature was
conceived to be the expression. Any
attempt to mould natural phenomena to
the convenience of mankind might easily
appear an interference with the govern
ment of those superior beings; and
though life could not have been main
tained, much less made pleasant, without
perpetual interferences of the kind, each
new one was doubtless made with fear
and trembling, until experience had
shown that it could be ventured on with
out drawing down the vengeance of the
Gods. The sagacity of priests showed
them a way to reconcile the impunity of
particular infringements with the main
tenance of the general dread of encroach
ing on the divine administration. This
�NATURE
was effected by representing each of the
principal human inventions as the gift
and favour of some god. The old reli
gions also afforded many resources for
consulting the Gods, and obtaining their
express permission for what would other
wise have appeared a breach of their
prerogative. When oracles had ceased,
any religion which recognised a revela
tion afforded expedients for the same
purpose. The Catholic religion had the
resource of an infallible Church, autho
rised to declare what exertions of human
spontaneity were permitted or forbidden ;
and in default of this the case was always
open to argument from the Bible whether
any particular practice had expressly or
by implication been sanctioned. The
notion remained that this liberty to con
trol Nature was conceded to man only
by special indulgence, and as far as
required by his necessities; and there
was always a tendency, though a dimin
ishing one, to regard any attempt to
exercise power over nature beyond a
certain degree and a certain admitted
range as an impious effort to usurp divine
power and dare more than was permitted
to man. The lines of Horace in which
the familiar arts of shipbuilding and
navigation are reprobated as vetitum
nefas indicate even in that sceptical age
a still unexhausted vein of the old senti
ment. The intensity of the correspond
ing feeling in the Middle Ages is not a
precise parallel, on account of the super
stition about dealing with evil spirits with
which it was complicated; but the im
putation of prying into the secrets of the
Almighty long remained a powerful
weapon of attack against unpopular
inquirers into nature ; and the charge of
presumptuously attempting to defeat the
designs of Providence still retains enough
of its original force to be thrown in as a
15
make-weight along with other objections
when there is a desire to find fault with
any new exertion of human forethought
and contrivance. No one, indeed, asserts
it to be the intention of the Creator that
the spontaneous order of the creation
should not be altered, or even that it
should not be altered in any new way.
But there still exists a vague notion that,
though it is very proper to control this
or the other natural phenomenon, the
general scheme of nature is a model for
us to imitate; that with more or less
liberty in details, we should on the whole
be guided by the spirit and general con
ception of nature’s own ways ; that they
are God’s work, and as such perfect; that
man cannot rival their unapproachable
excellence, and can best show his skill
and joiety by attempting, in however
imperfect a way, to reproduce their like
ness ; and that, if not the whole, yet some
particular parts of the spontaneous order
of nature, selected according to the
speakers predilections, are in a peculiar
sense manifestations of the Creator’s
will—a sort of finger-posts pointing out
the direction which things in general,
and therefore our voluntary actions, are
intended to take. Feelings of this sort,
though repressed on ordinary occasions
by the contrary current of life, are ready
to break out whenever custom is silent,
and the native promptings of the mind
have nothing opposed to them but
reason; and appeals are continually
made to them by rhetoricians, with the
effect, if not of convincing opponents,
at least of making those who already
hold the opinion which the rhetorician
desires to recommend, better satisfied
with it. For in the present day it pro
bably seldom happens that anyone is per
suaded to approve any course of action
because it appears to him to bear an
�i6
NA TURE
analogy to the divine government of the
world, though the argument tells on him
with great force, and is felt by him to be
a great support, in behalf of anything
which he is already inclined to approve.
If this notion of imitating the ways
of Providence as manifested in Nature
is seldom expressed plainly and downrightly as a matter of general applica
tion, it also is seldom directly contra
dicted. Those who find it on their path
prefer to turn the obstacle rather than to
attack it, being often themselves not
free from the feeling, and in any case
afraid of incurring the charge of impiety
by saying anything which might be held
to disparage the works of the Creator’s
power. They, therefore, for the most
part, rather endeavour to show that they
have as much right to the religious argu
ment as their opponents, and that, if the
course they recommend seems to conflict
with some part of the ways of Providence,
there is some other part with which it
agrees better than what is contended for
on the other side. In this mode of
dealing with the great a priori fallacies,
the progress of improvement clears away
particular errors while the causes of
errors are still left standing, and very
little weakened by each conflict; yet by
a long series of such partial victories
precedents are accumulated, to which
an appeal may be made against these
powerful prepossessions, and which
afford a growing hope that the misplaced
feeling, after having so often learnt to
recede, may some day be compelled to
an unconditional surrender. For, how
ever offensive the proposition may appear
to many religious persons, they should
be willing to look in the face the unde
niable fact that the order of nature, in so
far as unmodified by man, is such as no
being, whose attributes are justice and
benevolence, would have made with the
intention that his rational creatures
should follow it as an example. If made
wholly by such a Being, and not partly
by beings of very different qualities, it
could only be as a designedly imperfect
work, which man, in his limited sphere,
is to exercise justice and benevolence in
amending. The best persons have always
held it to be the essence of religion that
the paramount duty of man upon earth
is to amend himself; but all except
monkish quietists have annexed to this
in their inmost minds (though seldom
willing to enunciate the obligation with
the same clearness) the additional reli
gious duty of amending the world, and
not solely the human part of it, but the
material—the order of physical nature.
In considering this subject it is neces
sary to divest ourselves of certain pre
conceptions which may justly be called
natural prejudices, being grounded on
feelings which, in themselves natural
and inevitable, intrude into matters with
which they ought to have no concern.
One of these feelings is the astonishment,
rising into awe, which is inspired (even
independently of all religious sentiment)
by any of the greater natural phenomena.
A hurricane; a mountain precipice;
the desert; the ocean, either agitated or
at rest; the solar system, and the great
cosmic forces which hold it together;
the boundless firmament, and to an edu
cated mind any single star—excite feel
ings which make all human enterprises
and powers appear so insignificant that,
to a mind thus occupied, it seems in
sufferable presumption in so puny a
creature as man to look critically on
things so far above him, or dare to
measure' himself against the grandeur of
the universe. But a little interrogation
of our own consciousness will suffice to
�NATURE
convince us that what makes these
phenomena so impressive is simply their
vastness. The enormous extension in
space and time, or the enormous power
they exemplify, constitutes their sub
limity ; a feeling in all cases, more allied
to terror than to any moral emotion.
And though the vast scale of these
phenomena may well excite wonder, and
sets at defiance all idea of rivalry, the
feeling it inspires is of a totally different
character from admiration of excellence.
Those in whom awe produces admiration
may be aesthetically developed, but they
are morally uncultivated. It is one of
the endowments of the imaginative part
of our mental nature that conceptions of
greatness and power, vividly realised,
produce a feeling which, though in its
higher degrees closely bordering on pain,
we prefer to most of what are accounted
pleasures. But we are quite equally
capable of experiencing this feeling
towards maleficent power; and we never
experience it so strongly towards most of
the powers of the universe as when we
have most present to our consciousness
a vivid sense of their capacity of inflict
ing evil. Because these natural powers
have what we cannot imitate, enormous
might, and overawe us by that one attri
bute, it would be a great error to infer
that their other attributes are such as we
ought to emulate, or that we should be
justified in using our small powers after
the example which Nature sets us with
her vast forces. For how stands the
fact? That, next to the greatness of
these cosmic forces, the quality which
most forcibly strikes every one who does
not avert his eyes from it is their perfect
and absolute recklessness. They go
straight to their end, without regarding
what or whom they crush on the road.
Optimists, in their attempts to prove
17
that “whatever is, is right,” are obliged
to maintain, not that Nature ever turns
one step from her path to avoid tramp
ling us into destruction, but that it would
be very unreasonable in us to expect
that she should. Pope’s “ Shall gravita
tion cease when you go by ? ” may be a
just rebuke to any one who should be
so silly as to expect common human
morality from nature. But if the ques
tion were between two men, instead of
between a man and a natural phenome
non, that triumphant apostrophe would be
thought a rare piece of impudence. A
man who should persist in hurling stones
or firing cannon when another man
“ goes by,” and having killed him should
urge a similar plea in exculpation,
would very deservedly be found guilty of
murder.
In sober truth, nearly all the things
which men are hanged or imprisoned
for doing to one another are nature’s
every-day performances. Killing, the
most criminal act recognised by human
laws, Nature does once to every being
that lives ; and, in a large proportion of
cases, after protracted tortures sUch as
only the greatest monsters whom we
read of ever purposely inflicted on their
living fellow-creatures. If, by an arbi
trary reservation, we refuse to account
anything murder but what abridges a
certain term supposed to be allotted to
human life, nature also does this to all
but a small percentage of lives, and does
it in all the modes, violent or insidious,
in which the worst human beings take
the lives of one another. Nature impales
men, breaks them as if on the wheel,
casts them to be devoured by wild
beasts, burns them to death, crushes
them with stones like the first Christian
martyr, starves them with hunger, freezes
them with cold, poisons them by the
c
�iS
NATURE
quick or slow venom of her exhalations,
and has hundreds of other hideous
deaths in reserve, such as the ingenious
cruelty of a Nabis or a Domitian never
surpassed. All this Nature does with
the most supercilious disregard both of
mercy and of justice, emptying her
shafts upon the best and noblest indif
ferently with the meanest and worst;
upon those who are engaged in the
highest and worthiest enterprises, and
often as the direct consequence of the
noblest acts; and it might almost
be imagined as a punishment for them.
She mows down those on whose exist
ence hangs the well-being of a whole
people, perhaps the prospect of the
human race for generations to come,
with as little compunction as those
whose death is a relief to themselves, or
a blessing to those under their noxious
influence. Such are Nature’s dealings
with life. Even when she does not
intend to kill, she inflicts the same
tortures in apparent wantonness. In the
clumsy provision which she has made
for that perpetual renewal of animal life,
rendered necessary by the prompt termi
nation she puts to it in every individual
instance, no human being ever comes
into the world but another human being
is literally stretched on the rack for hours
or days, not unfrequently issuing in
death. Next to taking life (equal to it
according to a high authority) is taking
the means by which we live ; and Nature
does this too on the largest scale and
with the most callous indifference. A
single hurricane destroys the hopes of a
season ; a flight of locusts, or an inun
dation, desolates a district; a trifling I
chemical change in an edible root
starves a million of people. The waves
of the sea, like banditti, seize and appro
priate the wealth of the rich and the little
all of the poor with the same accompani
ments of stripping, wounding, and killing
as their human antitypes. Everything,
in short, which the worst men commit
either against life or property is perpe
trated on a larger scale by natural agents.
Nature has Noyades more fatal than
those of Carrier; her explosions of fire
damp are as destructive as human
artillery; her plague and cholera far
surpass the poison-cups of the Borgias.
Even the love of “ order,” which is
thought to be a following of the ways of
Nature, is in fact a contradiction of them.
All which people are accustomed to
deprecate as “disorder” and its conse
quences is precisely a counterpart of
Nature’s ways. Anarchy and the Reign
of Terror are overmatched in injustice,
ruin, and death by a hurricane and a
pestilence.
But, it is said, all these things are for
wise and good ends. On this I must
first remark that whether they are so or
not is altogether beside the point. Sup
posing it true that, contrary to appear
ances, these horrors, when perpetrated by
Nature, promote good ends, still, as no
one believes that good ends would be
promoted by our following the example,
the course of Nature cannot be a proper
model for us to imitate. Either it is
right that we should kill because nature
kills; torture because nature tortures ;
ruin and devastate because nature does
the like; or we ought not to consider at
all what nature does, but what it is good
to do. If there is such a thing as a
reductio adabsurdum, this surely amounts
to one. If it is a sufficient reason for
doing one thing, that nature does it, why
not another thing ? If not all things,
why anything ? The physical govern
ment of the world being full of the things
which when done by men are deemed
�NATURE
the greatest enormities, it cannot be
religious or moral in us to guide our
actions by the analogy of the course of
nature. This proposition remains true,
whatever occult quality of producing
good may reside in those facts of nature
which to our perceptions are most
noxious, and which no one considers it
other than a crime to produce artifici
ally.
But, in reality, no one consistently
believes in any such occult quality. The
phrases which ascribe perfection to the
course of nature can only be considered
as the exaggerations of poetic or devo
tional feeling, not intended to stand the
test of a sober examination. No one,
either religious or irreligious, believes
that the hurtful agencies of nature, con
sidered as a whole, promote good pur
poses, in any other way than by inciting
human rational creatures to rise up and
struggle against them. If we believed
that those agencies were appointed by a
benevolent Providence as the means of
accomplishing wise purposes which could
not be compassed if they did not exist,
then everything done by mankind which
tends to chain up these natural agencies
or to restrict their mischievous operation,
from draining a pestilential marsh down
to curing the toothache, or putting up an
umbrella, ought to be accounted im
pious ; which assuredly nobody does
account them, notwithstanding an under
current of sentiment setting in that
direction which is occasionally percep
tible. On the contrary, the improve
ments on which the civilised part of man
kind most pride themselves consist in
more successfully warding off those
natural calamities which, if we really
believed what most people profess to
believe, we should cherish as medicines
provided for our earthly state by infinite
19
wisdom. Inasmuch, too, as each genera
tion greatly surpasses its predecessors in
the amount of natural evil which it
succeeds in averting, our condition, if
the theory were true, ought by this time
to have become a terrible manifestation
of some tremendous calamity, against
which the physical evils we have learnt
to overmaster had previously operated
as a preservative. Any one, however,
who acted as if he supposed this to be
the case would be more likely, I think,
to be confined as a lunatic than rever
enced as a saint.
It is undoubtedly a very common fact
that good comes out of evil, and when it
does occur it is far too agreeable not tofind people eager to dilate on it. But, in
the first place, it is quite as often true of
human crimes as of natural calamities.
The fire of London, which is believed to
have had so salutary an effect on the
healthiness of the city, would have pro
duced that effect just as much if it had
been really the work of the furor
papisticus ” so long commemorated on
the Monument. The deaths of those
whom tyrants or persecutors have made
martyrs in any noble cause have done a
service to mankind which would not
have been obtained if they had died by
accident or disease. Yet, whatever inci
dental and unexpected benefits may
result from crimes, they are crimes,
nevertheless. In the second place, if
good frequently comes out of evil, the
converse fact, evil coming out of good,
is equally common. Every event, public
or private, which, regretted on its occur
rence, was declared providential at a
later period on account of some unfore
seen good consequence, might be
matched by some other event, deemed
fortunate at the time, but which proved
calamitous or fatal to those whom it
�20
IVA TURE
appeared to benefit. Such conflicts
between the beginning and the end, or
between the event and the expectation,
are not only as frequent, but as often
held up to notice, in the painful cases as
in the agreeable; but there is not the
same inclination to generalise on them ;
or at all events they are not regarded by
the moderns (though they were by the
ancients) as similarly an indication of
the divine purposes : men satisfy them
selves with moralising on the imperfect
nature of our foresight, the uncertainty
of events, and the vanity of human ex
pectations. The simple fact is, human
interests are so complicated, and the
effects of any incident whatever so multi
tudinous, that, if it touches mankind at
all, its influence on them is, in the great
majority of cases, both good and bad.
If the greater number of personal mis
fortunes have their good side, hardly any
..good fortune ever befel any one which
■did not give either to the same or to
some other person something to regret :
and unhappily there are many misfor
tunes so overwhelming that their favour
able side, if it exist, is entirely over
shadowed and made insignificant; while
the corresponding statement can seldom
be made concerning blessings. The
.effects, too, of every cause depend so
much on the circumstances which acci
dentally accompany it that many cases
are sure to occur in which even the total
result is markedly opposed to the pre
dominant tendency: and thus not only
evil has its good and good its evil side,
but good often produces an overbalance
of evil and evil an overbalance of good.
This, however, is by no means the
general tendency of either phenomenon.
On the contrary, both good and evil
naturally tend to fructify, each in its own
kind, good producing good, and evil,
evil. It is one of Nature’s general rules,
and part of her habitual injustice, that
“ to him that hath shall be given, but
from him that hath not shall be taken
even that which he hath.” The ordinary
and predominant tendency of good is
towards more good. Health, strength,
wealth, knowledge, virtue, are not only
good in themselves, but facilitate and
promote the acquisition of good, both of
the same and of other kinds. The person
who can learn easily is he who already
knows much : it is the strong and not
the sickly person who can do everything
which most conduces to health ; those
who find it easy to gain money are not
the poor, but the rich; while health,
strength, knowledge, talents, are all
means of acquiring riches, and riches
are often an indispensable means of
acquiring these. Again, e conveyso, what
ever may be said of evil turning into
good, the general tendency of evil is
towards further evil. Bodily illness
renders the body more susceptible of
disease; it produces incapacity of exer
tion, sometimes debility of mind, and
often the loss of means of subsistence.
All severe pain, either bodily or mental,
tends to increase the susceptibilities of
pain for ever after. Poverty is the parent
of a thousand mental and moral evils.
What is still worse, to be injured or
oppressed, when habitual, -lowers the
whole tone of the character. One bad
action leads to others, both in the agent
himself, in the bystanders, and in
the sufferers. All bad qualities are
strengthened by habit, and all vices and
follies tend to spread.
Intellectual
defects generate moral, and moral, intel
lectual ; and every intellectual or moral
defect generates others, and so on with
out end.
That much applauded class of authors,
�NA TURE
the writers on natural theology, have, I
venture to think, entirely lost their way,
and missed the sole line of argument
which could have made their speculations
acceptable to any one who can perceive
when two propositions contradict one
another. They have exhausted the
resources of sophistry to make it appear
that all the suffering in the world exists
to prevent greater—that misery exists,
for fear lest there should be misery : a
thesis which, if ever so well maintained,
could only avail to explain and justify
the works of limited beings, compelled
to labour under conditions independent
of their own will; but can have no
application to a Creator assumed to be
omnipotent, who, if he bends to a sup
posed necessity, himself makes the
necessity which he bends to. If the
maker of the world can all that he will,
he wills misery, and there is no escape
from the conclusion. The more consis
tent of those who have deemed them
selves qualified to “ vindicate the ways of
God to man ” have endeavoured to avoid
the alternative by hardening their hearts,
and denying that misery is an evil. The
goodness of God, they say, does not
consist in willing the happiness of his
creatures, but their virtue; and the uni
verse, if not a happy, is a just, universe.
But, waving the objections to this scheme
of ethics, it does not at all get rid of the
difficulty. If the Creator of mankind
willed that they should all be virtuous,
his designs are as completely baffled as
if he had willed that they should all be
happy : and the order of nature is con
structed with even less regard to the
requirements of justice than to those of
benevolence. If the law of all creation
were justice and the Creator omnipotent,
then, in whatever amount suffering and
happiness might be dispensed to the
2r
world, each person’s share of them would
be exactly proportioned to that person’s
good or evil deeds ; no human being
would have a worse lot than another,
without worse deserts ; accident or
favouritism would have no part in such
a world, but every human life would be
the playing out of a drama constructed
like a perfect moral tale. No one is able
to blind himself to the fact that the
world we live in is totally different from
this ; insomuch that the necessity of re
dressing the balance has been deemed
one of the strongest arguments for
another life after death, which amounts
to an admission that the order of things
in this life is often an example of injus
tice, not justice. If it be said that God
does not take sufficient account of
pleasure and pain to make them the
reward or punishment of the good or the
wicked, but that virtue is itself the
greatest good and vice the greatest evil,
then these at least ought to be dispensed
to all according to what they have done
to deserve them; instead of which, every
kind of moral depravity is entailed upon
multitudes by the fatality of their birth ;
through the fault of their parents, of
society, or of uncontrollable circum
stances, certainly through no fault of
their own. Not even on the most dis
torted and contrasted theory of good
which ever was framed by religious or
philosophical fanaticism can the govern
ment of Nature be made to resemble the
work of a being at once good and omni
potent.
The only admissible moral theory of
Creation is that the Principle of Good
cinnot at once and altogether subdue the
powers of evil, either physical or moral;
could not place mankind in a world free
from the necessity of an incessant struggle
with the maleficent powers, or make
�22
NATURE
them always victorious in that struggle,
but could and did make them capable of
carrying on the fight with vigour and
with progressively increasing success.
Of all the religious explanations of the
order of nature, this alone is neither
contradictory to itself nor to the facts
for which it attempts to account. Accord
ing to it, man’s duty would consist, not
in simply taking care of his own interests
by obeying irresistible power, but in
standing forward a not ineffectual auxi
liary to a Being of perfect beneficence ;
a faith which seems much better adapted
for nerving him to exertion than a vague
and inconsistent reliance on an Author
of Good who is supposed to be also the
author of evil. And I venture to assert
that such has really been, though often
unconsciously, the faith of all who have
drawn strength and support of any worthy
kind from trust in a superintending
Providence. There is no subject on
which men’s practical belief is more
incorrectly indicated by the words they
use to express it than religion. Many
have derived a base confidence from
imagining themselves to be favourites of
an omnipotent but capricious and
despotic Deity. But those who have
been strengthened in goodness by rely
ing on the sympathising support of a
powerful and good Governor of the
world have, I am satisfied, never really
believed that Governor to be, in the
strict sense of the term, omnipotent.
They have always saved his goodness at
the expense of his power. They have
believed, perhaps, that he could, if he
willed, remove all the thorns from their
individual path, but not without causing
greater harm to some one else, or frus
trating some purpose of greater importance
to the general well-being. They have
believed that he could do any one thing,
but not any combination of things; that
his government, like human government,
was a system of adjustments and com
promises ; that the world is inevitably
imperfect, contrary to his intention.1
And since the exertion of all his power
to make it as little imperfect as possible
leaves it no better than it is, they cannot
but regard that power, though vastly
beyond human estimate, yet as in itself
not merely finite, but extremely limited.
They are bound, for example, to suppose
that the best he could do for his human
creatures was to make an immense
majority of all who have yet existed be
born (without any fault of their own)
Patagonians, or Esquimaux, or something
nearly as brutal and degraded, but to
give them capacities which, by being
cultivated for very many centuries
in toil and suffering, and after many
of the best specimens of the race
have sacrificed their lives for the
purpose, have at last enabled some
chosen portions of the species to grow
into something better, capable of being
improved in centuries more into
1 This irresistible conviction conies out in the
writings of religious philosophers, in exact pro
portion to the general clearness of their under
standing. It nowhere shines forth so distinctly
as in Leibnitz’s famous Theodicee, so strangely
mistaken for a system of optimism, and, as such,
satirised by Voltaire on grounds which do not
even touch the author’s argument. Leibnitz
does not maintain that this world is the best of
all imaginable, but only of all possible, worlds ;
which, he argues, it cannot but be, inasmuch as
God, who is absolute goodness, has chosen it
and not another. In every page of the work be
tacitly assumes an abstract possibility and impos
sibility, independent of the divine power ; and,
though his pious feelings make him continue to
designate that power by the word “Omnipotence, ’
he so explains that term as to make it mean
power extending to all that is within the limits
of that abstract possibility.
�NA TURE
something really good, of which hitherto
there are only to be foun 1 individual
instances. It may be possible to believe
with Plato that perfect goodness, limited
and thwarted in every direction by the
intractableness of the material, has done
this because it could do no better. But
that the same perfectly wise and good
Being had absolute power over the
material, and made it, by voluntary
choice, what it is; to admit this might
have been supposed impossible to any
one who has the simplest notions of
moral good and evil. Nor can any such
person, whatever kind of religious phrases
he may use, fail to believe that if Nature
and man are both the works of a Being
of perfect goodness, that Being intended
Nature as a scheme to be amended, not
imitated, by man.
But even though unable to believe
that Nature, as a whole, is a realisation
of the designs of perfect wisdom and
benevolence, men do not willingly re
nounce the idea that some part of
Nature, at least, must be intended as an
exemplar, or type; that on some portion
or other of the Creator’s works the
image of the moral qualities which they
are accustomed to ascribe to him must be
impressed ; that if not all which is, yet
something which is, must not only be a
faultless model of what ought to be, but
must be intended to be our guide and
standard in rectifying the rest. It does
not suffice them to believe that what
tends to good'is to be imitated and per
fected, and what tends to evil is to be
corrected: they are anxious for some
more definite indication of the Creator’s
designs; and, being persuaded that this
must somewhere be met with in his
works, undertake the dangerous respon
sibility of picking and choosing among
them in quest of it. A choice which,
except so far as directed by the general
maxim that he intends all the good and
none of the evil, must of necessity be
perfectly arbitrary; and if it leads to any
conclusions other than such as can be
deduced from that maxim, must be,
exactly in that proportion, pernicious.
It has never been settled by any
accredited doctrine what particular de
partments of the order of nature shall be
reputed to be designed for our moral
instruction and guidance ; and accord
ingly each person’s individual predilec
tions, or momentary convenience, have
decided to what parts of the divine
government the practical conclusions
that he was desirous of establishing
should be recommended to approval as
being analogous. One such recommen
dation must be as fallacious as another,
for it is impossible to decide that cer
tain of the Creator’s works are more
truly expressions of his character than
the rest; and the only selection which
does not lead to immoral results is the
selection of those which most conduce
to the general good—in other words, of
those which point to an end which, if the
entire scheme is the expression of a
single omnipotent and consistent will, is
evidently not the end intended by it.
There is, however, one particular
element in the construction of the world
which, to minds on the look-out for
special indications of the Creator’s will,
has appeared, not without plausibility,
peculiarly fitted to afford them ; viz.,
the active impulses of human and other
animated beings. One can imagine such
persons arguing that, when the Author of
Nature only made circumstances, he may
not have meant to indicate the manner
in which his rational creatures were to
adjust themselves to those circumstances;
but that when he implanted positive
�24
AU TURE
stimuli in the creatures themselves,
stirring them up to a particular kind of
action, it is impossible to doubt that he
intended that sort of action to be prac
tised by them. This reasoning, followed
out consistently, would lead to the con
clusion that the Deity intended, and
approves, whatever human beings do;
since all that they do being the conse
quence of some of the impulses with
which their Creator must have endowed
them, all must equally be considered as
done in obedience to his will. As this
practical conclusion wras shrunk from, it
was necessary to draw a distinction, and
to pronounce that not the whole, but
only parts, of the active nature of man
kind point to a special intention of the
Creator in respect to their tonduct.
These parts, it seemed natural to suppose,
must be those in which the Creator’s
hand is manifested rather than the man’s
own; and hence the frequent antithesis
between man as God made him and
man as he has made himself. Since
what is done with deliberation seems
more the man’s own act, and he is held
more completely responsible for it than
for what he does from sudden impulse,
the considerate part of human conduct
is apt to be set down as man’s share in
the business, and the inconsiderate as
God’s. The result is the vein of senti
ment so common in the modern world
(though unknown to the philosophic
ancients) which exalts instinct at the
expense of reason ; an aberration ren
dered still more mischievous by the
opinion commonly held in conjunction
with it, that every, or almost every, feel
ing or impulse which acts promptly with
out waiting to ask questions is an instinct.
Thus almost every variety of unreflecting
and uncalculating impulse receives a
kind of consecration, except those which,
though unreflecting at the moment, owe
their origin to previous habits of reflec
tion : these, being evidently not instinc
tive, do not meet with the favour accorded
to the rest; so that all unreflecting
impulses are invested with authority over
reason, except the only ones which are
most probably right. I do not mean, of
course, that this mode of judgment is
even pretended to be consistently carried
out : life could not go on if it were not
admitted that impulses must be con
trolled, and that reason ought to govern
our actions. The pretension is not to
drive Reason from the helm, but rather
to bind her by articles to steer only in a
particular way. Instinct is not to govern,
but reason is to practise some vague and
unassignable amount of deference to
Instinct. Though the impression in
favour of instinct as being a peculiar
manifestation of the divine purposes has
not been cast into the form of a con
sistent general theory, it remains a stand
ing prejudice, capable of being stirred up
into hostility to reason in any case in
which the dictate of the rational faculty
has not acquired the authority of pre
scription.
I shall not here enter into the difficult
psychological question, what are or are
not instincts : the subject would require
a volume to itself. Without touching
upon any disputed theoretical points, it
is possible to judge how little worthy is
the instinctive part of human nature to
be held up as its chief excellence—as the
part in which the hand of infinite good
ness and wisdom is peculiarly visible.
Allowing everything to be an instinct
which anybody has ever asserted to be
one, it remains true that nearly every
respectable attribute of humanity is the
result not of instinct, but of a victory
over instinct; and that there is hardly
�NA TURE
anything valuable in the natural man
except capacities—a whole world of pos
sibilities, all of them dependent upon
eminently artificial discipline for being
realised.
It is only in a highly artificialised con
dition of human nature that the notion
grew up, or, I believe, ever could have
grown up, that goodness was natural :
because only after a long course of arti
ficial education did good sentiments
become so habitual, and so predominant
over bad, as to arise unprompted when
occasion called for them. In the times
when mankind were nearer to their
natural state, cultivated observers re
garded the natural man as a sort of wild
animal, distinguished chiefly by being
craftier than the other beasts of the field;
and all worth of character was deemed
the result of a sort of taming ; a phrase
often applied by the ancient philosophers
to the appropriate discipline of human
beings. The truth is that there is hardly
a single point of excellence belonging to
human character which is not decidedly
repugnant to the untutored feelings of
human nature.
If there be a virtue which more than
any other we expect to find, and really
do find, in an uncivilised state, it is the
virtue of courage. Yet this is from first
to last a victory achieved over one of the
most powerful emotions of human nature.
If there is any one feeling or attribute
more natural than all others to human
beings, it is fear ; and no greater proof
can be given of the power of artificial
discipline than the conquest which it has
at all times and places shown itself
capable of achieving over so mighty and
so universal a sentiment. The widest
difference no doubt exists between one
human being and another in the facility
or difficulty with which they acquire this
25
virtue. There is hardly any department
of human excellence in which difference
of original temperament goes so far.
But it may fairly be questioned if any
human being is naturally courageous.
Many are naturally pugnacious, or
irascible, or enthusiastic, and these
passions when strongly excited may
render them insensible to fear. But
take away the conflicting emotion, and
fear reasserts its dominion : consistent
courage is always the effect of cultiva
tion. The courage which is occasionally,
though by no means generally, found
among tribes of savages is as much the
result of education as that of the
Spartans or Romans. In all such tribe?
there is a most emphatic direction of the
public sentiment into every channel of
expression through which honour can be
paid to courage and cowardice held up to
contempt and derision. It will perhaps
be said that, as the expression of a senti
ment implies the sentiment itself, the
training of the young to courage pre
supposes an originally courageous people.
It presupposes only what all good
customs presuppose—that there must
have been individuals better than the
rest who set the customs going. Some
individuals, who like other people had
fears to conquer, must have had strength
of mind and will to conquer them for
themselves. These would obtain the
influence belonging to heroes, for that
which is at once astonishing and
obviously useful never fails to be ad
mired : and partly through this admira
tion, partly through the fear they them
selves excite, they would obtain the
power of legislators, and could establish
whatever customs they pleased.
Let us next consider a quality which
forms the most visible and one of the
most radical of the moral distinctions
�26
NA TURE
between human beings and most of the
lower animals ; that of which the absence,
more than of anything else, renders men
bestial—the quality of cleanliness. Can
anything be more entirely artificial ?
Children, and the lower classes of most
countries, seem to be actually fond of
dirt: the vast majority of the human
race are indifferent to it : whole nations
of otherwise civilised and cultivated
human beings tolerate it in some of its
worst forms, and only a very small
minority are consistently offended by it.
Indeed, the universal law of the subject
appears to be that uncleanliness offends
only those to whom it is unfamiliar, so
that those who have lived in so artificial
a state as to be unused to it in any form
are the sole persons whom it disgusts in
all forms. Of all virtues this is the most
evidently not instinctive, but a triumph
over instinct. Assuredly neither cleanli
ness nor the love of cleanliness is natural
to man, but only the capacity of acquir
ing a love of cleanliness.
Our examples have thus far been taken
from the personal, or, as they are called
by Bentham, the self-regarding virtues,
because these, if any, might be supposed
to be congenial even to the uncultivated
mind. Of the social virtues it is almost
superfluous to speak, so completely is
it the verdict of all experience that
selfishness is natural. By this I do not
in any wise mean to deny that sympathy
is natural also ; I believe, on the contrary,
that on that important fact rests the pos
sibility of any cultivation of goodness
and nobleness, and the hope of their
ultimate entire ascendancy. But sym
pathetic characters, left uncultivated and
given up to their sympathetic instincts,
are as selfish as others. The difference
is in the kind of selfishness : theirs is not
solitary but sympathetic selfishness;
rego'isme a deux, a trois, or a quatre; and
they may be very amiable and delightful
to those with whom they sympathise, and
grossly unjust and unfeeling to the rest
of the world. Indeed, the finer nervous
organisations which are most capable of
and most require sympathy have, from
their fineness, so much stronger impulses
of all sorts that they often furnish the
most striking examples of selfishness,
though of a less repulsive kind than that
of colder natures. Whether there ever
was a person in whom, apart from all
teaching of instructors, friends or books,
and from all intentional self-modelling
according to an ideal, natural benevolence
was a more powerful attribute than
selfishness in any of its forms, may
remain undecided. That such cases are
extremely rare every one must admit,
and this is enough for the argument.
But (to speak no further of self-control
for the benefit of others) the commonest
self-control for one’s own benefit—that
power of sacrificing a present desire to a
distant object or a general purpose which
is indispensable for making the actions
of the individual accord with his own
notions of his individual good; even this
is most unnatural to the undisciplined
human being: as may be seen by the
long apprenticeship which children serve
to it; the very imperfect manner in
which it is acquired by persons born to
power, whose will is seldom resisted, and
by all who have been early and much
indulged; and the marked absence of
the quality in savages, in soldiers and
sailors, and in a somewhat less degree in
nearly the whole of the poorer classes in
this and many other countries. The prin
cipal difference, on the point under con
sideration, between this virtue and others,
is that although, like them, it requires
a course of teaching, it is more susceptible
�NA TURE
than most of them of being self-taught.
The axiom is trite that self-control is only
learnt by experience ; and this endow
ment is only thus much nearer to being
natural than the others we have spoken
of, inasmuch as personal experience,
without external inculcation, has a certain
tendency to engender it. Nature does
not of herself bestow this, any more than
other virtues; but nature often ad
ministers the rewards and punishments
which cultivate it, and which in other
cases have to be created artificially for
the express purpose.
Veracity might seem, of all virtues, to
have the most plausible claim to being
natural, since, in the absence, of motives
to the contrary, speech usually conforms
to, or at least does not intentionally
deviate from, fact. Accordingly, this is
the virtue with which writers like
Rousseau delight in decorating savage
life, and setting it in advantageous con
trast with the treachery and trickery of
civilisation. Unfortunately this is a mere
fancy picture, contradicted by all the
realities of savage life. Savages are
always liars. They have not the faintest
notion of truth as a virtue. They have
a notion of not betraying to their hurt,
as of not hurting in any other way,
persons to whom they are bound by
some special tie of obligation; their
chief, their guest, perhaps, or their
friend: these feelings of obligation being
the taught morality of the savage state,
growing out of its characteristic circum
stances. But of any point of honour
respecting truth for truth’s sake they
have not the remotest idea; no more
than the whole East and the greater
part of Europe ; and in the few countries
which are sufficiently improved to have
such a point of honour it is confined to
a small minority, who alone, under any
27
circumstances of real temptation, prac
tise it.
From the general use of the expression
“natural justice,” it must be presumed
that justice is a virtue generally thought
to be directly implanted by Nature. I
believe, however, that the sentiment of
justice is entirely of artificial origin; the
idea of natural justice not preceding but
following that of conventional justice.
The farther we look back into the early
modes of thinking of the human race,
whether we consider ancient times
(including those of the Old Testament)
or the portions of mankind who are still
in no more advanced a condition than
that of ancient times, the more com
pletely do we find men’s notions of
justice defined and bounded by the
express appointment of law. A man’s
just rights meant the rights which the
law gave him : a just man was he who
never infringed, nor sought to infringe,
the legal property or other legal rights of
others. The notion of a higher justice,
to which laws themselves are amenable,
and by which the conscience is bound
without a positive prescription of law, is
a later extension of the idea, suggested
by, and following the analogy of, legal
justice, to which it maintains a parallel
direction through all the shades and
varieties of the sentiment, and from
which it borrows nearly the whole of its
phraseology. The very words justus and
justilia are derived from jus, law.
Courts of justice, administration of
justice, always mean the tribunals.
If it be said that there must be the
germs of all these virtues in human
nature, otherwise mankind would be
incapable of acquiring them, I am ready,
with a certain amount of explanation, to
admit the fact. But the weeds that dis
pute the ground with these beneficent
�28
NATURE
germs are themselves not germs, but
rankly luxuriant growths, and would, in
all but some one case in a thousand,
entirely stifle and destroy the former,
were it not so strongly the interest of
mankind to cherish the good germs in
one another, that they always do so, in
as far as their degree of intelligence
(in this as in other respects still very
imperfect) allows. It is through such
fostering, commenced early, and not
counteracted by unfavourable influences,
that, in some happily circumstanced
specimens of the human race, the most
elevated sentiments of which humanity
is capable become a second nature,
stronger than the first, and not so much
subduing the original nature as merging
it into itself. Even those gifted organisa
tions which have attained the like excel
lence by self-culture owe it essentially to
the same cause; for what self-culture
would be possible without aid from the
general sentiment of mankind delivered
through books, and from the contempla
tion of exalted characters, real or ideal ?
This artificially created, or at least artifi
cially perfected, nature of the best and
noblest human beings is the only nature
which it is ever commendable to follow.
It is almost superfluous to say that even
this cannot be erected into a standard of
conduct, since it is itself the fruit of a
training and culture the choice of which,
if rational and not accidental, must have
been determined by a standard already
chosen.
This brief survey is amply sufficient to
prove that the duty of man is the same
in respect to his own nature as in respect
to the nature of all other things—namely,
not to follow but to amend it. Some
people, however, who do not attempt to
deny that instinct ought to be subordi
nate to reason, pay deference to Nature
so far as to maintain that every natural
inclination must have some sphere of
action granted to it, some opening left
for its gratification. All natural wishes,
they say, must have been implanted for
a purpose: and this argument is carried
so far that we often hear it maintained
that every wish which it is supposed to
be natural to entertain must have a
corresponding provision in the order of
the universe for its gratification; inso
much (for instance) that the desire of an
indefinite prolongation of existence is
believed by many to be in itself a
sufficient proof of the reality of a future
life.
I conceive that there is a radical
absurdity in all these attempts to dis
cover, in detail, what are the designs of
Providence, in order, when they are dis
covered, to help Providence in bringing
them about. Those who argue, from
particular indications, that Providence
intends this or that, either believe that
the Creator can do all that he will or
that he cannot. If the first supposition
is adopted—if Providence is omnipotent,
Providence intends whatever happens,
and the fact of its happening proves that
Providence intended it. If so, every
thing which a human being can do is
predestined by Providence and is a fulfil
ment of its designs. But if, as is the
more religious theory, Providence intends
not all which happens, but only what is
good, then indeed man has it in his
power, by his voluntary actions, to aid
the intentions of Providence; but he
can only learn those intentions by con
sidering what tends to promote the
general good, and not what man has
a natural inclination to; for, limited as,
on this showing, the divine power must
be, by inscrutable but insurmountable
obstacles, who knows that nun could.
�NATURE
have been created without desires which
never are to be, and even which never
ought to be, fulfilled ? The inclinations
with which man has been endowed, as
well as any of the other contrivances
which we observe in Nature, may be the
expression not of the divine will, but of
the fetters which impede its free action;
and to take hints from these for the
guidance of our own conduct may be
falling into a trap laid by the enemy.
The assumption that everything which
infinite goodness can desire actually
comes to pass in this universe, or at
least that we must never say or suppose
that it does not, is worthy only of those
whose slavish fears make them offer the
homage of lies to a Being who, they
profess to think, is incapable of being
deceived and holds all falsehood in
abomination.
With regard to this particular hypo
thesis, that all natural impulses, all
propensities sufficiently universal and
sufficiently spontaneous to be capable of
passing for instincts, must exist for good
ends, and ought to be only regulated,
not repressed; this is of course true of
the majority of them, for the species
could not have continued to exist unless
most of its inclinations had been directed
to things needful or useful for its pre
servation. But unless the instincts can
be reduced to a very small number
indeed, it must be allowed that we have
also bad instincts which it should be the
aim of education not simply to regulate,
but to extirpate, or rather (what can be
done even to an instinct) to starve
by disuse. Those who are inclined to
multiply the number of instincts, usually
include among them one which they call
destructiveness: an instinct to destroy
for destruction’s sake. I can conceive
no good reason for preserving this, any
29
more than another propensity which, if
notan instinct, is very like one—what has
been called the instinct of domination ;
a delight in exercising despotism, in
holding other beings in subjection to our
will. The man who takes pleasure in
the mere exertion of authority, apart
from the purpose for which it is to
be employed, is the last person in whose
hands one would willingly entrust it.
Again, there are persons who are cruel
by character, or, as the phrase is,
naturally cruel; who have a real pleasure
in inflicting, or seeing the infliction of
pain. This kind of cruelty is not mere
hardheartedness, absence of pity or re
morse; it is a positive thing; a par
ticular kind of voluptuous excitement.
The East and Southern Europe have
afforded, and probably still afford,
abundant examples of this hateful pro
pensity. I suppose it will be granted
that this is not one of the natural in
clinations which it would be wrong to
suppress. The only question would be,
whether it is not a duty to suppress the
man himself along with it.
But even if it were true that every one
of the elementary impulses of human
nature has its good side, and may by a
sufficient amount of artificial training be
made more useful than hurtful; how
little would this amount to, when it must
in any case be admitted that without
such training all of them, even those
which are necessary to our preservation,
would fill the world with misery, making
human life an exaggerated likeness of
the odious scene of violence and tyranny
which is exhibited by the rest of the
animal kingdom, except in so far as
tamed and disciplined by man. There,
indeed, those who flatter themselves
with the notion of reading the purposes
of the Creator in his works ought in
�3°
NATURE
consistency to have seen grounds for
inferences from which they have shrunk.
If there are any marks at all of special
design in creation, one of the things
most evidently designed is that a large
proportion of all animals should pass
their existence in tormenting and de
vouring other animals. They have been
lavishly fitted out with the instru
ments necessary for that purpose; their
strongest instincts impel them to it, and
many of them seem to have been con
structed incapable of supporting them
selves by any other food. If a tenth
part of the pains which have been ex
pended in finding benevolent adaptations
in all nature had been employed in
collecting evidence to blacken the
character of the Creator, what scope for
comment would not have been found in
the entire existence of the lower animals,
divided, with scarcely an exception, into
devourers and devoured, and a prey to a
thousand ills from which they are denied
the faculties necessary for protecting
themselves ! If we are not obliged to
believe the animal creation to be the
work of a demon, it is because we need
not suppose it to have been made by a
Being of infinite power. But if imitation
of the Creator’s will as revealed in nature
were applied as a rule of action in this
case, the most atrocious enormities of the
worst men would be more than justified
by the apparent intention of Providence
■that throughout all animated nature the
strong should prey upon the weak.
The preceding observations are far
from having exhausted the almost infinite
variety of modes and occasions in which
the idea of conformity to nature is intro
duced as an element into the ethical
appreciation of actions and dispositions.
I he same favourable prejudgment follows
the word “nature” through the numerous
acceptations in which it is employed as
a distinctive term for certain parts of the
constitution of humanity as contrasted
with other parts. We have hitherto con
fined ourselves to one of these accepta
tions, in which it stands as a general
designation for those parts of our mental
and moral constitution which are sup
posed to be innate, in contradistinction
to those which are acquired; as when
nature is contrasted with education; or
when a savage state, without laws, arts,
or knowledge, is called a state of nature;
or when the question is asked whether
benevolence, or the moral sentiment, is
natural or acquired; or whether some
persons are poets or orators by nature
and others not. But, in another and a
more lax sense, any manifestations by
human beings are often termed natural
when it is merely intended to say that
they are not studied or designedly
assumed in the particular case; as when
a person is said to move or speak with
natural grace; or when it is said that a
person’s natural manner or character is
so and so; meaning that it is so when he
does not attempt to control or disguise
it. In a still looser acceptation, a person
is said to be naturally that which he was
until some special cause had acted upon
him, or which it is supposed he would
be if some such cause were withdrawn.
Thus a person is said to be naturally
dull, but to have made himself intel
ligent by study and perseverance; to be
naturally cheerful, but soured by misfor
tune; naturally ambitious, but kept down
by want of opportunity. Finally, the
word “natural,” applied to feelings or
conduct, often seems to mean no
more than that they are such as are
ordinarily found in human beings ; as
when it is said that a person acted, on
some particular occasion, as it was
�NA TURE
natural to do; or that to be affected in
a particular way by some sight, or sound,
or thought, or incident in life, is perfectly
natural.
In all these senses of the term, the
quality called natural is very often con
fessedly a worse quality than the one
contrasted with it; but whenever its
being so is not too obvious to be
questioned, the idea seems to be enter
tained that by describing it as natural
something has been said amounting to a
considerable presumption in its favour.
For my part, I can perceive only one
sense in which nature, or naturalness, in
a human being, is really a term of praise ;
and then the praise is only negative—
namely, when used to denote the absence
of affectation. Affectation may be de
fined,the effort to appear what one is not,
when the motive or the occasion is not
such as either to excuse the attempt or
to stamp it with the more odious name
of hypocrisy. It must be added that the
deception is often attempted to be
practised on the deceiver himself as well
as on others ; he imitates the external
signs of qualities which he would like to
have, in hopes to persuade himself that
he has them. Whether in the form
of deception or of self-deception, or of
something hovering between the two,
affectation is very rightly accounted a re
proach, and naturalness, understood as
the reverse of affectation, a merit. But
a more proper term by which to express
this estimable quality would be sincerity :
a term which has fallen from its original
elevated meaning, and popularly denotes
only a subordinate branch of the cardinal
virtue it once designated as a whole.
Sometimes also, in cases wheretheterm
“ affectation ” would be inappropriate,
since the conduct or demeanour spoken
of is really praiseworthy, people say, in
disparagement of the person concerned,
that such conduct or demeanour is not
natural to him; and make uncompli
mentary comparisons between him and
some other person, to whom it is natural:
meaning that what in the one seemed
excellent was the effect of temporary
excitement, or of a great victory over
himself, while in the other it is the
result to be expected from the habitu il
character. This mode of speech is not
open to censure, since nature is here
simply a term for the person’s ordinary
disposition, and if he is praised it is not
for being natural, but for being naturally
good.
Conformity to nature has no con
nection whatever with right and wrong.
The idea can never be fitly introduced
into ethical discussions at all, except,
occasionally and partially, into the
question of degrees of culpability. To
illustrate this point, let us consider the
phrase by which the greatest intensity of
condemnatory feeling is conveyed in
connection with the idea of nature—the
word “ unnatural.” That a thing is un
natural, in any precise meaning which
can be attached to the word, is no
argument for its being blamable ; since
the most criminal actions are to a being
like man not more unnatural than most
of the virtues. The acquisition of virtue
has in all ages been accounted a work of
labour and difficulty, while the descensus
Averni, on the contrary, is of proverbial
facility; and it assuredly requires in
most persons a greater conquest over a
greater number of natural inclinations to
become eminently virtuous than tran
scendently vicious. But if an action, or
an inclination, has been decided on
other grounds to be blamable, it may be
a circumstance in aggravation that it is
unnatural—that is, repugnant to some
�32
NA TURE
strong feeling usually found in human
beings ; since the bad propensity, what
ever it be, has afforded evidence of being
both strong and deeply rooted, by having
overcome that repugnance. This pre
sumption, of course, fails if the individual
never had the repugnance; and the
argument, therefore, is not fit to be
urged unless the feeling which is violated
by the act is not only justifiable and
reasonable, but is one which it is
blamable to be without.
The corresponding plea in extenuation
of a culpable act because it was natural,
or because it was prompted by a natural
feeling, never, I think, ought to be
admitted. There is hardly a bad action
ever perpetrated which is not perfectly
natural, and the motives to which are
not perfectly natural feelings. In the
eye of reason, therefore, this is no
excuse, but it is quite “natural” that it
should be so in the eyes of the multi
tude ; because the meaning of the ex
pression is, that they have a fellow
feeling with the offender. When they
say that something which they cannot
help admitting to be blamable is never
theless natural, they mean that they can
imagine the possibility of their being
themselves tempted to commit it. Most
people have a considerable amount of in
dulgence towards all acts of which they
feel a possible source within themselves,
reserving their rigour for those which,
though perhaps really less bad, they can
not in any way understand how it is
possible to commit. If an action con
vinces them (which it often does on very
inadequate grounds) that the person who
does it must be a being totally unlike
themselves, they are seldom particular in
examining the precise degree of blame
due to it, or even if blame is properly
due to it at all. They measure the
degree of guilt by the strength of their
antipathy; and hence differences of
opinion, and even differences of taste,
have been objects of as intense moral
abhorrence as the most atrocious crimes.
It will be useful to sum up in a few
words the leading conclusions of this
Essay.
The word “ nature ” has two principal
meanings : it either denotes the entire
system of things, with the aggregate of all
their properties, or it denotes things as
they would be, apart from human
intervention.
In the first of these senses, the
doctrine that man ought to follow nature
is unmeaning; since man has no power
to do anything else than follow nature ;
all his actions are done through, and in
obedience to, some one or many of
nature’s physical or mental laws.
In the other sense of the term, the
doctrine that man ought to follow nature,
or, in other words, ought to make the
spontaneous course of things the model
of his voluntary actions, is equally
irrational and immoral.
Irrational, because all human action
whatever consists in altering, and all
useful action in improving, the spon
taneous course of nature.
Immoral, because the course of natural
phenomena being replete with every
thing which when committed by human
beings is most worthy of abhorrence, any
one who endeavoured in his actions to
imitate the natural course of things
would be universally seen and acknow
ledged to be the wickedest of men.
The scheme of Nature, regarded in its
whole extent, cannot have had, for its
sole or even principal object, the good of
human or other sentient beings. What
good it brings to them is mostly the
result of their own exertions. What
�NA TURE
soever, in nature, gives indication of
beneficent design proves this benefi
cence to be armed only with limited
power; and the duty of man is to co
operate with the beneficent powers, not
by imitating, but by perpetually striving
33
to amend, the course of nature—and
bringing that part of it over which we can
exercise control more nearly into con
formity with a high standard of justice
and goodness.
D
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
It has sometimes been remarked how
much has been written, both by friends
and enemies, concerning the truth of
religion, and how little, at least in the
way of discussion or controversy, con
cerning its usefulness. This, however,
might have been expected; for the truth,
in matters which so deeply affect us, is
our first concernment. If religion, or
any particular form of it, is true, its
usefulness follows without other proof.
If to know authentically in what order of
things, under what government of the
universe, it is our destiny to live were
not useful, it is difficult to imagine what
could be considered so. Whether a
person is in a pleasant or in an un
pleasant place, a palace or a prison, it
cannot be otherwise than useful to him
to know where he is. So long, therefore,
as men accepted the teachings of their
religion as positive facts, no more a
matter of doubt than their own existence
or the existence of the objects around
them, to ask the use of believing it
could not possibly occur to them. The
utility of religion did not need to be
asserted until the arguments for its truth
had in a great measure ceased to con
vince. People must either have ceased
to believe, or have ceased to rely on the
belief of others, before they could take
that inferior ground of defence without a
consciousness of lowering what they were
endeavouring to raise. An argument
for the utility of religion is an appeal
to unbelievers, to induce them to prac
tise a well-meant hypocrisy; or to semi
believers, to make them avert their eyes
from what might possibly shake their
unstable belief; or finally to persons in
general, to abstain from expressing any
doubts they may feel, since a fabric of
immense importance to mankind is so
insecure at its foundations that men
must hold their breath in its neighbour
hood for fear of blowing it down.
In the present period of history, how
ever, we seem to have arrived at a time
when, among the arguments for and
against religion, those which relate to its
usefulness assume an important place.
We are in an age of weak beliefs, and in
which such belief as men have is much
more determined by their wish to be
lieve than by any mental appreciation of
evidence. The wish to believe does not
arise only from selfish, but often from
the most disinterested, feelings; and,
though it cannot produce the unwaver
ing and perfect reliance which once
existed, it fences round all that remains
of the impressions of early education;
it often causes direct misgivings to fade
away by disuse; and, above all, it induces
people to continue laying out their lives,
according to doctrines which have lost
part of their hold on the mind, and
to maintain towards the world the same,
or a rather more demonstrative, attitude
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
of belief than they thought it necessary
to exhibit when their personal conviction
was more complete.
If religious belief be indeed so neces
sary to mankind as we are continually
assured that it is, there is great reason to
lament that the intellectual grounds
of it should require to be backed by
moral bribery or subornation of the
understanding. Such a state of things
is most uncomfortable, even for those
who may, without actual insincerity,
describe themselves as believers; and
still worse as regards those who, having
consciously ceased to find the evidences
of religion convincing, are withheld from
saying so lest they should aid in doing
an irreparable injury to mankind. It is
a most painful position, to a conscien
tious and cultivated mind, to be drawn
in contrary directions by the two noblest
of all objects of pursuit—truth and the
general good. Such a conflict must
inevitably produce a growing indiffer
ence to one or other of these objects,
most probably to both. Many who
could render giant’s service both to
truth and to mankind, if they believed
that they could serve the one without
loss to the other, are either totally para
lysed, or led to confine their exertions to
matters of minor detail, by the apprehen
sion that any real freedom of speculation,
or any considerable strengthening or
enlargement of the thinking faculties of
mankind at large, might, by making
them unbelievers, be the surest way to
render them vicious and miserable.
Many, again, having observed in others
or experienced in themselves elevated
feelings which they imagine incapable of
emanating from any other source than
religion, have an honest aversion to any
thing tending, as they think, to dry up
the fountain of such feelings. They,
35
therefore, either dislike and disparage all
philosophy, or addict themselves with
intolerant zeal to those forms of it in
which intuition usurps the place of
evidence, and internal feeling is made
the test of objective truth. The whole
of the prevalent metaphysics of the
present century is one tissue of suborned
evidence in favour of religion; often of
Deism only, but in any case involving a
misapplication of noble impulses and
speculative capacities, among the most
deplorable of those wretched wastes of
human faculties which make us wonder
that enough is left to keep mankind
progressive, at however slow a pace. It
is time to consider, more impartially
and therefore more deliberately than is
usually done, whether all this training to
prop up beliefs which require so great
an expense of intellectual toil and in
genuity to keep them standing, yields
any sufficient return in human well
being ; and whether that end would not
be better served by a frank recognition
that certain subjects are inaccessible to
our faculties, and by the application of
the same mental powers to the strength
ening and enlargement of those other
sources of virtue and happiness which
stand in no need of the support or
sanction of supernatural beliefs and in
ducements.
Neither, on the other hand, can the
difficulties of the question be so promptly
disposed of as sceptical philosophers are
sometimes inclined to believe. It is not
enough to aver, in general terms, that
there never can be any conflict between
truth and utility; that, if religion be
false, nothing but good can be the conse
quence of rejecting it. For, though the
knowledge of every positive truth is an
useful acquisition, this doctrine cannot
without reservation be applied to negative
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
truth. When the only truth ascertain
able is that nothing can be known, we
do not, by this knowledge, gain any
new fact by which to guide ourselves;
we are, at best, only disabused of our
trust in some former guide-mark, which,
though itself fallacious, may have pointed
in the same direction with the best indi
cations we have, and if it happens to be
more conspicuous and legible, may have
kept us right when they might have been
overlooked. It is, in short, perfectly
conceivable that religion may be morally
useful without being intellectually sus
tainable ; and it would be a proof of
great prejudice in any unbeliever to deny
that there have been ages, and that there
are still both nations and individuals,
with regard to whom this is actually the
case. Whether it is the case generally,
and with reference to the future, it is the
object of this paper to examine. We
propose to inquire whether the belief in
religion, considered as a mere persuasion,
apart from the question of its truth, is
really indispensable to the temporal wel
fare of mankind; whether the usefulness
of the belief is intrinsic and universal,
or local, temporary, and, in some sense,
accidental; and whether the benefits
which it yields might not be obtained
otherwise, without the very large alloy
of evil, by which, even in the best form
of the belief, those benefits are qualified.
With the arguments on one side of
the question we are all familiar : religious
writers have not neglected to celebrate
to the utmost the advantages both of
religion in general and of their own
religious faith in particular. But those
who have held the contrary opinion have
generally contented themselves with in
sisting on the more obvious and flagrant
of the positive evils which have been en
gendered by past and present forms of
I
religious belief. And, in truth, mankind
have been so unremittingly occupied in
doing evil to one another in the name of
religion, from the sacrifice of Iphigenia
to the Dragonnades of Louis XIV. (not
to descend lower), that for any immediate
purpose there was little need to seek
arguments further off. These odious
consequences, however, do not belong to
religion in itself, but to particular forms
of it, and afford no argument against the
usefulness of any religions except those
by which such enormities are encouraged.
Moreover, the worst of these evils are
already in a great measure extirpated
from the more improved forms of
religion; and as mankind advance in
ideas and in feelings, this process of
extirpation continually goes on: the
immoral or otherwise mischievous con
sequences which have been drawn from
religion are, one by one, abandoned,
and, after having been long fought for as
of its very essence, are discovered to be
easily separable from it. These mis
chiefs, indeed, after they are past, though
no longer arguments against religion,
remain valid as large abatements from its
beneficial influence, by showing that
some of the greatest improvements ever
made in the moral sentiments of man
kind have taken place without it and in
spite of it, and that what we are taught
to regard as the chief of all improving in
fluences has in practice fallen so far
short of such a character that one of the
hardest burdens laid upon the other good
influences of human nature has been
that of improving religion itself. The
improvement, however, has taken place;
it is still proceeding, and for the sake of
fairness it should be assumed to be com
plete. We ought to suppose religion to
have accepted the best human morality
which reason and goodness can work out,
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
37
The first question is interesting to
everybody; the latter only to the best;
but to them it is, if there be any differ
ence, the more important of the two.
We shall begin with the former, as being
that which best admits of being easily
brought to a precise issue.
To speak first, then, of religious belief
as an instrument of social good. We
must commence by drawing a distinction
most commonly overlooked. It is usual
to credit religion as such with the whole
of the power inherent in any system of
moral duties inculcated by education and
enforced by opinion. Undoubtedly
mankind would be in a deplorable state
if no principles or precepts of justice,
veracity, beneficence, were taught
publicly or privately, and if these virtues
were not encouraged, and the opposite
vices repressed, by the praise and blame,
the favourable and unfavourable, senti
ments of mankind. And since nearly
everything of this sort which does take
place takes place in the name of religion ;
since almost all who are taught any
morality whatever have it taught to them
as religion, and inculcated on them
through life principally in that character;
the effect which the teaching produces as
teaching, it is supposed to produce as
religious teaching, and religion receives
the credit of all the influence in human
affairs which belongs to any generally
accepted system of rules for the guidance
and government of human life.
Few persons have sufficiently con
sidered how great an influence this is ;
what vast efficacy belongs naturally to
1 Analysis of the Influence ofNatural Religion any doctrine received with tolerable
on the Temporal Happiness of Mankind. By unanimity as true, and impressed on the
Philip Beauchamp. See Autobiography, pp. 69- mind from the earliest childhood as duty.
71. This work, I believe, is really by George
A little reflection will, I think, lead us to
Grote, the Historian of Greece, and friend and
the conclusion that it is this which is the
fellow-student of Mill. He read and analysed
great moral power in human affairs, and
it in the MS. so early as 1822.—II.T.
from philosophical, Christian, or any
other elements. When it has thus freed
itself from the pernicious consequences
which result from its identification with
any bad moral doctrine, the ground is
clear for considering whether its useful
properties are exclusively inherent in it, or
their benefits can be obtained without it.
This essential portion of the inquiry
into the temporal usefulness of religion
is the subject of the present Essay. It
is a part which has been little treated of
by sceptical writers. The only direct
discussion of it with which I am
acquainted is in a short treatise, under
stood to have been partly compiled from
manuscripts of Mr. Bentham,1 and
abounding in just and profound views;
but which, as it appears to me, presses
many parts of the argument too hard.
This treatise, and the incidental remarks
scattered through the writings of M.
Comte, are the only sources known to
me from which anything very pertinent
to the subject can be made available for
the sceptical side of the argument. I
shall use both of them freely in the
sequel of the present discourse.
The inquiry divides itself into two
parts, corresponding to the double aspect
of the subject; its social, and its in
dividual aspect. What does religion do
for society, and what for the individual ?
What amount of benefit to social
interests, in the ordinary sense of the
phrase, arises from religious belief? And
what influence has it in improving and
ennobling individual human nature ?
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
that religion only seems so powerful be
cause this mighty power has been under
its command.
Consider first the enormous influence
of authority on the human mind. I am
now speaking of involuntary influence;
effect on men’s convictions, on their per
suasion, on their involuntary sentiments.
Authority is the evidence on which the
mass of mankind believe everything
which they are said to know, except facts
of which their own senses have taken
cognisance. It is the evidence on which
even the wisest receive all those truths of
science, or facts in history or in life, of
which they have not personally examined
the proofs. Over the immense majority
of human beings the general concurrence
of mankind, in any matter of opinion, is
all-powerful. Whatever is thus certified
to them they believe with a fulness of
assurance which they do not accord even
to the evidence of their senses when the
general opinion of mankind stands in
opposition to it. When, therefore, any
rule of life and duty, whether grounded
or not on religion, has conspicuously re
ceived the general assent, it obtains a
hold on the belief of every individual,
stronger than it would have even if he
had arrived at it by the inherent force of
his own understanding.
If Novalis
could say, not without a real meaning,
4‘ My belief has gained infinitely to me
from the moment when one other human
being has begun to believe the same,”
how much more when it is not one other
person, but all the human beings whom
one knows of. Some may urge it as an
objection, that no scheme of morality has
this universal assent, and that none,
therefore, can be indebted to this source
for whatever power it possesses over the
mind. So far as relates to the present
age, the assertion is true, and strengthens
the argument which it might at first seem
to controvert; for exactly in proportion
as the received systems of belief have
been contested, and it has become known
that they have many dissentients, their
hold on the general belief has been
loosened, and their practical influence on
conduct has declined; and since this
has happened to them, notwithstanding
the religious sanction which attached to
them, there can be no stronger evidence
that they were powerful not as religion,
but as beliefs generally accepted by man
kind. To find people who believe their
religion as a person believes that fire
will burn his hand when thrust into
it, we must seek them in those Oriental
countries where Europeans do not yet
predominate, or in the European world
when it was still universally Catholic.
Men often disobeyed their religion in
those times, because their human
passions and appetites were too strong
for it, or because the religion itself
afforded means of indulgence to breaches
of its obligations; but, though they dis
obeyed, they, for the most part, did not
doubt. There was in those days an
absolute and unquestioning complete
ness of belief, never since general in
Europe.
Such being the empire exercised over
mankind by simple authority, the mere
belief and testimony of their fellow
creatures; consider next how tremendous
is the power of education; how unspeak
able is the effect of bringing people up
from infancy in a belief, and in habits
founded on it. Consider also that in
all countries, and from the earliest ages
down to the present, not merely those
who are called, in a restricted sense of
the term, the educated, but all, or nearly
all, who have been brought up by parents,
or by any one interested in them, have
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
been taught from their earliest years
some kind of religious belief, and some
precepts as the commands of the
heavenly powers to them and to man
kind. And as it cannot be imagined
that the commands of God are to young
children anything more than the com
mands of their parents, it is reasonable
to think that any system of social duty
which mankind might adopt, even though
divorced from religion, would have the
same advantage of being inculcated from
childhood, and would have it hereafter
much more perfectly than any doctrine
has at present, society being far more
disposed than formerly to take pains for
the moral tuition of those numerous
classes whose education it has hitherto
left very much to chance. Now, it is
especially characteristic of the impres
sions of early education that they possess
what it.is so much more difficult for later
convictions to obtain—command over
the feelings. We see daily how powerful
a hold these first impressions retain over
the feelings even of those who have
given up the opinions which they were
early taught. While, on the other hand,
it is only persons of a much higher
degree of natural sensibility and intellect
combined than it is at all common to
meet with, whose feelings entwine them
selves with anything like the same force
round opinions which they have adopted
from their own investigations later in
life; and even when they do, we may
say with truth that it is because the
strong sense of moral duty, the sincerity,
courage, and self-devotion which enabled
them to do so, were themselves the fruits
of early impressions.
The power of education is almost
boundless : there is not one natural in
clination which it is not strong enough to
coerce, and, if needful, to destroy by
39
disuse. In the greatest recorded victory
which education has ever achieved over
a whole host of natural inclinations
in an entire people—the maintenance
through centuries of the institutions of
Lycurgus—it was very little, if even at
all, indebted to religion : for the Gods
of the Spartans were the same as those
of other Greek States; and though, no
doubt, every State of Greece believed
that its particular polity had at its first
establishment some sort of divine sanc
tion (mostly that of the Delphian oracle),
there was seldom any difficulty in obtain
ing the same or an equally powerful
sanction for a change. It was not
religion which formed the strength of
the Spartan institutions : the root of the
system was devotion to Sparta, to the
ideal of the country or State; which,
transformed into ideal devotion to a
greater country, the world, would be
equal to that and far nobler achieve
ments. Among the Greeks generally
social morality was extremely indepen
dent of religion. The inverse relation
was rather that which existed between
them; the worship of the gods was
inculcated chiefly as a social duty, inas
much as, if they were neglected or
insulted, it was believed that their dis
pleasure would fall not more upon the
offending individual than upon the State
or community which bred and tolerated
him. Such moral teaching as existed in
Greece had very little to do with religion.
The gods were not supposed to concern
themselves much with men’s conduct to
one another, except when men had con
trived to make the gods themselves an
interested party, by placing an assertion
or an engagement under the sanction of a
solemn appeal to them, by oath or vow.
I grant that the sophists and philoso
phers, and even popular orators, did
�40
UTILITY OF RELIGION
their best to press religion into the
service of their special objects, and to
make it be thought that the sentiments
of whatever kind, which they were
engaged in inculcating, were particularly
acceptable to the gods; but this never
seems the primary consideration in any
case save those of direct offence to the
dignity of the gods themselves. For
the enforcement of human moralities
secular inducements were almost exclu
sively relied on. The case of Greece is,
I believe, the only one in which any
teaching, other than religious, has had
the unspeakable advantage of forming
the basis of education; and though
much may be said against the quality of
some part of the teaching, very little can
be said against its effectiveness. The
most memorable example of the power
of education over conduct is afforded
(as I have just remarked) by this excep
tional case; constituting a strong pre
sumption that in .other cases early
religious teaching has owed its power
over mankind rather to its being early
than to its being religious.
We have now considered two powers,
that of authority and that of early educa
tion, which operate through men’s in
voluntary beliefs, feelings, and desires,
and which religion has hitherto held
as its almost exclusive appanage. Let
us now consider a third power which
operates directly on their actions, whether
their involuntary sentiments are carried
with it or not. This is the power of
public opinion; of the praise and blame,
the favour and disfavour, of their fellow
creatures; and is a source of strength
inherent in any system of moral belief
which is generally adopted, whether con
nected with religion or not.
Men are so much accustomed to give
to the motives that decide their actions
more flattering names than justly belong
to them that they are generally quite un
conscious how much those parts of their
conduct which they most pride them
selves on (as well as some which they
are ashamed of) are determined by the
motive of public opinion. Of course,
public opinion for the most part enjoins
the same things which are enjoined by
the received social morality; that
morality being, in truth, the summary of
the conduct which each one of the
multitude, whether he himself observes
it with any strictness or not, desires that
others should observe towards him.
People are therefore easily able to flatter
themselves that they are acting from the
motive of conscience when they are
doing in obedience to the inferior motive
things which their conscience approves.
We continually see how great is the
power of opinion in opposition to con
science; how men “follow a multitude
to do evil ”; how often opinion induces
them to do what their conscience dis
approves, and still oftener prevents them
from doing what it commands. But
when the motive of public opinion acts
in the same direction with conscience,
which, since it has usually itself made the
conscience in the first instance, it for the
most part naturally does; it is then, of
all motives which operate on the bulk of
mankind, the most overpowering.
The names of all the strongest passions
(except the merely animal ones) mani
fested by human nature are each of them
a name for some one part only of the
motive derived from what I here call
public opinion. The love of glory ; the
love of praise; the love of admiration ;
the love of respect and deference ; even
the love of sympathy, are portions of its
attractive power. Vanity is a vituperative
name for its attractive influence generally,
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
when considered excessive in degree.
The fear of shame, the dread of ill repute
or of being disliked or hated, are the
direct and simple forms of its deterring
power. But the deterring force of the
unfavourable sentiments of mankind
does not consist solely in the painfulness
of knowing oneself to be the object of
those sentiments; it includes all the
penalties which they can inflict: ex
clusion from social intercourse and from
the innumerable good offices which
human beings require from one another;
the forfeiture of all that is called success
in life; often the great diminution or
total loss of means of subsistence;
positive ill offices of various kinds,
sufficient to render life miserable, and
reaching in some states of society as far
as actual persecution to death. And
again the attractive or impelling influ
ence of public opinion includes the
whole range of what is commonly meant
by ambition ; for, except in times of law
less military violence, the objects of
social ambition can be attained only by
means of the good opinion and favour
able disposition of our fellow-creatures;
now, in nine cases out of ten, would
those objects be even desired were it not
for the power they confer over the senti
ments of mankind. Even the pleasure
of self-approbation, in the great majority,
is mainly dependent on the opinion of
others. Such is the involuntary influence
of authority on ordinary minds that per
sons must be of a better than ordinary
mould to be capable of a full assurance
that they are in the right, when the world
—that is, when their world—thinks them
wrong ; nor is there, to most men, any
proof so demonstrative of their own
virtue or talent as that people in general
seem to believe in it. Through all depart
ments of human affairs regard for the
4’
sentiments of our fellow-creatures is in
one shape or other, in nearly all
characters, the pervading motive. And
we ought to note that this motive is
naturally strongest in the most sensitive
natures, which are the most promising
material for the formation of great virtues.
How far its power reaches is known by
too familiar experience to require either
proof or illustration here. When once
the means of living have been obtained,
the far greater part of the remaining
labour and effort which takes place on
the earth has for its object to acquire
the respect or the favourable regard of
mankind; to be looked up to, or at all
events not to be looked down upon, by
them. The industrial and commercial
activity which advances civilisation, the
frivolity, prodigality, and selfish thirst of
aggrandisement which retard it, flow
equally from that source. While, as an
instance of the power exercised by the
terrors derived from public opinion, we
know how many murders have been
committed merely to remove a witness
who knew and was likely to disclose
some secret that would bring disgrace
upon his murderer.
Any one who fairly and impartially
considers the subject will see reason to
believe that those great effects on human
conduct which are commonly ascribed
to motives derived directly from religion
have mostly for their proximate cause the
influence of human opinion. Religion
has been powerful not by its intrinsic
force, but because it has wielded that
additional and more mighty power. The
effect of religion has been immense in
giving a direction to public opinion ;
which has, in many most important
respects, been wholly determined by it.
But without the sanctions superadded by
public opinion its own proper sanctions
�42
UTILITY OF RELIGION
have never, save in exceptional charac
ters, or in peculiar moods of mind,
exercised a very potent influence, after
the times had gone by, in which divine
agency was supposed habitually to
employ temporal rewards and punish
ments. When a man firmly believed
that, if he violated the sacredness of a
particular sanctuary, he would be struck
dead on the spot, or smitten suddenly
with a mortal disease, he doubtless took
care not to incur the penalty ; but when
any one had had the courage to defy the
danger, and escaped with impunity, the
spell was broken. If ever any people
were taught that they were under a
divine government, and that unfaithful
ness to their religion and law would be
visited from above with temporal
chastisements, the Jews were so. Yet
their history was a mere succession of
lapses into Paganism. Their prophets
and historians, who held fast to the
ancient beliefs (though they gave them
so liberal an interpretation as to think it
a sufficient manifestation of God’s dis
pleasure towards a king if any evil
happened to his great grandson), never
ceased to complain that their countrymen
turned a deaf ear to their vaticinations ;
and hence, with the faith they held in a
divine government operating by temporal
penalties, they could not fail to anticipate
(as Mirabeau’s father, without such
prompting, was able to do on the eve of
the French Revolution) laculbutegenerate;
an expectation which, luckily for the
credit of their, prophetic powers, was
fulfilled; unlike that of the Apostle John,
who, in the only intelligible prophecy in
the Revelations, foretold to the city of
the seven hills a fate like that of Nineveh
and Babylon; which prediction remains
to this hour unaccomplished. Unques
tionably the conviction which experience
in time forced on all but the very
ignorant, that divine punishments were
not to be confidently expected in a tem
poral form, contributed much to the
downfall of the old religions, and the
general adoption of one which, without
absolutely excluding providential inter
ferences in this life for the punishment
of guilt or the reward of merit, removed
the principal scene of divine retribution
to a world after death. But rewards and
punishments postponed to that distance
of time, and never seen by the eye, are
not calculated, even when infinite and
eternal, to have, on ordinary minds, a
very powerful effect in opposition to
strong temptation. Their remoteness
alone is a prodigious deduction from
their efficacy on such minds as those
which most require the restraint of
punishment. A still greater abatement
is their uncertainty, which belongs to
them from the very nature of the case :
for rewards and punishments adminis
tered after death must be awarded not
definitely to particular actions, but on a
general survey of the person’s whole life,
and he easily persuades himself that,
whatever may have been his peccadilloes,
there will be a balance in his favour at
the last. All positive religions aid this
self-delusion. Bad religions teach that
divine vengeance may be bought off by
offerings or personal abasement; the
better religions, not to drive sinners to
despair, dwell so much on the divine
mercy that hardly any one is compelled
to think himself irrevocably condemned.
The sole quality in these punishments
which might seem calculated to make
them efficacious, their overpowering mag
nitude, is itself a reason why nobody
(except a hypochondriac here and there)
ever really believes that he is in any very
serious danger of incurring them. Even
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
the worst malefactor is hardly able to
think that any crime he lias had it in his
power to commit, any evil he can have
inflicted in this short space of existence,
can have deserved torture extending
through an eternity. Accordingly, re
ligious writers and preachers are never
tired of complaining how little effect
religious motives have on men’s lives and
conduct, notwithstanding the tremendous
penalties denounced.
Mr. Bentham, whom I have already
mentioned as one of the few authors
who have written anything to the purpose
on the efficacy of the religious sanction,
adduces several cases to prove that
religious obligation, when not enforced
by public opinion, produces scarcely any
effect on conduct. His first example is
that of oaths. The oaths taken in courts
of justice, and any others which, from
the manifest importance to society of
their being kept, public opinion rigidly
enforces, are felt as real and binding
obligations. But university oaths and
custom-house oaths, though in a religious
point of view equally obligatory, are in
practice utterly disregarded even by men
in other respects honourable. The uni
versity oath to obey the statutes has
been for centuries, with universal acquies
cence, set at nought; and utterly false
statements are (or used to be) daily and
unblushingly sworn to at the Custom
house by persons as attentive as other
people to all the ordinary obligations of
life—the explanation being that veracity
in these cases was not enforced by
public opinion. The second case which
Bentham cites is duelling; a practice
now in this country obsolete, but in full
vigour in several other Christian coun
tries ; deemed and admitted to be a sin
by almost all who, nevertheless, in obedi
ence to opinion, and to escape from
43
personal humiliation, are guilty of it.
The third case is that of illicit sexual
intercourse, which in both sexes stands
in the very highest rank of religious sins,
yet, not being severely censured by
opinion in the male sex, they have in
general very little scruple in committing
it; while in the case of women, though
the religious obligation is not stronger,
yet, being backed in real earnest by
public opinion, it is commonly effectual.
Some objection may doubtless be
taken to Bentham’s instances, considered
as crucial experiments on the power of
the religious sanction; for (it may be
said) people do not really believe that in
these cases they shall be punished by
God, any more than by man. And this
is certainly true in the case of those
university and other oaths, which are
habitually taken without any intention of
keeping them. The oath, in these
cases, is regarded as a mere formality,
destitute of any serious meaning in the
sight of the Deity; and the most scrupu
lous person, even if he does reproach
himself for having taken an oath which
nobody deems fit to be kept, does not in
his conscience tax himself with the guilt
of perjury, but only with the profanation
of a ceremony. This, therefore, is not a
good example of the weakness of the
religious motive when divorced from
that of human opinion. The point
which it illustrates is rather the tendency
of the one motive to come and go with
the other, so that, where the penalties of
public opinion cease, the religious motive
ceases also. The same criticism, how
ever, is not equally applicable to Ben
tham’s other examples—duelling and
sexual irregularities. Those who do
these acts—the first by the command of
public opinion, the latter with its indul
gence—really do, in most cases, believe
�44
UTILITY OF RELIGION
that they are offending God. Doubtless,
they do not think that they are offending
him in such a degree as very seriously to
endanger their salvation. Their reliance
on his mercy prevails over their dread of
his resentment: affording an exemplifica
tion of the remark already made, that
the unavoidable uncertainty of religious
penalties makes them feeble as a
deterring motive. They are so, even in
the case of acts which human opinion
condemns ; much more with those to
which it is indulgent. What mankind
think venial, it is hardly ever supposed
that God looks upon in a serious light;
at least by those who feel in themselves
any inclination to practise it.
I do not for a moment think of deny
ing that there are states of mind in which
the idea of religious punishment acts
with the most overwhelming force. In
hypochondriacal disease, and in those
with whom, from great disappointments
or other moral causes, the thoughts and
imagination have assumed an habitually
melancholy complexion, that topic,
falling in with the pre-existing tendency
of the mind, supplies images well fitted
to drive the unfortunate sufferer even to
madness. Often, during a temporary
state of depression, these ideas take such
a hold of the mind as to give a per
manent turn to the character ; being the
most common case of what, in sectarian
phraseology, is called conversion. But
if the depressed state ceases after the
conversion, as it commonly does, and
the convert does not relapse, but per
severes in his new course of life, the
principal difference between it and the
old is usually found to be that the man
now guides his life by the public opinion
of his religious associates, as he before
guided it by that of the profane world.
At all events, there is one clear proof how
little the generality of mankind, either
religious or worldly, really dread eternal
punishments, when we see how, even at
the approach of death, when the remote
ness which took so much from their
effect has been exchanged for the closest
proximity, almost all persons who have
not been guilty of some enormous crime
(and many who have) are quite free from
uneasiness as to their prospects in
another world, and never for a moment
seem to think themselves in any real
danger of eternal punishment.
With regard to the cruel deaths and
bodily tortures which confessors and
martyrs have so often undergone for the
sake of religion, I would not depreciate
them by attributing any part of this
admirable courage and constancy to the
influence of human opinion. Human
opinion, indeed, has shown itself quite
equal to the production of similar firm
ness in persons not otherwise distin
guished by moral excellence ; such as
the North American Indian at the stake.
But if it was not the thought of glory in
the eyes of their fellow-religionists which
upheld these heroic sufferers in their
agony, as little do I believe that it was,
generally speaking, that of the pleasures
of heaven or the pains of hell. Their
impulse was a divine enthusiasm—a self
forgetting devotion to an idea : a state of
exalted feeling, by no means peculiar
to religion, but which it is the privilege
of every great cause to inspire; a
phenomenon belonging to the critical
moments of existence, not to the ordi
nary play of human motives, and from
which nothing can be inferred as to the
efficacy of the ideas which it sprung
from, whether religious or any other, in
overcoming ordinary temptations and
regulating the course of daily life.
We may now have done with this
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
branch of the subject, which is, after all,
the vulgarest part of it. The value of
religion as a supplement to human laws,
a more cunning sort of police, an
auxiliary to the thief-catcher and the
hangman, is not that part of its claims
which the more high-minded of its
votaries are fondest of insisting on ; and
they would probably be as ready as any
one to admit that, if the nobler offices
of religion in the soul could be dispensed
with, a substitute might be found for so
coarse and selfish a social instrument as
the fear of hell. In their view of the
matter, the best of mankind absolutely
require religion for the perfection of their
own character, even though the coercion
of the worst might possibly be accom
plished without its aid.
Even in the social point of view, how
ever, under its most elevated aspect,
these nobler spirits generally assert the
necessity of religion, as a teacher, if not
as an enforcer, of social morality. They
say that religion alone can teach us what
morality is; that all the high morality
ever recognised by mankind was learnt
from religion; that the greatest unin
spired philosophers in their sublimest
flights stopped far short of the Christian
morality, and, whatever inferior morality
they may have attained to (by the assist
ance, as many think, of dim traditions
derived from the Hebrew books, or from
a primaeval revelation), they never could
induce the common mass of their fellow
citizens to accept it from them. That
only when a morality is understood to
come from the gods do men in general
adopt it, rally round it, and lend their
human sanctions for its enforcement.
That, granting the sufficiency of human
motives to make the rule obeyed, were it
not for the religious idea we should not
have had the rule itself.
45
There is truth in much of this, con
sidered as matter of history. Ancient
peoples have generally, if not always,
received their morals, their laws, their
intellectual beliefs, and even their prac
tical arts of life, all in short which tended
either to guide or to discipline them, as
revelations from the superior powers, and
in any other way could not easily have
been induced to accept them. This
was partly the effect of their hopes and
fears from those powers, which were of
much greater and more universal potency
in early times, when the agency of the
gods was seen in the daily events of life,
experience not having yet disclosed the
fixed laws according to which physical
phenomena succeed one another. In
dependently, too, of personal hopes and
fears, the involuntary deference felt by
these rude minds for power superior to
their own, and the tendency to suppose
that beings of superhuman power must
also be of superhuman knowledge and
wisdom, made them disinterestedly desire
to conform their conduct to the pre
sumed preferences of these powerful
beings, and to adopt no new practice
without their authorisation either spon
taneously given, or solicited and ob
tained.
But because, when men were still
savages, they would not have received
either moral or scientific truths unless
they had supposed them to be supernaturally imparted, does it follow that
they would now give up moral truths any
more than scientific because they be
lieved them to have no higher origin than
wise and noble human hearts ? Are not
moral truths strong enough in their own
evidence, at all events to retain the belief
of mankind when once they have
acquired it ? I grant that some of the
precepts of Christ as exhibited in the
�46
UTILITY OF RELIGION
Gospels—rising far above the Paulism
which is the foundation of ordinary
Christianity—carry some kinds of moral
goodness to a greater height than had
ever been attained before, though much
even of what is supposed to be peculiar
to them is equalled in the meditations of
Marcus Antoninus, which we have no
ground for believing to have been in any
way indebted to Christianity. But this
benefit, whatever it amounts to, has been
gained. Mankind have entered into the
possession of it. It has become the
property of humanity, and cannot now
be lost by anything short of a return to
primaeval barbarism. The “ new com
mandment to love one another”/ the
recognition that the greatest are those
who serve, not who are served by,
others; the reverence for the weak and
humble, which is the foundation of
chivalry, they and not the strong being
pointed out as having the first place in
God’s regard, and the first claim on their
fellow-men; the lesson of the parable of
the Good Samaritan; that of “he that
is without sin let him throw the first
stone”; the precept of doing as we
would be done by; and such other
noble moralities as are to be found,
mixed with some poetical exaggerations,
and some maxims of which it is difficult
to ascertain the precise object; in the
authentic sayings of Jesus of Nazareth :
these are surely in sufficient harmony
with the intellect and feelings of every
good man or woman to be in no danger
of being let go, after having been once
acknowledged as the creed of the best
1 Not, however, a new commandment. In
justice to the great Hebrew lawgiver, it should
always be remembered that the precept, to love
thy neighbour as thyself, already existed in the
Pentateuch ; and very surprising it is to find it
there. (See John xiii. 34, Levit. xix. 18.)
and foremost portion of our species.
There will be, as there have been, short
comings enough for a long time to come
in acting on them ; but that they should
be forgotten, or cease to be operative on
the human conscience, while human
beings remain cultivated or civilised,
may be pronounced, once for all, im
possible.
On the other hand, there is a very real
evil consequent on ascribing a super
natural origin to the received maxims of
morality. That origin consecrates the
whole of them, and protects them from
being discussed or criticised. So that if,
among the moral doctrines received as a
part of religion, there be any which are
imperfect—which were either erroneous
from the first, or not properly limited and
guarded in the expression, or which, un
exceptionable once, are no longer suited
to the changes that have taken place in
human relations (and it is my firm belief
that in so-called Christian morality
instances of all these kinds are to be
found), these doctrines are considered
equally binding on the conscience with
the noblest, most permanent, and most
universal precepts of Christ. Wherever
morality is supposed to be of supernatural
origin, morality is stereotyped; as law is,
for the same reason, among believers in
the Koran.
Belief, then, in the supernatural, great
as are the services which it rendered in
the early stages of human development,
cannot be considered to be any longer
required, either for enabling us to know
what is right and wrong, in social
morality, or for supplying us with motives
to do right and to abstain from wrong.
Such belief, therefore, is not necessary
for social purposes, at least in the coarse
way in which these can be considered
apart from the character of the individual
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
human being. That more elevated
branch of the subject now remains to be
considered. If supernatural beliefs are
indeed necessary to the perfection of the
individual character, they are necessary
also to the highest excellence in social
conduct: necessary in a far higher sense
than that vulgar one which constitutes
it the great support of morality in
common eyes.
Let us, then, consider what it is in
human nature which causes it to require
a religion; what wants of the human
mind religion supplies, and what qualities
it developes. When we have understood
this, we shall be better able to judge
how far these wants can be otherwise
supplied, and those qualities, or qualities
equivalent to them, unfolded and brought
to perfection by other means.
The old saying, Primus in orbe Deos
fecit timor, I hold to be untrue, or to con
tain, at most, only a small amount of truth.
Belief in gods had, I conceive, even in
the rudest minds, a more honourable
origin. Its universality has been very
rationally explained from the spon
taneous tendency of the mind to attribute
life and volition, similar to what it feels
in itself, to all natural objects and
phenomena which appear to be self
moving. This was a plausible fancy, and
no better theory could be formed at first.
It was naturally persisted in so long as
the motions and operations of these
objects seemed to be arbitrary, and in
capable of being accounted for but by
the free choice of the Power itself. At
first, no doubt, the objects themselves
were supposed to be alive; and this
belief still subsists among African fetish
worshippers. But as it must soon have
appeared absurd that things which could
do so much more than man, could not or
would not do what man does, as for
47
example to speak, the transition was
made to supposing that the object pre
sent to the senses was inanimate, but
was the creature and instrument of an
invisible being with a form and organs
similar to the human.
These beings having first been be
lieved in, fear of them necessarily
followed ; since they were thought able
to inflict at pleasure on human beings
great evils, which the sufferers neither
knew how to avert nor to foresee, but
were left dependent, for their chances of
doing either, upon solicitations addressed
to the deities themselves. It is true,
therefore, that fear had much to do with
religion; but belief in the gods evidently
preceded, and did not arise from, fear:
though the fear, when established, was
a strong support to the belief, nothing
being conceived to be so great an offence
to the divinities as any doubt of their
existence.
It is unnecessary to prosecute further
the natural history of religion, as we
have not here to account for its origin in
rude minds, but for its persistency in the
cultivated. A sufficient explanation of
this will, I conceive, be found in the
small limits of man’s certain knowledge
and the boundlessness of his desire to
know. Human existence is girt round
with mystery: the narrow region of our
experience is a small island in the midst
of a boundless sea, which at once awes
our feelings and stimulates our imagina
tion by its vastness and its obscurity.
To add to the mystery, the domain of
our earthly existence is not only an
island in infinite space, but also in
infinite time. The past and the future
are alike shrouded from us : we neither
know the origin of anything which is nor
its final destination. If we feel deeply
interested in knowing that there are
�4S
UTILITY OF RELIGION
myriads of worlds at an immeasurable,
and to our faculties inconceivable, dis
tance from us in space; if we are eager
to discover what little we can about
these worlds, and when we cannot know
what they are, can never satiate our
selves with speculating on what they may
be; is it not a matter of far deeper inte
rest to us to learn, or even to conjecture,
from whence came this nearer world
which we inhabit—what cause or agency
made it what it is, and on what powers
depends its future fate ? Who would not
desire this more ardently than any other
conceivable knowledge, so long as there
appeared the slightest hope of attaining
it ? What would not one give for any
credible tidings from that mysterious
region, any glimpse into it which might
enable us to see the smallest light
through its darkness, especially any
theory of it which we could believe, and
which represented it as tenanted by a
benignant and not a hostile influence?
But since we are able to penetrate into
that region with the imagination only,
assisted by specious but inconclusive
analogies derived from human agency
and design, imagination is free to fill up
the vacancy with the imagery most con
genial to itself; sublime and elevating if
it be a lofty imagination, low and mean
if it be a grovelling one.
Religion and poetry address them
selves, at least in one of their aspects, to
the same part of the human constitution:
they both supply the same want, that of
ideal conceptions grander and more
beautiful than we see realised in the
prose of human life. Religion, as dis
tinguished from poetry, is the product
of the craving to know whether these
imaginative conceptions have realities
answering to them in some other world
than ours. The mind, in this stage,
eagerly catches at any rumours respect
ing other worlds, especially when de
livered by persons whom it deems wiser
than itself. To the poetry of the super
natural comes to be thus added a
positive belief and expectation, which
unpoetical minds can share with the
poetical. Belief in a god or gods, and
in a life after death, becomes the canvas
which every mind, according to its
capacity, covers with such ideal pictures
as it can either invent or copy. In that
other life each hopes to find the good
which he has failed to find on earth, or
the better which is suggested to him by
the good which on earth he has partially
seen and known. More especially, this
belief supplies the finer minds with
material for conceptions of beings more
awful than they can have known on
earth, and more excellent than they
probably have known. So long as human
life is insufficient to satisfy human aspira
tions, so long there will be a craving for
higher things, which finds its most
obvious satisfaction in religion. So long
as earthly life is full of sufferings, so long
there will be need of consolations, which
the hope of heaven affords to the selfish,
the love of God to the tender and
grateful.
The value, therefore, of religion to the
individual, both in the past and present,
as a source of personal satisfaction and
of elevated feelings, is not to be dis
puted. But it has still to be considered
whether, in order to obtain this good, it
is necessary to travel beyond the boun
daries of the world which we inhabit;
or whether the idealisation of our earthly
life, the cultivation of a high conception
of what it may be made, is not capable
of supplying a poetry, and, in the best
sense of the word, a religion, equally
fitted to exalt the feelings, and (with the
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
same aid from education) still better
calculated to ennoble the conduct, than
any belief respecting the unseen powers.
At the bare suggestion of such a possi
bility, many will exclaim that the short
duration, the smallness and insignificance
of life, if there is no prolongation of it
beyond what we see, makes it impossible
that great and elevated feelings can con
nect themselves with anything laid out
on so small a scale : that such a concep
tion of life can match with nothing
higher than Epicurean feelings, and the
Epicurean doctrine, “ Let us eat and
drink, for to-morrow we die.”
Unquestionably, within certain limits,
the maxim of the Epicureans is sound,
and applicable to much higher things
than eating and drinking. To make
the most of the present for all good
purposes, those of enjoyment among the
rest; to keep under control those mental
dispositions which lead to undue sacri
fice of present good for a future which
may never arrive; to cultivate the habit
of deriving pleasure from things within
our reach, rather than from the too eager
pursuit of objects at a distance; to think
all time wasted which is not spent either
in personal pleasure or in doing things
useful to oneself or others: these are
wise maxims, and the “carpe diem” doc
trine, carried thus far, is a rational and
legitimate corollary from the shortness of
life. But that because life is short we
should care for nothing beyond it, is not
a legitimate conclusion; and the supposi
tion, that human beings in general are
not capable of feeling deep, and even the
deepest, interest in things which they will
never live to see, is a view of human
nature as false as it is abject. Let it be
remembered that, if individual life is
short, the life of the human species is
not short; its indefinite duration is
49
practically equivalent to endlessness; and,
being combined with indefinite capability
of improvement, it offers to the imagina
tion and sympathies a large enough
object to satisfy any reasonable demand
for grandeur of aspiration. If such an
object appears small to a mind accus
tomed to dream of infinite and eternal
beatitudes, it will expand into far other
dimensions when those baseless fancies
shall have receded into the past.
Nor let it be thought that only the
more eminent of our species, in mind
and heart, are capable of identifying their
feelings with the entire life of the human
race. This noble capability implies, in
deed, a certain cultivation, but not
superior to that which might be, and
certainly will be if human improvement
continues, the lot of all. Objects far
smaller than this, and equally confined
within the limits of the earth (though
not within those of a single human life),
have been found sufficient to inspire
large masses and long successions of
mankind with an enthusiasm capable of
ruling the conduct and colouring the
whole life. Rome was to the entire
Roman people for many generations as
much a religion as Jehovah was to the
Jews; nay, much more, for they never
fell off from their worship as the Jews
did from theirs. And the Romans,
otherwise a selfish people, with no very
remarkable faculties of any kind except
the purely practical, derived, nevertheless,
from this one idea a certain greatness of
soul, which manifests itself in all their
history where that idea is concerned and
nowhere else, and has earned for them
the large share of admiration, in other
respects not at all deserved, which has
been felt for them by most noble-minded
persons from that time to this.
When we consider how ardent a
E
�5°
UTILITY OF RELIGION
sentiment, in favourable circumstances
of education, the love of country has
become, we cannot judge it impossible
that the love of that larger country, the
world, may be nursed into similar
strength, both as a source of elevated
emotion and as a principle of duty. He
who needs any other lesson on this sub
ject than the whole course of ancient
history affords, let him read Cicero de
Officiis. It cannot be said that the
standard of morals laid down in that
celebrated treatise is a high standard.
To our notions it is on many points un
duly lax, and admits capitulations of
conscience. But on the subject of duty
to our country there is no compromise.
That any man with the smallest pre
tensions to virtue could hesitate to sacri
fice life, reputation, family, everything
valuable to him, to the love of country is
a supposition which this eminent inter
preter of Greek and Roman morality
cannot entertain for a moment. If, then,
persons could be trained, as we see they
were, not only to believe in theory that
the good of their country was an object
to which all others ought to yield, but to
feel this practically as the grand duty of
life, so also may they be made to feel the
same absolute obligation towards the
universal good. A morality grounded
on large and wise views of the good of
the whole, neither sacrificing the in
dividual to the aggregate nor the
aggregate to the individual, but giving
to duty on the one hand and to freedom
and spontaneity on the other their proper
province, would derive its power in the
superior natures from sympathy and
benevolence and the passion for ideal
excellence: in the inferior, from the
same feelings cultivated up to the
measure of their capacity, with the super
added force of shame. This exalted
morality would not depend for its
ascendancy on any hope of reward ; but
the reward which might be looked for,
and the thought of which would be a
consolation in suffering, and a support in
moments of weakness, would not be a
problematical future existence, but the
approbation, in this, of those whom we
respect, and ideally of all those, dead or
living, whom we admire or venerate.
For the thought that our dead parents
or friends would have approved our con
duct is a scarcely less powerful motive
than the knowledge that our living ones
do approve it; and the idea that
Socrates, or Howard, or Washington, or
Antoninus, or Christ, would have sympa
thised with us, or that we are attempting
to do our part in the spirit in which they
did theirs, has operated on the very best
minds, as a strong incentive to act up to
their highest feelings and convictions.
To call these sentiments by the name
morality, exclusively of any other title, is
claiming too little for them. They are a
real religion; of which, as of other
religions, outward good works (the ut
most meaning usually suggested by the
word “morality”) are only a part, and are
indeed rather the fruits of the religion
than the religion itself. The essence of
religion is the strong and earnest direction
of the emotions and desires towards an
ideal object, recognised as of the highest
excellence, and as rightfully paramount
over all selfish objects of desire. This
condition is fulfilled by the Religion of
Humanity in as eminent a degree, and
in as high a sense, as by the supernatural
religions even in their best manifesta
tions, and far more so than in any of
their others.
Much more might be added on this
topic; but enough has been said to con
vince any one, who can distinguish
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
between the intrinsic capacities of human
nature and the forms in which those
capacities happen to have been histori
cally developed, that the sense of unity
with mankind, and a deep feeling for the
general good, may be cultivated into a
sentiment and a principle capable of ful
filling every important function of religion
and itself justly entitled to the name. I
will now further maintain that it is not
only capable of fulfilling these functions,
but would fulfil them better than any
form whatever of supernaturalism. It is
not only entitled to be called a religion :
it is a better religion than any of those
which are ordinarily called by that title.
For, in the first place, it is dis
interested. It carries the thoughts and
feelings out of self, and fixes them on an
unselfish object, loved and pursued as an
end for its own sake. The religions
which deal in promises and threats
regarding a future life do exactly the
contrary : they fasten down the thoughts
to the person’s own posthumous interests;
they tempt him to regard the perfor
mance of his duties to others mainly as
a means to his own personal salvation;
and are one of the most serious obstacles
to the great purpose of moral culture,
the strengthening of the unselfish and
weakening of the selfish element in our
nature; since they hold out to the
imagination selfish good and evil of such
tremendous magnitude that it is difficult
for any one who fully believes in their
reality to have feeling or interest to spare
for any other distant and ideal object.
It is true, many of the most unselfish of
mankind have been believers in super
naturalism, because their minds have not
dwelt on the threats and promises of
their religion, but chiefly on the idea of
a Being to whom they looked up with a
confiding love, and in whose hands they
5i
willingly left all that related especially to
themselves. Butin its effect on common
minds, what now goes by the name of
religion operates mainly through the
feelings of self-interest. Even the Christ
of the Gospel holds out the direct
promise of reward from heaven as a
primary inducement to the noble and
beautiful beneficence towards our fellow
creatures which he so impressively incul
cates. This is a radical inferiority of
the best supernatural religions, compared
with the Religion of Humanity, since
the greatest thing which moral influences
can do for the amelioration of human
nature is to cultivate the unselfish feel
ings in the only mode in which any
active principle in human nature can be
effectually cultivated—namely, by habitual
exercise; but the habit of expecting to
be rewarded in another life for our con
duct in this makes even virtue itself no
longer an exercise of the unselfish
feelings.
Secondly, it is an immense abate
ment from the worth of the old religions
as means of elevating and improving
human character, that it is nearly, if not
quite, impossible for them to produce
their best moral effects, unless we sup
pose a certain torpidity, if not positive
twist, in the intellectual faculties. For it
is impossible that any one who habitually
thinks, and who is unable to blunt his
inquiring intellect by sophistry, should
be able without misgiving to go on
ascribing absolute perfection to the
author and ruler of so clumsily made
and capriciously governed a creation as
this planet and the life of its inhabitants.
1 he adoration of such a being cannot be
with the whole heart, unless the heart
is first considerably sophisticated. The
worship must either be greatly over
clouded by doubt, and occasionally quite
�52
UTILITY OF RELIGION
darkened by it, or the moral sentiments
must sink to the low level of the ordi
nances of Nature : the worshipper must
learn to think blind partiality, atrocious
cruelty, and reckless injustice, not
blemishes in an object of worship, since
all these abound to excess in the com
monest phenomena of Nature. It is
true, the God who is worshipped is not,
generally speaking, the God of Nature
only, but also the God of some revela
tion ; and the character of the revelation
will greatly modify and, it may be,
improve the moral influences of the
religion. This is emphatically true of
Christianity; since the Author of the
Sermon on the Mount is assuredly a far
more benignant Being than the Author
of Nature. But, unfortunately, the be
liever in the Christian revelation is
obliged to believe that the same Being
is the author of both. This, unless he
resolutely averts his mind from the
subject, or practises the act of quieting
his conscience by sophistry, involves
him in moral perplexities without end;
since the ways of his Deity in Nature
are on many occasions totally at variance
with the precepts, as he believes, of the
same Deity in the Gospel. He who
comes out with least moral damage from
this embarrassment is probably the one
who never attempts to reconcile the two
standards with one another, but con
fesses to himself that the purposes of
Providence are mysterious, that its ways
are not our ways, that its justice and
goodness are not the justice and good
ness which we can conceive and which
it befits us to practise. When, however,
this is the feeling of the believer, the
worship of the Deity ceases to be the
adoration of abstract moral perfection.
It becomes the bowing down to a
gigantic image of something not fit for
us to imitate. It is the worship of power
only.
I say nothing of the moral difficulties
and perversions involved in revelation
itself; though even in the Christianity
of the Gospels, at least in its ordinary
interpretation, there are some of so
flagrant a character as almost to out
weigh all the beauty and benignity and
moral greatness which so eminently dis
tinguish the sayings and character of
Christ. The recognition, for example,
of the object of highest worship in a
being who could make a hell, and who
could create countless generations of
human beings with the certain fore
knowledge that he was creating them for
this fate. Is there any moral enormity
which might not be justified by imita
tion of such a Deity ? And is it possible
to adore such a one without a frightful
distortion of the standard of right and
wrong ? Any other of the outrages to
the most ordinary justice and humanity
involved in the common Christian con
ception of the moral character of God
sinks into insignificance beside this
dreadful idealisation of wickedness.
Most of them, too, are happily not so
unequivocally deducible from the very
words of Christ as to be indisputably a
part of Christian doctrine. It may be
doubted, for instance, whether Chris
tianity is really responsible for atone
ment and redemption, original sin and
vicarious punishment: and the same may
be said respecting the doctrine which
makes belief in the divine mission of
Christ a necessary condition of salvation.
It is nowhere represented that Christ
himself made this statement, except in
the huddled-up account of the Resurrec
tion contained in the concluding verses
of St. Mark, which some critics (I believe
the best) consider to be an interpolation.
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
Again, the proposition that “ the powers
that be are ordained of God,” and the
whole series of corollaries deduced
from it in the Epistles, belong to St.
Paul, and must stand or fall with
Paulism, not with Christianity. But
there is one moral contradiction insepar
able from every form of Christianity,
which no ingenuity ca.i resolve, and no
sophistry explain away. It is, that so
precious a gift, bestowed on a few,
should have been withheld from the
many; that countless millions of human
beings should have been allowed to live
and die, to sin and suffer, without the
one thing needful^ the divine remedy for
sin and suffering, which it would have
cost the Divine Giver as little to have
vouchsafed to all as to have bestowed
by special grace upon a favoured
minority. Add to this that the divine
message, assuming it to be such, has
been authenticated by credentials so in
sufficient that they fail to convince a
large proportion of the strongest and
cultivated minds, and the tendency to
disbelieve them appears to grow with
the growth of scientific knowledge and
critical discrimination. He who can be
lieve these to be the intentional short
comings of a perfectly good Being must
impose silence on every prompting of
the sense of goodness and justice as
received among men.
It is, no doubt, possible (and there
are many instances of it) to worship
with the intensest devotion either Deity,
that of Nature or of the Gospel, without
any perversion of the moral sentiments ;
but this must be by fixing the attention
exclusively on what is beautiful and
beneficent in the precepts and spirit of
the Gospel and in the dispensations of
Nature, and putting all tjiat is the reverse
as entirely aside as if it did not exist.
53
Accordingly, this simple and innocent
faith can only, as I have said, co-exist
with a torpid and inactive state of the
speculative faculties. For a person of
exercised intellect there is no way of
attaining anything equivalent to it, save
by sophistication and perversion, either
of the understanding or of the con
science. It may almost always be said
both of sects and of individuals, who
derive their morality from religion, that
the better logicians they are, the worse
moralists.
One only form of belief in the super
natural—one only theory respecting the
origin and government of the universe—■
stands wholly clear both of intellectual
contradiction and of moral obliquity. It
is that which, resigning irrevocably the
idea of an omnipotent creator, regards
Nature and Life not as the expression
throughout of the moral character and
purpose of the Deity, but as the product
of a struggle between contriving good
ness and an intractable material, as was
believed by Plato, or a Principle of Evil,
as was the doctrine of the Manicheans.
A creed like this, which I have known
to be devoutly held by at least one culti
vated and conscientious person of our
own day, allows it to be believed that all
the mass of evil which exists was un
designed by, and exists not by the
appointment of, but in spite of, the Being
whom we are called upon to worship. A
virtuous human being assumes in this
theory the exalted character of a fellow
labourer with the Highest, a fellow
combatant in the great strife; con
tributing his little, which by the aggrega
tion of many like himself becomes much,
towards that progressive ascendancy, and
ultimately complete triumph of good
over evil, which history points to, and
which this doctrine teaches us to regard
�54
UTILITY OF RELIGION
as planned by the Being to whom we
owe all the benevolent contrivance we
behold in Nature. Against the moral
tendency of this creed no possible
objection can lie : it can produce on
whoever can succeed in believing it no
other than an ennobling effect. The
evidence for it, indeed, if evidence it can
be called, is too shadowy and unsub
stantial, and the promises it holds out
too distant and uncertain, to admit of its
being a permanent substitute for the
religion of humanity; but the two may
be held in conjunction : and he to whom
ideal good, and the progress of the
world towards it, are already a religion,
even though that other creed may seem
to him a belief not grounded on evidence,
is at liberty to indulge the pleasing and
encouraging thought that its truth is
possible. Apart from all dogmatic belief,
there is for those who need it an ample
domain in the region of the imagination
which may be planted with possibilities,
with hypotheses which cannot be known
to be false; and when there is anything
in the appearances of nature to favour
them, as in this case there is (for, what
ever force we attach to the analogies of
nature with the effects of human con
trivance, there is no disputing the remark
of Paley, that what is good in nature
exhibits those analogies much oftener
than what is evil), the contemplation of
these possibilities is a legitimate indul
gence, capable of bearing its part, with
other influences, in feeding and animat
ing the tendency of the feelings and
impulses towards good.
One advantage, such as it is, the
supernatural religions must always
possess over the Religion of Humanity :
the prospect they hold out to the indi
vidual of a life after death. For, though
the scepticism of the understanding
does not necessarily exclude the Theism
of the imagination and feelings, and
this, again, gives opportunity for a
hope that the power which has done so
much for us may be able and willing to
do this also, such vague possibility must
ever stop far short of a conviction. It
remains then to estimate the value of
this element—the prospect of a world to
come—as a constituent of earthly happi
ness. I cannot but think that as the
condition of mankind becomes improved,
as they grow happier in their lives, and
more capable of deriving happiness from
unselfish sources, they will care less and
less for this flattering expectation. It is
not, naturally or generally, the happy
who are the most anxious either for a
prolongation of the present life, or for a
life hereafter : it is those who never have
been happy. They who have had their
happiness can bear to part with existence;
but it is hard to die without ever having
lived. When mankind cease to need a
future existence as a consolation for the
sufferings of the present, it will have lost
its chief value to them, for themselves.
I am now speaking of the unselfish.
Those who are so wrapped up in self
that they are unable to identify their
feelings with anything w’hich will survive
them, or to feel their life prolonged in
their younger cotemporaries and in all
who help to carry on the progressive
movement of human affairs, require the
notion of another selfish life beyond the
grave, to enable them to keep up any in
terest in existence, since the present life,
as its termination approaches, dwindles
into something too insignificant to be
worth caring about. But if the Religion
of Humanity were as sedulously culti
vated as the supernatural religions are
(and there is no difficulty in conceiving
that it might be much more so), all who
�UTILITY OF RELIGION
had received the customary amount of
moral cultivation would, up to the hour
of death, live ideally in the life of those
who are to follow them; and though,
doubtless, they would often willingly sur
vive as individuals for a much longer
period than the present duration of life,
it appears to me probable that, after a
length of time different in different per
sons, they would have had enough of
existence, and would gladly lie down and
take their eternal rest. Meanwhile, and
without looking so far forward, we may
remark that those who believe the
immortality of the soul generally quit
life with fully as much, if not more,
reluctance as those who have no such
expectation. The mere cessation of ex
istence is no evil to any one : the idea is
only formidable through the illusion of
imagination which makes one conceive
oneself as if one were alive and feeling
oneself dead. What is odious in death
is not death itself, but the act of dying
and its lugubrious accompaniments : all
of which must be equally undergone by
the believer in immortality. Nor can I
perceive that the sceptic loses by his
scepticism any real and valuable consola
tion except one—the hope of reunion
with those dear to him who have ended
their earthly life before him. That loss,
indeed, is neither to be denied nor ex
tenuated. In many cases it is beyond
the reach of comparison or estimate;
and will always suffice to keep alive, in
the more sensitive natures, the imagina
tive hope of a futurity which, if there is
nothing to prove, there is as little in our
knowledge and experience to contradict.
History, so far as we know it, bears
out the opinion that mankind can per
fectly well do without the belief in a
heaven. The Greeks had anything but
a tempting idea of a future state. Their
55
Elysian fields held out very little attrac
tion to their feelings and imagination.
Achilles in the Odyssey expressed a very
natural, and no doubt a very common
sentiment, when he said that he would
rather be on earth the serf of a needy
master than reign over the whole king
dom of the dead. And the pensive
character so striking in the address of the
dying emperor Hadrian to his soul gives
evidence that the popular conception had
not undergone much variation during
that long interval. Yet we neither find
that the Greeks enjoyed life less nor
feared death more than other people.
The Buddhist religion counts probably
at this day a greater number of votaries
than either the Christian or the Moham
medan. The Buddhist creed recognises
many modes of punishment in a future
life, or rather lives, by the transmigration
of the soul into new bodies of men or
animals. But the blessing from heaven
which it proposes as a reward, to be
earned by perseverance in the highest
order of virtuous life, is annihilation;
the cessation, at least, of all conscious
or separate existence. It is impossible
to mistake in this religion the work of
legislators and moralists endeavouring to
supply supernatural motives for the con
duct which they were anxious to en
courage; and they could find nothing
more transcendent to hold out as the
capital prize to be won by the mightiest
efforts of labour and self-denial than
what we are so often told is the terrible
idea of annihilation. Surely this is a
proof that the idea is not really or
naturally terrible; that not philosophers
only, but the common order of mankind,
can easily reconcile themselves to it, and
even consider it as a good; and that it is
no unnatural part of the idea of a happy
life, that life itself be laid down, after the
�56
UTILITY OF RELIGION
best that it can give has been fully en
joyed through a long lapse of time; when
all its pleasures, even those of benevo
lence, are familiar, and nothing untasted
and unknown is left to stimulate curiosity
and keep up the desire of prolonged
existence. It seems to me not only
possible, but probable, that in a higher,
and above all a happier, condition of
human life, not annihilation but immor
tality may be the burdensome idea ; and
that human nature, though pleased with
the present, and by no means impatient
to quit it, would find comfort and not
sadness in the thought that it is not
chained through eternity to a conscious
existence which it cannot be assured that
it will always wish to preserve.
�THEISM
Part
I.—INTRODUCTION
The contest which subsists from of old
between believers and unbelievers in
natural and revealed religion has, like
other permanent contests, varied materi
ally in its character from age to age;
and the present generation, at least in
the higher regions of controversy, shows,
as compared with the eighteenth and
the beginning of the nineteenth century,
a marked alteration in the aspect of the
dispute. One feature of this change is
so apparent as to be generally acknow
ledged : the more softened temper in
which the debate is conducted on the
part of unbelievers. The reactionary
violence, provoked by the intolerance of
the other side, has in a great measure
exhausted itself. Experience has abated
the ardent hopes once entertained of
the regeneration of the human race by
merely negative doctrine—by the destruc
tion of superstition. The philosophical
study of history, one of the most im
portant creations of recent times, has
rendered possible an impartial estimate
of the doctrines and institutions of the
past, from a relative instead of an abso
lute point of view—as incidents of
human development at which it is use
less to grumble, and which may deserve
admiration and gratitude for their effects
in the past, even though they may be
thought incapable of rendering similar
services to the future. And the position
assigned to Christianity or Theism by
the more instructed of those who reject
the supernatural is that of things once
of great value, but which can now be
done without, rather than, as formerly, of
things misleading and noxious ab initio.
Along with this change in the moral
attitude of thoughtful unbelievers to
wards the religious ideas of man
kind, a corresponding difference has
manifested itself in their intellectual
attitude. The war against religious
beliefs in the last century was carried
on principally on the ground of
common sense or of logic; in the present
age, on the ground of science. The
progress of the physical science is con
sidered to have established, by conclu
sive evidence, matters of fact with which
the religious traditions of mankind are not
reconcilable; while the science of human
nature and history is considered to show
that the creeds of the past are natural
growths of the human mind, in particular
stages of its career, destined to dis
appear and give place to other convic
tions in a more advanced stage. In the
progress of discussion this last class of
considerations seems even to be super
seding those which address themselves
directly to the question of truth. Re
ligions tend to be discussed, at least by
�58
THEISM
those who reject them, less as intrinsi
cally true or false than as products
thrown up by certain states of civilisa
tion, and which, like the animal and
vegetable productions of a geological
period, perish in those which succeed it
from the cessation of the conditions
necessary to their continued existence.
This tendency of recent speculation
to look upon human opinions pre
eminently from an historical point of
view, as facts obeying laws of their own,
and requiring, like other observed facts,
an historical or a scientific explanation
(a tendency not confined to religious
subjects), is by no means to be blamed,
but to be applauded; not solely as
drawing attention to an important .and
previously neglected aspect of human
opinions, but because it has a real,
though indirect, bearing upon the ques
tion of their truth. For whatever opinion
a person may adopt on any subject that
admits of controversy, his assurance, if
he be a cautious thinker, cannot be
complete unless he is able to account
for the existence of the opposite opinion.
To ascribe it to the weakness of the
human understanding is an explanation
which cannot be sufficient for such a
thinker, for he will be slow to assume
that he has himself a less share of that
infirmity than the rest of mankind, and
that error is more likely to be on the
other side than on his own. In his
examination of evidence the persuasion
of others, perhaps of mankind in general,
is one of the data of the case—one of
the phenomena to be accounted for. As
the human intellect, though weak, is not
essentially perverted, there is a certain
presumption of the truth of any opinion
held by many human minds, requiring to
be rebutted by assigning some other real
or possible cause for its prevalence.
And this consideration has a special
relevancy to the inquiry concerning the
foundations of Theism, inasmuch as no
argument for the truth of Theism is more
commonly invoked or more confidently
relied on than the general assent of
mankind.
But while giving its full value to this
historical treatment of the religious ques
tion, we ought not, therefore, to let it
supersede the dogmatic. The most im
portant quality of an opinion on any
momentous subject is its truth or falsity,
which to us resolves itself into the
sufficiency of the evidence on which it
rests. It is indispensable that the
subject of religion should from time to
time be reviewed as a strictly scientific
question, and that its evidences should
be tested by the same scientific methods
and on the same principles as those of
the speculative conclusions drawn by
physical science. It being granted, then,
that the legitimate conclusions of science
are entitled to prevail over all opinions,
however widely held, which conflict with
them, and that the canons of scientific
evidence which the successes and failures
of two thousand years have established
are applicable to all subjects on which
knowledge is attainable, let us proceed
to consider what place there is for
religious beliefs on the platform of
science; what evidences they can appeal
to such as science can recognise, and
what foundation there is for the doc
trines of religion, considered as scientific
theorems.
In this inquiry we, of course, begin
with Natural Religion, the doctrine of
the existence and attributes of God.
THEISM.
Though I have defined the problem
of Natural Theology to be that of the
�THEISM
existence of God or of a god, rather than
of gods, there is the amplest historical
evidence that the belief in gods is
immeasurably more natural to the human
mind than the belief in one author and
ruler of nature; and that this more
elevated belief is, compared with the
former, an artificial product, requiring
(except when impressed by early educa
tion) a considerable amount of intellectual
culture before it can be reached. For a
long time the supposition appeared
forced and unnatural that the diversity
we see in the operations of nature can
all be the work of a single will. To the
untaught mind", and to all minds in prescientific times, the phenomena of nature
seem to be the result of forces altogether
heterogeneous, each taking its course
quite independently of the others; and
though to attribute them to conscious
wills is eminently natural, the natural
tendency is to suppose as many such
independent wills as there are distin
guishable forces of sufficient importance
and interest to have been remarked and
named. There is no tendency in Poly
theism as such to transform itself spon
taneously into Monotheism. It is true
that in polytheistic systems generally the
Deity, whose special attributes inspire
the greatest degree of awe, is usually
supposed to have a power of controlling
the other deities; and even in the most
degraded, perhaps, of all such systems,
the Hindoo, adulation heaps upon the
divinity who is the immediate object of
adoration epithets like those habitual to
believers in a single god. But there is
no real acknowledgment of one governor.
Every god normally rules his particular
department, though there may be a still
stronger god, whose power when he
chooses to exert it can frustrate the
purposes of the inferior divinity. There
59
could be no real belief in one Creator
and one Governor until mankind had
begun to see in the apparently confused
phenomena which surrounded them a
system capable of being viewed as the
possible working out of a single plan. This
conception of the world was perhaps
anticipated (though less frequently than
is often supposed) by individuals of ex
ceptional genius, but it could only
become common after a rather long
cultivation of scientific thought.
The special mode in which scientific
study operates to instil Monotheism in
place of the more natural Polytheism is
in no way mysterious. The specific
effect of science is to show by accumula
ting evidence that every event in nature
is connected by laws with some fact or
facts which preceded it, or, in other
words, depends for its existence on some
antecedent; but yet not so strictly on
one as not to be liable to frustration or
modification from others; for these dis
tinct chains of causation are so entangled
with one another; the action of each
cause is so interfered with by other
causes, though each acts according to its
own fixed law; that every effect is truly
the result rather of the aggregate of all
causes in existence than of any one only;
and nothing takes place in the world of
our experience without spreading a per
ceptible influence of some sort through
a greater or less portion of nature, and
making perhaps every portion of it
slightly different from what it would have
been if that event had not taken place.
Now, when once the double conviction
has found entry into the mind—that every
event depends on antecedents; and at
the same time that to bring it about
many antecedents must concur, perhaps
all the antecedents in nature, insomuch
that a slight difference in any one of
�6o
THEISM
them might have prevented the
phenomenon, or materially altered its
character—the conviction follows that
no one event, certainly no one kind of
events, can be absolutely preordained or
governed by any Being but one who
holds in his hand the reins of all Nature,
and not of some department only. At
least, if a plurality be supposed, it is
necessary to assume so complete a con
cert of action and unity of will among
them that the difference is for most pur
poses immaterial between such a theory
and that of the absolute unity of the
Godhead.
The reason, then, why Monotheism
may be accepted as the representative of
Theism in the abstract is not so much
because it is the Theism of all the more
improved portions of the human race, as
because it is the only Theism which can
claim for itself any footing on scientific
ground. Every other theory of the
government of the universe by super
natural beings is inconsistent, either with
the carrying on of that government
through a continual series of natural
antecedents according to fixed laws, or
with the interdependence of each of
these series upon all the rest, which are
the two most general results of science.
Setting out, therefore, from the scientific
view of nature as one connected system,
or united whole—united not like a web
composed of separate threads in passive
juxtaposition with one another, but
rather like the human or animal frame,
an apparatus kept going by perpetual
action and reaction among all its parts
—it must be acknowledged that the
question, to which Theism is an answer,
is at least a very natural one, and issues
from an obvious want of the human
mind. Accustomed as we are to find, in
proportion to our means of observation,
a definite beginning to each individual
fact; and since, wherever there is a be
ginning, we find that there was an ante
cedent fact (called by us a cause), a fact
but for which the phenomenon which
thus commences would not have been,
it was impossible that the human mind
should not ask itself whether the whole,
of which these particular phenomena are
a part, had not also a beginning, and, if
so, whether that beginning was not an
origin; whether there was not something
antecedent to the whole series of causes
and effects that we term Nature, and but
for which Nature itself would not have
been. From the first recorded specula
tion this question has never remained
without an hypothetical answer. The
only answer which has long continued to
afford satisfaction is Theism.
Looking at the problem, as it is our
business to do, merely as a scientific in
quiry, it resolves itself into two questions.
First: Is the theory which refers the
origin of all the phenomena of nature to
the will of a Creator consistent or not
with the ascertained results of science ?
Secondly, assuming it to be consistent,
will its proofs bear to be tested by the
principles of evidence and canons of
belief by which our long experience of
scientific inquiry has proved the necessity
of being guided ?
First, then : there is one conception of
Theism which is consistent, another
which is radically inconsistent, with the
most general truths that have been made
known to us by scientific investigation.
The one which is inconsistent is the
conception of a God governing the
world by acts of variable will. The one
which is consistent is the conception of
a God governing the world by invariable
laws.
The primitive, and even in our own
�THE EVIDENCES OF THEISM
day the vulgar, conception of the divine
rule is that the one God, like the many
gods of antiquity, carries on the govern
ment of the world by special decrees,
made pro hac vice. Although supposed
to be omniscient as well as omnipotent,
he is thought not to make up his mind
until the moment of action; or at least
not so conclusively, but that his in
tentions may be altered up to the very
last moment by appropriate solicitation.
Without entering into the difficulties of
reconciling this view of the divine govern
ment with the prescience and the per
fect wisdom ascribed to the Deity, we
may content ourselves with the fact that
it contradicts what experience has taught
us of the manner in which things actually
take place. The phenomena of nature
do take place according to general laws.
They do originate from definite natural
antecedents. Therefore, if their ultimate
origin is derived from a will, that will
must have established the general laws
and willed the antecedents. If there be
a Creator, his intention must have been
that events should depend upon ante
cedents and be produced according to
fixed laws. But this being conceded,
there is nothing in scientific experience
inconsistent with the belief that those
laws and sequences are themselves due
to a divine will. Neither are we obliged
to suppose that the divine will exerted
itself once for all, and, after putting a
power into the system which enabled it
to go on of itself, has ever since let it
alone. Science contains nothing repug
nant to the supposition that every event
which takes place results from a specific
volition of the presiding Power, provided
that this Power adheres in its particular
volitions to general laws laid down by
itself. The common opinion is that this
hypothesis tends more to the glory of the
61
Deity than the supposition that the
universe was made so that it could go
on of itself. There have been thinkers,
however—of no ordinary eminence (of
whom Leibnitz was one)—who thought
the last the only supposition worthy of
the Deity, and protested against likening
God to a clockmaker whose clock will
not go unless he puts his hand to the
machinery and keeps it going. With
such considerations we have no concern
in this place. We are looking at the
subject not from the point of view of
reference, but from that of science ; and
with science both these suppositions as
to the mode of the divine action are
equally consistent.
We must now, however, pass to the
next question. There is nothing to dis
prove the creation and government of
Nature by a sovereign will; but is there
anything to prove it ? Of what nature
are its evidences; and, weighed in the
scientific balance, what is their value ?
THE EVIDENCES OF THEISM.
The evidences of a Creator are not only
of several distinct kinds, but of such
diverse characters that they are adapted
to minds of very different descriptions,
and it is hardly possible for any mind to
be equally impressed by them all. The
familiar classification of them into proofs
a priori and a posteriori marks that, when
looked at in a purely scientific view, they
belong to different schools of thought.
Accordingly, though the unthoughtful
believer whose creed really rests on
authority gives an equal welcome to all
plausible arguments in support of the
belief in which he has been brought up,
philosophers who have had to make a
choice between the a priori and the
a posteriori methods in general science
seldom fail, while insisting on one of
�62
THEISM
these modes of support for religion, to
speak with more or less of disparage
ment of the other. It is our duty in the
present inquiry to maintain complete im
partiality and to give a fair examination
to both. At the same time, I entertain a
strong conviction that one of the two
modes of argument is in its nature scien
tific, the other not only unscientific, but
condemned by science. The scientific
argument is that which reasons from the
facts and analogies of human experience,
as a geologist does when he infers the
past states of our terrestrial globe, or an
astronomical observer when he draws
conclusions respecting the physical com
position of the heavenly bodies. This is
the cl posteriori method, the principal
application of which to Theism is the
argument (as it is called) of design. The
mode qf reasoning which I call unscien
tific, though in the opinion of some
thinkers it is also a legitimate mode
of scientific procedure, is that which
infers external objective facts from ideas
or convictions of our minds. I say this
independently of any opinion of my own
respecting the origin of our ideas or con
victions ; for even if we were unable to
point out any manner in which the idea
of God, for example, can have grown
up from the impressions of experience,
still the idea can only prove the idea,
and not the objective fact, unless, in
deed, the fact is supposed (agreeably to
the book of Genesis) to have been
handed down by tradition from a time
when there was direct personal inter
course with the Divine Being; in which
case the argument is no longer a priori.
The supposition that an idea, or a wish,
or a need, even if native to the mind,
proves the reality of a corresponding
object, derives all the plausibility from
the belief already in our minds that we
were made by a benignant Being who
would not have implanted in us a ground
less belief, or a want which he did not
afford us the means of satisfying; and
is therefore a palpable petitio principii if
adduced as an argument to support the
very belief which it pre-supposes.
At the same time, it must be admitted
that all a priori systems, whether in
philosophy or religion, do in some sense
profess to be founded on experience,
since, though they affirm the possibility
of arriving at truths which transcend
experience, they yet make the facts of
experience their starting-point (as what
other starting-point is possible ?). They
are entitled to consideration in so far as
it can be shown that experience gives
any countenance either to them or to
their method of inquiry. Professedly a
priori arguments are not unfrequently of
a mixed nature, partaking in some degree
of the a posteriori character, and may
often be said to be a posteriori arguments
in disguise; the d priori considerations
acting chiefly in the way of making some
particular a posteriori argument tell for
more than its worth. This is emphati
cally true of the argument for Theism
which I shall first examine—the necessity
of a First Cause. For this has in truth
a wide basis of experience in the univer
sality of the relation of cause and effect
among the phenomena of nature ; while,
at the same time, theological philoso
phers have not been content to let it
rest upon this basis, but have affirmed
causation as a truth of reason appre
hended intuitively by its own light.
ARGUMENT FOR A FIRST
CAUSE.
The argument for a First Cause
admits of being, and is, presented as a
conclusion from the whole of human
�ARGUMENT FOR A FIRST CAUSE
experience. Everything that we know
(it is argued) had a cause, and owed its
existence to that cause. How, then, can
it be but that the world, which is but a
name for the aggregate of all that we
know, has a cause to which it is indebted
for its existence ?
The fact of experience, however, when
correctly expressed, turns out to be, not
that everything which we know derives
its existence from a cause, but only
every event or change. There is in
nature a permanent element, and also a
changeable : the changes are always the
effects of previous changes; the perma
nent existences, so far as we know, are
not effects at all. It is true we are
accustomed to say, not only of events,
but of objects, that they are produced
by causes, as water by the union of
hydrogen and oxygen. But by this we
only mean that, when they begin to exist,
their beginning is the effect of a cause.
But their beginning to exist is not an
object; it is an event. If it be objected
that the cause of a thing’s beginning to
exist may be said with propriety to be
the cause of the thing itself, I shall not
quarrel with the expression. But thatwhich in an object begins to exist is that
in it which belongs to the changeable
element in nature ; the outward form and
the properties depending on mechanical
or chemical combinations of its compo
nent parts. There is in every object
another and a permanent element—viz.,
the specific elementary substance or sub
stances of which it consists and their
inherent properties. These are not known
to us as beginning to exist: within the
range of human knowledge they had
no beginning, consequently no cause;
though they themselves are causes or
con-causes of everything that takes place.
Experience, therefore, affords no evi
63
dences, not even analogies, to justify our
extending to the apparently immutable
a generalisation grounded only on our
observation of the changeable.
As a fact of experience, then, causation
cannot legitimately be extended to the
material universe itself, but only to its
changeable phenomena; of these, indeed,
causes may be affirmed without any
exception. But what causes ? The cause
of every change is a prior change ; and
such it cannot but be; for, if there were
no new antecedent, there would not be
a new consequent. If the state of facts
which brings the phenomenon into
existence had existed always or for an
indefinite duration, the effect also would
have existed always or been produced
an indefinite time ago. It is thus a
necessary part of the fact of causation,
within the sphere of our experience, that
the causes as well as the effects had a
beginning in time, and were themselves
caused. It would seem, therefore, that
our experience, instead of furnishing an
argument for a First Cause, is repugnant
to it; and that the very essence of
causation, as it exists within the limits
of our knowledge, is incompatible with a
First Cause.
But it is necessary to look more par
ticularly into the matter, and analyse
more closely the nature of the causes of
which mankind have experience. For
if it should turn out that, though all
causes have a beginning, there is in all
of them a permanent element which
had no beginning, this permanent
element may with some justice be
termed a first or universal cause, inas
much as, though not sufficient of itself to
cause anything, it enters as a con-cause
into all causation. Now, it ‘ happens
that the last result of physical inquiry,
derived from the converging evidences
�64
THEISM
of all branches of physical science, does, from it, inasmuch as mind is the only
if it holds good, land us, so far as the thing which is capable of originating
material world is concerned, in a result change. This is said to be the lesson of
of this sort. Whenever a physical phe human experience. In the phenomena
nomenon is traced to its cause, that of inanimate nature the force which
cause when analysed is found to be works is always a pre-existing force, not
a certain quantum of force, combined originated, but transferred. One physical
with certain collocations. And the last object moves another by giving out to it
great generalisation of science, the con the force by which it has first been itself
servation of force, teaches us that vhe moved. The wind communicates to
variety in the effects depends partly the waves, or to a windmill, or a ship,
upon the amount of the force and partly part of the motion which has been given
upon the diversity of the collocations. to itself by some other agent. In volun
The force itself is essentially one and tary action alone we see a commence
the same; and there exists of it in ment, an origination of motion ; since all
nature a fixed quantity, which (if the other causes appear incapable of this
theory be true) is never increased or origination, experience is in favour of the
diminished. Here, then, we find, even conclusion that all the motion in exist
in the changes of material nature, a per ence owed its beginning to this one
manent element,-to all appearance the cause, voluntary agency, if not that of
very one of which we were in quest. This man, then of a more powerful Being.
it is apparently to which, if to anything,
This argument is a very old one. It
we must assign the character of First is to be found in Plato; not, as might
Cause, the cause of the material universe. have been expected, in the Phadon,
For all effects may be traced up to it, where the arguments are not such as
while it cannot be traced up by our would now be deemed of any weight, but
experience to anything beyond : its trans in his latest production, the Leges. LnA
formations alone can be so traced, and of it is still one of the most telling arguthem the cause always includes the force • ments with the more metaphysical class
itself; the same quantity of force in of defenders of Natural Theology.
some previous form. It would seem,
Now, in the first place, if there be
then, that in the only sense in which truth in the doctrine of the conservation
experience supports in any shape the of force—in other words, the constancy
doctrine of a First Cause—viz., as the of the total amount of force in existence—
primaeval and universal element in all this doctrine does not change from true
causes—the First Cause can be no other to false when it reaches the field of
than Force.
voluntary agency. The will does not,
We are, however, by no means at the any more than other causes, create force :
end of the question. On the contrary, granting that it originates motion, it has
the greatest stress of the argument is no means of doing so but by converting
exactly at the point which we have now into that particular manifestation a por
reached. For it is maintained that mind tion of force which already existed in
is the only possible cause of force; or other forms. It is known that the source
rather, perhaps, that mind is a force, from which this portion of force is
and that all other force must be derived derived is chiefly, or entirely, the force
�ARGUMENT FOR A FIRST CAUSE
evolved in the processes of chemical com
position and decomposition which con
stitute the body of nutrition; the force
so liberated becomes a fund upon which
every muscular, and even every merely
nervous action, as of the brain in thought,
is a draft. It is in this sense only that,
according to the best lights of science,
volition is an originating cause. Volition,
therefore, does not answer to the idea of
a First Cause; since force must in
every instance be assumed as prior to it;
and there is not the slightest colour, de
rived from experience, for supposing
force itself to have been created by a
volition. As far as anything can be con
cluded from human experience, force has
all the attributes of a thing eternal and
uncreated.
This, however, does not close the dis
cussion. For though whatever verdict
experience can give in the case is against
the possibility that will ever originates
force, yet, if we can be assured that
neither does force originate will, will
must be held to be an agency, if not
prior to force, yet coeternal with it; and
if it be true that will can originate, not
indeed force, but the transformation of
force from some other of its mani
festations into that of mechanical motion,
and that there is within human experience
no other agency capable of doing so, the
argument for a will as the originator,
though not of the universe, yet of the
kosmos, or order of the universe, remains
unanswered.
But the case thus stated is not con
formable to fact. Whatever volition can
do in the way of creating motion out of
other forms of force, and generally of
evolving force from a latent into a visible
state, can be done by many other causes.
Chemical action, for instance; electricity ;
heat; the mere presence of a gravitating
65
body : all these are causes of mechanical
motion on a far larger scale than any
volitions which experience presents to us ;
and in most of the effects thus produced
the motion given by one body to another
is not, as in the ordinary cases of
mechanical action, motion that has first
been given to that other by some third
body. The phenomenon is not a mere
passing on of mechanical motion, but a
creation of it out of a force previously
latent or manifesting itself in some other
form. Volition, therefore, regarded as
an agent in the material universe, has no
exclusive privilege of origination : all that
it can originate is also originated by other
transforming agents. If it be said that
those other agents must have had the
force they give out put into them from
elsewhere, I answer that this is no less
true of the force which volition disposes
of. We know that this force comes from
an external source—the chemical action
of the food and air. The force by which
the phenomena of the material world are
produced circulates through all physical
agencies in a never-ending though some
times intermitting stream. I am, of
course, speaking of volition only in its
action on the material world. We have
nothing to do here with the freedom of
the will itself as a mental phenomenon—
with the vex ata questio whether volition
is self-determining or determined by
causes. To the question now in hand it
is only the effects of volition that are
relevant, not its origin. The assertion is
that physical nature must have been pro
duced by a will, because nothing but will
is known to us as having the power of
originating the production of phenomena.
We have seen that, on the contrary, all
the power that will possesses over
phenomena is shared, as far as we have
the means of judging, by other and much
F
�66
THEISM
more powerful agents, and that in the
only sense in which those agents do not
originate, neither does will originate. No
prerogative, therefore, can, on the ground
of experience, be assigned to volition
above other natural agents, as a pro
ducing cause of phenomena. All that
can be affirmed by the strongest assertor
of the freedom of the will is that voli
tions are themselves uncaused, and are
therefore alone fit to be the First or
Universal Cause. But, even assuming
volitions to be uncaused, the properties
of matter, so far as experience discloses,
are uncaused also, and have the advan
tage over any particular volition, in being,
so far as experience can show, eternal.
Theism, therefore, in so far as it rests on
the necessity of a First Cause, has no
support from experience.
To those who, in default of experience,
consider the necessity of a First Cause as
matter of intuition, I would say that it is
needless, in this discussion, to contest
their premises; since admitting that there
is and must be a First Cause, it has now
been shown that several other agencies
than will can lay equal claim to that
character. One thing only may be said
which requires notice here. Among the
facts of the universe to be accounted for,
it may be said, is mind; and it is selfevident that nothing can have produced
mind but mind.
The special indications that mind is
deemed to give, pointing to intelligent
contrivance, belong to a different portion
of this inquiry. But if the mere exist
ence of mind is supposed to require,
as a necessary antecedent, another mind
greater and more powerful, the difficulty
is not removed by going one step back :
the creating mind stands as much in
need of another mind to be the source
of its existence as the created mind. Be
it remembered that we have no direct
knowledge (at least apart from revela
tion) of a mind which is even apparently
eternal, as force and matter are: an
eternal mind is, as far as the present
argument is concerned, a simple
hypothesis to account for the minds
which we know to exist. Now, it is
essential to an hypothesis that, if ad
mitted, it should at least remove the
difficulty and account for the facts. But
it does not account for mind to refer one
mind to a prior mind for its origin. The
problem remains unsolved, the difficulty
undiminished—nay, rather increased.
To this it may be objected that the
causation of every human mind is matter
of fact, since we know that it had a
beginning in time. We even know, or
have the strongest grounds for believing,
that the human species itself had a
beginning in time. For there is a vast
amount of evidence that the state of
our planet was once such as to be incom
patible with animal life, and that human
life is of a very much more modern
origin than animal life. In any case,
therefore, the fact must be faced that
there must have been a Cause which
called the first human mind—nay, the
very first germ of organic life—into exist
ence. No such difficulty exists in the
supposition of an eternal mind. If we
did not know that mind on our earth
began to exist, we might suppose it to
be uncaused; and we may still suppose
this of the mind to which we ascribe its
existence.
To take this ground is to return into
the field of human experience, and to
become subject to its canons, and we
are then entitled to ask where is the
proof that nothing can have caused a
mind except another mind. From what,
except from experience, can we know
�ARGUMENT FROM THE GENERAL CONSENT OF MANKIND
67
what can produce what—what causes reason to expect, from the mere occur
are adequate to what effects ? That rence of changes, that, if we could trace
nothing can consciously produce mind back the series far enough, we should
but mind is self-evident., being involved arrive at a primaeval volition. The world
in the meaning of the words ; but that does not, by its mere existence, bear
there cannot be unconscious production witness to a God; if it gives indications
must not be assumed, for it is the very of one, these must be given by the
point to be proved. Apart from experi special nature of the phenomena, by
ence, and arguing on what is called what they present that resembles adapta
reason—that is, on supposed self-evidence tion to an end : of which hereafter. If,
—the notion seems to be that no causes in default of evidence from experience,
can give rise to products of a more the evidence of intuition is relied upon,
precious or elevated kind than them it may be answered that if mind, as
selves. But this is at variance with the mind, presents intuitive evidence of
known analogies of nature. How vastly having been created, the creative mind
nobler and more precious, for instance, must do the same, and we are no nearer
are the higher vegetables and animals to the First Cause than before. But if
than the soil and manure out of which, there be nothing in the nature of mind
and by the properties of which, they are which in itself implies a Creator, the
raised up. The tendency of all recent minds which have a beginning in time, as
speculation is towards the opinion that all minds have which are known to our ex
the development of inferior orders of perience, must, indeed, have been caused,
existence into superior, the substitution but it is not necessary that their cause
of greater elaboration and higher organi should have been a prior intelligence.
sation for lower, is the general rule of
ARGUMENT FROM THE
Nature. Whether it is so or not, there
GENERAL CONSENT OF MAN
are at least in nature a multitude of facts
KIND.
bearing that character, and this is
sufficient for the argument.
Before proceeding to the argument
Here, then, this part of the discussion from Marks of Design, which, as it
may stop. The result it leads to is that seems to me, must always be the main
the First Cause argument is in itself of no strength of Natural Theism, we may
value for the establishment of Theism : dispose briefly of some other arguments
because no cause is needed for the exist which are of little scientific weight, but
ence of that which has no beginning; which have greater influence on the
and both matter and force (whatever human mind than much better argu
metaphysical theory we may give of the ments, because they are appeals to
one or the other) have had, so far as authority, and it is by authority that the
our experiences can teach us, no begin opinions of the bulk of mankind are
ning—which cannot be said of mind. principally, and not unnaturally, governed.
The phenomena or changes in the The authority invoked is that of mankind
universe have, indeed, each of them a generally, and specially of some of its
beginning and a cause, but their cause wisest men; particularly such as were in
is always a prior change; nor do the other respects conspicuous examples of
analogies of experience give us any ' breaking loose from received prejudices.
�68
THEISM
Socrates and Plato, Bacon, Locke, and
Newton, Descartes and Leibnitz, are
common examples.
It may, doubtless, be good advice to
persons who in point of knowledge and
cultivation are not entitled to think
themselves competent judges of difficult
questions, to bid them content them
selves with holding that true which
mankind generally believe, and so long
as they believe it; or that which has
been believed by those who pass for the
most eminent among the minds of the
past. But to a thinker the argument
from other people’s opinion has little
weight. It is but second-hand evidence;
and merely admonishes us to look out
for and weigh the reasons on which this
conviction of mankind or of wise men
was founded. Accordingly, those who
make any claim to philosophic treat
ment of the subject employ this general
consent chiefly as evidence that there is
in the mind of man an intuitive percep
tion, or an instinctive sense, of Deity.
From the generality of the belief they
infer that it is inherent in our constitu
tion ; from which they draw the con
clusion, a precarious one indeed, but
conformable to the general mode of
proceeding of the intuitive philosophy,
that the belief must be true; though as
applied to Theism this argument begs
the question, since it has itself nothing
to rest upon but the belief that the
human mind was made by a God, who
would not deceive his creatures.
But, indeed, what ground does the
general prevalence of the belief in Deity
afford us for inferring that this belief is
native to the human mind, and indepen
dent of evidence ? Is it, then, so very
devoid of evidence, even apparent ?
Lias it so little semblance of foundation
in fact that it can only be accounted for
by the supposition of its being innate ?
We should not expect to find Theists
believing that the appearances in nature
of a contriving intelligence are not only
insufficient, but are not even plausible,
and cannot be supposed to have carried
conviction either to the general or to
the wiser mind. If there are external
evidences of Theism, even if not perfectly
conclusive, why need we suppose that
the belief of its truth was the result of
anything else ? The superior minds to
whom an appeal is made, from Socrates
downwards, when they professed to give
the grounds of their opinion, did not
say that they found the belief in them
selves without knowing from whence it
came, but ascribed it, if not to revelation,
either to some metaphysical argument
or to those very external evidences
which are the basis of the argument
from design.
If it be said that the belief in Deity is
universal among barbarous tribes, and
among the ignorant portion of civilised
populations, who cannot be supposed to
have been impressed by the marvellous
adaptations of Nature, most of which are
unknown to them ; I answer, that the
ignorant in civilised countries take their
opinions from the educated, and that in
the case of savages, if the evidence is in
sufficient, so is the belief. The religious
belief of savages is not belief in the God
of natural theology, but a mere modifica
tion of the crude generalisation which
ascribes life, consciousness, and will to all
natural powers of which they cannot per
ceive the source or control the operation.
And the divinities believed in are as
numerous as those powers. Each river,
fountain, or tree has a divinity of its own.
To see in this blunder of primitive
ignorance the hand of the Supreme
Being implanting in his creatures an
�ARGUMENT FROM THE GENERAL CONSENT OF MANKIND
instinctive knowledge of his existence is
a poor compliment to the Deity. The
religion of savages is fetichism of the
grossest kind, ascribing animation and
will to individual objects, and seeking to
propitiate them by prayer and sacrifice.
That this should be the case is the less
surprising when we remember that there
is not a definite boundary line, broadly
separating the conscious human being
from inanimate objects. Between these
and man there is an intermediate class
of objects, sometimes much more power
ful than man, which do possess life and
will—viz., the brute animals, which in an
early stage of existence play a very great
part in human life; making it the less
surprising that the line should not at
first be quite distinguishable between the
animate and the inanimate part of nature.
As observation advances, it is perceived
that the majority of outward objects have
all their important qualities in common
with entire classes or groups of objects
which comport themselves exactly alike
in the same circumstances, and in these
cases the worship of visible objects is ex
changed for that of an invisible Being
supposed to preside over the whole class.
This step in generalisation is slowly
made, with hesitation and even terror;
as we still see in the case of ignorant
populations with what difficulty experi
ence disabuses them of belief in the
supernatural powers and terrible resent
ment of a particular idol. Chiefly by
these terrors the religious impressions of
barbarians are kept alive, with only
slight modifications, until the Theism
of cultivated minds is ready to take
their place. And the Theism of culti
vated minds, if we take their own
word for it, is always a conclusion either
from arguments called rational or from
the appearances in nature.
69
It is needless here to dwell upon the
difficulty of the hypothesis of a natural
belief not common to all human beings,
an instinct not universal. It is con
ceivable, doubtless, that some men
might be born without a particular
natural faculty, as some are born without
a particular sense. But when this is the
case, we ought to be much more particular
as to the proof that it really is a natural
faculty. If it were not a matter of
observation, but of speculation, that men
can see ; if they had no apparent organ
of sight, and no perceptions or knowledge
but such as they might conceivably have
acquired by some circuitous process
through their other senses, the fact that
men exist who do not even suppose
themselves to see would be a consider
able argument against the theory of a
visual sense. But it would carry us too
far to press, for the purposes of this dis
cussion, an argument which applies so
largely to the whole of the intuitional
philosophy. The strongest Intuitionist
will not maintain that a belief should be
held for instinctive when evidence (real
or apparent), sufficient to engender it, is
universally admitted to exist. To the
force of the evidence must be, in this
case, added all the emotional or moral
causes which incline men to the belief;
the satisfaction which it gives to the
obstinate questionings with which men
torment themselves respecting the past;
the hopes which it opens for the future ;
the fears also, since fear as well as hope
predisposes to belief; and to these in the
case of the more active spirits must
always have been added a perception of
the power which belief in the supernatural
affords for governing mankind, either for
their own good or for the selfish pur
poses of the governors.
The general consent of mankind does
�70
THEISM
not, therefore, afford ground for ad
mitting, even as an hypothesis, the origin,
in an inherent law of the human mind,
of a fact otherwise so more than suffici
ently, so amply, accounted for.
THE ARGUMENT FROM CON
SCIOUSNESS.
There have been numerous arguments,
indeed almost every religious meta
physician has one of his own, to prove
the existence and attributes of God from
what are called truth of reason, sup
posed to be independent of experience.
Descartes, who is the real founder of the
intuitional metaphysics, draws the con
clusion immediately from the first
premise of his philosophy, the celebrated
assumption that whatever he could very
clearly and distinctly apprehend must
be true. The idea of a God, perfect in
power, wisdom, and goodness, is’ a clear
and distinct idea, and must therefore, on
this principle, correspond to a real object.
This bold generalisation, however, that a
conception of the human mind proves
its own objective reality, Descartes is
obliged to limit by the qualification—
“ if the idea includes existence.” Now,
the idea of God implying the union of
all perfections, and existence being a
perfection, the idea of God proves his
existence. This very simple argument,
which denies to man one of his most
familiar and most precious attributes,
that of idealising as it is called—of con
structing from the materials of experience
a conception more perfect than experi
ence itself affords—is not likely to satisfy
any one in the present day. More
elaborate, though scarcely more success
ful efforts, have been made by many of
Descartes’ successors, to derive know
ledge of the Deity from an inward light;
to make it a truth not dependent on ex
ternal evidence, a fact of direct per
ception, or, as they are accustomed to
call it, of consciousness. The philo
sophical world is familiar with the attempt
of Cousin to make out that, whenever we
perceive a particular object, we perceive
along with it, or are conscious of, God;
and also with the celebrated refutation
of this doctrine by Sir William Hamilton.
It would be waste of time to examine
any of these theories in detail. While
each has its own particular logical
fallacies, they labour under the common
infirmity that one man cannot, by pro
claiming with ever so much confidence
that he perceives an object, convince
other people that they see it too. If, in
deed, he laid claim to a divine faculty of
vision, vouchsafed to him alone, and
making him cognisant of things which
men not thus assisted have not the
capacity to see, the case might be
different. Men have been able to get
such claims admitted; and other people
can only require of them to show their
credentials. But when no claim is set up
to any peculiar gift, but we are told that
all of us are as capable as the prophet of
seeing what he sees, feeling what he feels
—nay, that we actually do so—and when
the utmost effort of which we are capable
fails to make us aware of what we are
told we perceive, this supposed universal
faculty of intuition is but
“ The dark lantern of the Spirit
Which none see by but those who bear it
and the bearers may fairly be asked to
consider whether it is not more likely
that they are mistaken as to the origin of
an impression in their minds than that
others are ignorant of the very existence
of an impression in theirs.
The inconclusiveness, in a speculative
point of view, of all arguments from the
subjective notion of Deity to its objective
�THE ARGUMENT FROM CONSCIOUSNESS
reality was well seen by Kant, the most
discriminating of the a prion meta
physicians, who always kept the two
questions, the origin and composition of
our ideas and the reality of the
corresponding objects, perfectly distinct.
According to Kant, the idea of the
Deity is native to the mind, in the sense
that it is constructed by the mind’s own
laws, and not derived from without; but
this idea of speculative reason cannot be
shown by any logical process, or per
ceived by direct apprehension, to have a
corresponding reality outside the human
mind. To Kant, God is neither an
object of direct consciousness nor a con
clusion of reasoning, but a Necessary
Assumption—necessary, not by a logical
but a practical necessity, imposed by the
reality of the Moral Law. Duty is a
fact of consciousness : “Thou shalt ” is
a command issuing from the recesses of
our being, and not to be accounted for
by any impressions derived from experi
ence ; and this command requires a
commander, though it is not perfectly
clear whether Kant’s meaning is that
conviction of a law includes conviction
of a lawgiver, or only that a being of
whose will the law is an expression is
eminently desirable. If the former be
intended, the argument is founded on a
double meaning of the word “ law.” A
rule to which we feel it a duty to con
form has, in common with laws commonly
so-called, the fact of claiming our obedi
ence ; but it does not follow that the
rule must originate, like the laws of the
land, in the will of a legislator or legis
lators external to the mind. We may
even say that a feeling of obligation
which is merely the result of a command
is not what is meant by moral obligation,
which, on the contrary, supposes some
thing that the internal conscience bears
7i
witness to as binding in its own nature;
and which God, in superadding his
command, conforms to, and perhaps
declares, but does not create. Conced
ing, then, for the sake of the argument,
that the moral sentiment is as purely of
the mind’s own growth, the obligation of
duty as entirely independent of experi
ence and acquired impressions, as Kant
or any other metaphysician ever con
tended, it may yet be maintained that
this feeling of obligation rather excludes
than compels the belief in a Divine
legislator merely as the source of the
obligation; and, as a matter of fact, the
obligation of duty is both theoretically
acknowledged and practically felt in the
fullest manner by many who have no
positive belief in God, though seldom,
probably, without habitual and familiar
reference to him as an ideal conception.
But if the existence of God as a wise
and just lawgiver is not a necessary part
of the feelings of morality, it may still be
maintained that those feelings make his
existence eminently desirable. No doubt
they do, and that is the great reason why
we find that good men and women cling
to the belief, and are pained by its being
questioned. But surely it is not legiti
mate to assume that in the order of the
universe whatever is desirable is true.
Optimism, even when a God is already
believed in, is a thorny doctrine to
maintain, and had to be taken by
Leibnitz in the limited sense that the
universe, being made by a good being, is
the best universe possible, not the best
absolutely; that the Divine power, in
short, was not equal to making it more
free from imperfections than it is. But
optimism, prior to belief in a God, and
as the ground of that belief, seems one
of the oddest of all speculative delusions.
[ Nothing, however, I believe, contributes
�72
THEISM
more to keep up the belief in the general
mind of humanity than this feeling of its
desirableness, which, when clothed, as it
very often is, in the forms of an argu
ment, is a naif expression of the ten
dency of the human mind to believe
what is agreeable to it. Positive value
the argument, of course, has none.
Without dwelling further on these or
on any other of the a priori arguments
for Theism, we will no longer delay
passing to the far more important argu
ment of the appearances of contrivance
in nature.
THE ARGUMENT FROM MARKS
OF DESIGN IN NATURE.
We now at last reach an argument of
a really scientific character, which does
not shrink from scientific tests, but
claims to be judged by the established
canons of Induction. The design argu
ment is wholly grounded on experience.
Certain qualities, it is alleged, are found
to be characteristic of such things as are
made by an intelligent mind for a
purpose. The order of Nature, or some
considerable parts of it, exhibit these
qualities in a remarkable degree. We
are entitled from this great similarity in
the effects to infer similarity in the
cause, and to believe that things which
it is beyond the power of man to make,
but which resemble the works of man in
all but power, must also have been made
by intelligence, armed with a power
greater than human.
I have stated this argument in its
fullest strength, as it is stated by its
most thoroughgoing assertors. A very
little consideration, however, suffices to
show that, though it has some force, its
force is very generally overrated. Paley’s
illustration of a watch puts the case
much too strongly. If I found a watch
on an apparently desolate island, I
should, indeed, infer that it had been
left there by a human being; but the
inference would not be from marks
of design, but because I already knew
by direct experience that watches are
made by men. I should draw the infer
ence no less confidently from a footprint,
or from any relic, however insignificant,
which experience has taught me to attri
bute to man : as geologists infer the past
existence of animals from coprolites,
though no one sees marks of design in a
coprolite. The evidence of design in
creation can never reach the height of
direct induction; it amounts only to the
inferior kind of inductive evidence called
analogy. Analogy agrees with induction
in this, that they both argue that a thing
known to resemble another in certain
circumstances (call those circumstances
A and B) will resemble it in another
circumstance (call it C). But the differ
ence is that in induction A and B are
known, by a previous comparison of
many instances, to be the very circum
stances on which C depends, or with
which it is in some way connected.
When this has not been ascertained, the
argument amounts only to this, that
since it is not known with which of the
circumstances existing in the known
case C is connected, they may as well be
A and B as any others ; and therefore
there is a greater probability of C in
cases where we know that A and B exist
than in cases of which we know nothing
at all. This argument is of a weight
very difficult to estimate at all, and
impossible to estimate precisely. It may
be very strong, when the known points of
agreement, A and B, etc., are numerous
and the known points of difference few;
or very weak when the reverse is the
case; but it can never be equal in
�THE ARGUMENT FROM MARKS OF DESIGN IN NATURE
validity to a real induction. The resem
blances between some of the arrange
ments in nature and some of those made
by man are considerable, and even as
mere resemblances afford a certain pre
sumption of similarity of cause; but how
great that presumption is it is hard to
say. All that can be said with certainty
is that these likenesses make creation by
intelligence considerably more probable
than if the likenesses had been less, or
than if there had been no likenesses
at all.
This mode, however, of stating the
case does not do full justice to the
evidence of Theism. The design argu
ment is not drawn from mere resem
blances in Nature to the works of human
intelligence, but from the special charac
ter of those resemblances. The circum
stances in which it is alleged that the
world resembles the works of man are
not circumstances taken at random, but
are particular instances of a circumstance
which experience shows to have a real
connection with an intelligent origin, the
fact of conspiring to an end. The
argument, therefore, is not one of mere
analogy. As mere analogy it has its
weight, but it is more than analogy. It
surpasses analogy exactly as induction
surpasses it. It is an inductive argu
ment.
This, I think, is undeniable, and it
remains to test the argument by the
logical principles applicable to induction.
For this purpose it will be convenient to
handle, not the argument as a whole, but
some one of the most impressive cases
of it, such as the structure of the eye or
of the ear. It is maintained that the
structure of the eye proves a designing
mind. To what class of inductive argu
ments does this belong ? and what is its
degree of force ?
73
The species of inductive arguments
are four in number, corresponding to the
four inductive methods—the methods of
agreement, of difference, of residues, and
of concomitant variations. The argu
ment under consideration falls within the
first of these divisions—the method of
agreement. This is, for reasons known
to inductive logicians, the weakest of the
four; but the particular argument is a
strong one of the kind. It may be
logically analysed as follows :—
The parts of which the eye is com
posed, and the collocations which con
stitute the arrangement of those parts,
resemble one another in this very
remarkable property, that they all con
duce to enabling the animal to see.
These things being as they are, the
animal sees; if any one of them were
different from what it is, the animal, for
the most part, would either not see, or
would not see equally well. And this is
the only marked resemblance that we can
trace among the different parts of this
structure, beyond the general likeness of
composition and organisation which
exists among all other parts of the animal.
Now, the particular combination of
organic elements called an eye had, in
every instance, a beginning in time, and
must, therefore, have been brought
together by a cause or causes. The
number of instances is immeasurably
greater than is, by the principles of in
ductive logic, required for the exclusion
of a random concurrence of independent
causes, or, speaking technically, for the
elimination of chance. We are, there
fore, warranted by the canons of in
duction in concluding that what brought
all these elements together was some
cause common to them all; and inasmuch
as the elements agree in the single
circumstance of conspiring to produce
�74
THEISM
sight, there must be some connection by
way of causation between the cause which
brought those elements together and the
fact of sight.
This I conceive to be a legitimate in
ductive inference, and the sum and sub
stance of what induction can do for
Theism. The natural sequel of the argu
ment would be this. Sight, being a fact
not precedent but subsequent to the
putting together of the organic structure
of the eye, can only be connected with
the production of that structure in the
character of a final, not an efficient, cause;
that is, it is not sight itself, but an ante
cedent idea of it, that must be the
efficient cause. But this at once marks
the origin as proceeding from an in
telligent will.
I regret to say, however, that this
latter half of the argument is not so in
expugnable as the former half. Creative
forethought is not absolutely the only
link by which the origin of the wonderful
mechanism of the eye may be connected
with the fact of sight. There is another
connecting-link on which attention has
been greatly fixed by recent speculations,
and the reality of which cannot be called
in question, though its adequacy to
account for such truly admirable com
binations as some of those in Nature is
still, and will probably long remain,
problematical. This is the principle of
“ the survival of the fittest.”
This principle does not pretend to
account for the commencement of
sensation or of animal or vegetable life.
But assuming the existence of some one
or more very low forms of organic life, in
which there are no complex adaptations
nor any marked appearances of con
trivance, and supposing, as experience
warrants us in doing, that many small
variations from those simple types would
be thrown out in all directions, which
would be transmissible by inheritance,
and of which some would be advan
tageous to the creature in its struggle for
existence and others disadvantageous,
the forms which are advantageous would
always tend to survive, and those which
are disadvantageous to perish. And
thus there would be a constant though
slow general improvement of the type as
it branched out into many different
varieties, adapting it to different media
and modes of existence, until it might
possibly, in countless ages, attain to the
most advanced examples which now
exist.
It must be acknowledged that there is
something very startling, and prima facie
improbable, in this hypothetical history
of Nature. It would require us, for
example, to suppose that the primaeval
animal, of whatever nature it may have
been, could not see, and had at most
such slight preparation for seeing as
might be constituted by some chemical
action of light upon its cellular structure.
One of the accidental variations which
are liable to take place in all organic
beings would at some time or other pro
duce a variety that could see, in some
imperfect manner, and this peculiarity
being transmitted by inheritance, while
other variations continued to take place
in other directions, a number of races
would be produced who, by the power of
even imperfect sight, would have a great
advantage over all other creatures which
could not see, and would in time ex
tirpate them from all places, except,
perhaps, a few very peculiar situations
underground. Fresh variations super
vening would give rise to races with
better and better seeing powers, until we
might at last reach as extraordinary a
combination of structures and functions
�ATTRIBUTES
as are seen in the eye of man and of the
more important animals. Of this theory,
when pushed to this extreme point, all
that can now be said is that it is not so
absurd as it looks, and that the analogies
which have been discovered in experi
ence, favourable to its possibility, far
exceed what any one could have sup
posed beforehand. Whether it will ever
be possible to say more than this is at
present uncertain.
The theory, if
admitted, would be in no way whatever
inconsistent with creation. But it must
be acknowledged that it would greatly
attenuate the evidence for it.
Leaving this remarkable speculation
to whatever fate the progress of discovery
may have in store for it, I think it must
be allowed that, in the present state of
our knowledge, the adaptations in Nature
afford a large balance of probability in
favour of creation by intelligence. It is
equally certain that this is no more than
Part
75
a probability ; and that the various other
arguments of natural theology which we
have considered add nothing to its force.
Whatever ground there is, revelation
apart, to believe in an author of nature
is derived from the appearances in the
universe. Their mere resemblance to
the works of man, or to what man could
do if he had the same power over the
materials of organised bodies which he
has over the materials of a watch, is of
some value as an argument of analogy;
but the argument is greatly strengthened
by the properly inductive considerations
which establish that there is some con
nection through causation between the
origin of the arrangements of nature and
the ends they fulfil; an argument which
is in many cases slight, but in others,
and chiefly in the nice and intricate
combinations of vegetable and animal
life, is of considerable strength.
II.—ATTRIBUTES
The question of the existence of a Deity,
in its purely scientific aspect, standing as
is shown in the First Part, it is next to
be considered, given the indications of a
Deity, what sort of a Deity do they point
to? What attributes are we warranted,
by the evidence which Nature affords of
a creative mind, in assigning to that
mind?
It needs no showing that the power, if
not the intelligence, must be so far
superior to that of man as to surpass
all human estimate. But from this to
omnipotence and omniscience there is a
wide interval. And the distinction is of
immense practical importance.
It is not too much to say that every
indication of Design in the Kosmos is so
much evidence against the omnipotence
of the designer. For what is meant by
design? Contrivance : the adaptation of
means to an end. But the necessity for
contrivance—the need of employing
means—is a consequence of the limita
tion of power. Who would have re
course to means if to attain his end his
mere word was sufficient? The very idea
of means implies that the means have an
�7&
THEISM
efficacy which the direct action of the
being who employs them has not.
Otherwise they are not means, but an
encumbrance. A man does not use
machinery to move his arms. If he did,
it could only be when paralysis had
deprived him of the power of moving
them by volition. But if the employ
ment of contrivance is in itself a sign of
limited power, how much more so
is the careful and skilful choice of con
trivances? Can any wisdom be shown
in the selection of means when the
means have no efficacy but what is given
them by the will of him who employs
them, and when his will could have
bestowed the same efficacy on any other
means ? Wisdom and contrivance are
shown in overcoming difficulties, and
there is no room for them in a being for
whom no difficulties exist. The evi
dences, therefore, of Natural Theology
distinctly imply that the Author of the
Kosmos worked under limitations; that
he was obliged to adapt himself to
conditions independent of his will, and
to attain his ends by such arrangements
as those conditions admitted of.
And this hypothesis agrees with what
we have seen to be the tendency of the
evidences in another respect. We foundthat the appearances in nature point,
indeed, to an origin of the Kosmos, or
order in nature, and indicate that origin
to be design, but do not point to any
commencement, still less creation, of the
two great elements of the universe—the
passive element and the active element,
matter and force. There is in nature
no reason whatever to suppose that
either matter or force, or any of their
properties, were made by the being who
was the author of the collocations by
which the world is adapted to what we
consider as its purposes; or that he has
power to alter any of those properties"
It is only when we consent to entertain
this negative supposition that there
arises a need for wisdom and con
trivance in the order of the universe.
The Deity had on this hypothesis to
work out his ends by combining materials
of a given nature and properties. Out
of these materials he had to construct a
world in which his designs should be
carried into effect through given proper
ties of matter and force, working to
gether and fitting into one another.
This did require skill and contrivance,
and the means by which it is effected
are often such as justly excite our
wonder and admiration; but exactly be
cause it requires wisdom, it implies
limitation of power, or rather the two
phrases express different sides of the
same fact.
If it be said that an Omnipotent
Creator, though under no necessity of
employing contrivances such as man
must use, thought fit to do so in order
to leave traces by which man might
recognise his creative hand, the answer
is that this equally supposes a limit to
his omnipotence. For if it was his will
that men should know that they them
selves and the world are his work, he,
being omnipotent, had only to will that
they should be aware of it. Ingenious
men have sought for reasons why God
might choose to leave his existence so
far a matter of doubt that men should
not be under an absolute necessity of
knowing it, as they are of knowing that
three and two make five. These
imagined reasons are very unfortunate
specimens of casuistry; but even did we
admit their validity, they are of no avail
on the supposition of omnipotence, since,
if it did not please God to implant in man
a complete conviction of his existence,
�ATTRIBUTES
nothing hindered him from making the
conviction fall short of completeness by
any margin he chose to leave. It is usual
to dispose of arguments of this descrip
tion by the easy answer—that we do not
know what wise reasons the Omniscient
may have had for leaving undone things
which he had the power to do. It is
not perceived that this plea itself implies
a limit to omnipotence. When a thing is
obviously good and obviously in accor
dance with what all the evidences of
creation imply to have been the Creator’s
design, and we say we do not know
what good reason he may have had for
not doing it, we mean that we do not
know to what other, still better object—
to what object still more completely in
the line of his purposes, he may have
seen fit to postpone it. But the neces
sity of postponing one thing to another
belongs only to limited power. Omni
potence could have made the objects
compatible. Omnipotence does not need
to weigh one consideration against
another. If the Creator, like a human
ruler, had to adapt himself to a set
of conditions which he did not make,
it is as unphilosophical as presumptuous
in Us to call him to account for any
imperfections in his work; to complain
that he left anything in it contrary to
what, if the indications of design prove
anything, he must have intended. He
must at least know more than we know,
and we cannot judge what greater good
would have had to be sacrificed, or what
greater evil incurred, if he had decided
to remove this particular blot. Not so
if he be omnipotent. If he be that, he
must himself have willed that the two
desirable objects should be incompatible;
he must himself have willed that the
obstacle to his supposed design should
be insuperable. It cannot, therefore, be
77
his design. It will not do to say that it
was, but that he had other designs which
interfered with it; for no one purpose
imposes necessary limitations on another
in the case of a being not restricted by
conditions of possibility.
Omnipotence, therefore, cannot be
predicated of the Creator on grounds of
natural theology. The fundamental
principles of natural religion, as deduced
from the facts of the universe, negative
his omnipotence. They do not, in the
same manner, exclude omniscience: if
we suppose limitation of power, there is
nothing to contradict the supposition of
perfect knowledge and absolute wisdom.
But neither is there anything to prove it.
The knowledge of the powers and
properties of things necessary for
planning and executing the arrange
ments of the Kosmos is, no doubt, as
much in excess of human knowledge as
the power implied in creation is in excess
of human power. And the skill, the
subtlety of contrivance, the ingenuity as
it would be called in the case of a human
work, is often marvellous. But nothing
obliges us to suppose that either the
knowledge or the skill is infinite. We
are not even compelled to suppose that
the contrivances were always the best
possible. If we venture to judge them
as we judge the works of human artificers,
we find abundant defects. The human
body, for example, is one of the most
striking instances of artful and ingenious
contrivance which nature offers, but we
may well ask whether so complicated a
machine could not have been made to
last longer, and not to get so easily and
frequently out of order. We may ask
why the human race should have been
so constituted as to grovel in wretched
ness and degradation for countless ages
before a small portion of it was enabled
�78
THEISM
to lift itself into the very imperfect state
of intelligence, goodness, and happiness
which we enjoy. The divine power may
not have been equal to doing more ; the
obstacles to a better arrangement of
things may have been insuperable. But
it is also possible that they were not.
The skill of the Demiourgos was suffi
cient to produce what we see; but we
cannot tell that this skill reached the
extreme limit of perfection compatible
with the material it employed and the
forces it had to work with. I know not
how we can even satisfy ourselves, on
grounds of natural theology, that the
Creator foresees all the future; that he
foreknows all the effects that will issue
from his own contrivances. There may
be great wisdom without the power of
foreseeing and calculating everything;
and human workmanship teaches us the
possibility that the workman’s knowledge
of the properties of the things he works
on may enable him to make arrange
ments admirably fitted to produce a given
result, while he may have very little
power of foreseeing the agencies of
another kind which may modify or
counteract the operation of the machinery
he has made. Perhaps a knowledge of
the laws of nature on which organic life
depends, not much more perfect than
the knowledge which man even now
possesses of .some other natural laws,
would enable man, if he had the same
power over the materials and the forces
concerned which he has over some of
those of inanimate nature, to create
organised beings not less wonderful nor
less adapted to their conditions of exist
ence than those in nature.
Assuming, then, that while we confine
ourselves to Natural Religion we must
rest content with a Creator less than
Almighty, the question presents itself,
Of what nature is the limitation of his
power ? Does the obstacle at which the
power of the Creator stops, which says
to it, Thus far shalt thou go and no
further, lie in the power of other Intelli
gent Beings; or in the insufficiency and
refractoriness of the materials of the
universe ; or must we resign ourselves to
admitting the hypothesis that the author
of the Kosmos, though wise and know
ing, was not all-wise and all-knowing, and
may not always have done the best that
was possible under the conditions of the
problem ?
The first of these suppositions has
until a very recent period been, and in
many quarters still is, the prevalent
theory even of Christianity. Though
attributing, and in a certain sense
sincerely, omnipotence to the Creator,
the received religion represents him as
for some inscrutable reason tolerating
the perpetual counteraction of his pur
poses by the will of another Being of
opposite character and of great though
inferior power, the Devil. The only
difference on this matter between popular
Christianity and the religion of Ormuzd
and Ahriman is that the former pays its
good Creator the bad compliment of
having been the maker of the Devil, and
of being at all times able to crush and
annihilate him and his evil deeds and
counsels, which, nevertheless, 'he does
not do. But, as I have already
remarked, all forms of polytheism, and
this among the rest, are with difficulty
reconcileable with an universe governed
by general laws. Obedience to law. is
the note of a settled government, and
not of a conflict always going on. When
powers are at war with one another for
the rule of the world, the boundary
between them is not fixed, but constantly
fluctuating. This may seem to be the
�ATTRIBUTES
case on our planet as between the
powers of good and evil when we look
only at the results; but when we con
sider the inner springs we find that both
the good and the evil take place in the
common course of nature, by'virtue of
the same general laws originally im
pressed—the same machinery turning
out now good, now evil things, and
oftener still the two combined. The
division of power is only apparently
variable, but really so regular that, were
we speaking of human potentates, we
should declare without hesitation that
the share of each must have been fixed
by previous consent. Upon that suppo
sition, indeed, the result of the combina
tion of antagonist forces might be much
the same as on that of a single creator
with divided purposes.
But when we come to consider, not
what hypothesis may be conceived, and
possibly reconciled with known facts, but
what supposition is pointed to by the
evidences of natural religion, the case
is different. The indications of design
point strongly in one direction—the
preservation of the creatures in whose
structure the indications are found.
Along with the preserving agencies there
are destroying agencies, which we might
be tempted to ascribe to the will of a
different Creator; but there are rarely
appearances of the recondite contrivance
of means of destruction, except when the
destruction of one creature is the means
of preservation to others. Nor can it be
supposed that the preserving agencies are
wielded by one Being, the destroying
agencies by another. The destroying
agencies are a necessary part of the pre
serving agencies : the chemical com
positions by which life is carried on
could not take place without a parallel
series of decompositions. The great J
79
agent of decay in both organic and in
organic substances is oxidation, and it is
only by oxidation that life is continued
for even the length of a minute. The
imperfections in the attainment of the
purposes which the appearances indicate
have not the air of having been designed.
They are like the unintended results of
accidents insufficiently guarded against,
or of a little excess or deficiency in the
quantity of some of the agencies by
which the good purpose is carried on, or
else they are consequences of the wearing
out of a machinery not made to last for
ever: they point either to shortcomings
in the workmanship as regards its in
tended purpose, or to external forces not
under the control of the workman, but
which forces bear no mark of being
wielded and aimed by any other and
rival Intelligence.
We may conclude, then, that there is
no ground in Natural Theology for attri
buting intelligence or personality to the
obstacles which partially thwart what
seem the purposes of the Creator. The
limitation of his power more -probably
results either from the qualities of the
material—the substances and forces of
which the universe is composed not
admitting of any arrangements by which
his purposes could be more completely
fulfilled; or else, the purposes might have
been more fully attained, but the Creator
did not know how to do it; creative
skill, wonderful as it is, was not suffi
ciently perfect to accomplish his purposes
more thoroughly.
We now pass to the moral attributes
of the Deity, so far as indicated in the
Creation ; or (stating the problem in the
broadest manner) to the question, what
indications Nature gives of the purposes
of its author. This question bears a very
different aspect to us from what it bears
�8o
THEISM
to those teachers of Natural Theology who
are encumbered with the necessity of ad
mitting the omnipotence of the Creator.
We have not to attempt the impossible
problem of reconciling infinite benevo
lence and justice with infinite power in
the Creator of such a world as this. The
attempt to do so not only involves abso
lute contradiction in an intellectual point
of view, but exhibits to excess the revolt
ing spectacle of a Jesuitical defence of
moral enormities.
On this topic I need not add to the
illustrations given of this portion of the
subject in my essay on Nature. At the
stage which our argument has reached
there is none of this moral perplexity.
Grant that creative power was limited by
conditions the nature and extent of which
are wholly unknown to us, and the good
ness and justice of the Creator may be all
that the most pious believe; and all in
the work that conflicts with those moral
attributes may be the fault of the con
ditions which left to the Creator only a
choice of evils.
It is, however, one question whether
any given conclusion is consistent with
known facts, and another whether there
is evidence to prove it; and if we have
no means for judging of the design but
from the work actually produced, it is a
somewhat hazardous speculation to sup
pose that the work designed was of a
different quality from the result realised.
Still, though the ground is unsafe, we
may, with due caution, journey a certain
distance on it. Some parts of the order
of nature give much more indication of
contrivance than others; many, it is not
too much to say, give no sign of it at all.
The signs of contrivance are most con
spicuous in the structure and processes
of vegetable and animal life. But for
these, it is probable that the appearances
in nature would never have seemed to
the thinking part of mankind to afford
any proofs of a God. But when a God
had been inferred from the organisation
of living beings, other parts of nature,
such as the structure of the solar system,
seemed to afford evidences more or less
strong in confirmation of the belief:
granting, then, a design in Nature, we can
best hope to be enlightened as to what
that design was by examining it in the
parts of nature in which its traces are the
most conspicuous.
To what purpose, then, do the ex
pedients in the construction of animals
and vegetables, which excite the admira
tion of naturalists, appear to tend ?
There is no blinking the fact that they
tend principally to no more exalted
object than to make the structure
remain in life and in working order for
a certain time; the individual for a few
years, the species or race for a longer
but still a limited period. And the
similar though less conspicuous marks
of creation which are recognised in
inorganic nature are generally of the
same character. The adaptations, for
instance, which appear in the solar
system consist in placing it under con
ditions which enable the mutual action
of its parts to maintain instead of
destroying its stability, and even that
only for a time, vast,.indeed, if measured
against our short span of animated
existence, but which can be per
ceived even by us to be limited;
for even the feeble means which
we possess of exploring the past are
believed by those who have examined
the subject by the most recent lights to
yield evidence that the solar system was
once a vast sphere of nebula or vapour,
and is going through a process which in
the course of ages will reduce it to a
�ATTRIBUTES
single and not very large mass of solid '
matter frozen up with more than arctic
cold. If the machinery of the system is
adapted to keep itself at work only for a
time, still less perfect is the adaptation
of it for the abode of living beings, since
it is only adapted to them during the
relatively short portion of its total dura
tion which intervenes between the time
when each planet was too hot and the
time when it became, or will become,
too cold to admit of life under the only
conditions in which we have experience
of its possibility. Or we should, per
haps, reverse the statement, and say that
organisation and life are only adapted
to the conditions of the solar system
during a relatively short portion of the
system’s existence.
The greater part, therefore, of the
design of which there is indication in
nature, however wonderful its mechanism,
is no evidence of any moral attributes,
because the end to which it is directed,
and its adaptation to which end is the
evidence of its being directed to an end at
all, is not a moral end; it is not the good
of any sentient creature; it is but the
qualified permanence for a limited period
of the work itself, whether animate or
inanimate. The only inference that can
be drawn from most of it respecting
the character of the Creator is that he
does not wish his works to perish as
soon as created; he wills them to have
a certain ^duration. From this alone
nothing can be justly inferred as to the '
manner in which he is affected towards
his animate or rational creatures.
After deduction of the great number
of adaptations which have no apparent
object but to keep the machine going,
there remain a certain number of pro
visions for giving pleasure to living
beings, and a certain number of provi-
sions for giving them pain. There is no
positive certainty that the whole of these
ought not to take their place among the
contrivances for keeping the creature or
its species in existence, for both the
pleasures and the pains have a con
servative tendency—the pleasures being
generally so disposed as to attract to the
things which maintain individual or
collective existence; the pains, so as to
deter from such as would destroy it.
When all these things are considered,
it is evident that a vast deduction must
be made from the evidences of a Creator
before they can be counted as evidences
of a benevolent purpose; so vast, indeed,
that some may doubt whether, after such
a deduction, there remains any balance.
Yet, endeavouring to look at the question
without partiality or prejudice, and with
out allowing wishes to have any influence
over judgment, it does appear that,
granting the existence of design, there is
a preponderance of evidence that the
Creator desired the pleasure of his
creatures. This is indicated by the fact
that pleasure of one description or
another is afforded by almost everything,
the mere play of the faculties, physical
and mental, being a never-ending source
of pleasure, and even painful things
giving pleasure by the satisfaction of
curiosity and the agreeable sense of
acquiring knowledge; and also that
pleasure, when experienced, seems to
result from the normal working of the
machinery, while pain usually arises from
some external interference with it, and
resembles in each particular case the
result of an accident. Even in cases
when pain results, like pleasure, from the
machinery itself, the appearances do not
indicate that contrivance was brought
into play purposely to produce pain :
what is indicated is rather a clumsiness
G
�82
THEISM
in the contrivance employed for some
other purposes. The author of the
machinery is no doubt accountable for
having made it susceptible of pain ; but
this may have been a necessary condition
of its susceptibility to pleasure; a suppo
sition which avails nothing on the theory
of an omnipotent Creator, but is an
extremely probable one in the case of a
Contriver working under the limitation
of inexorable laws and indestructible
properties of matter. The susceptibility
being conceded as a thing which did
enter into design, the pain itself usually
seems like a thing undesigned ; a casual
result of the collision of the organism
with some outward force to which it was
not intended to be exposed, and which
in many cases provision is even made to
hinder it from being exposed to. There
is, therefore, much appearance that
pleasure is agreeable to the Creator,
while there is very little, if any, appear
ance that pain is so; and there is a
certain amount of justification for infer
ring, on grounds of Natural Theology
alone, that benevolence is one of the
attributes of the Creator. But to jump
from this to the inference that his sole
or chief purposes are those of benevo
lence, and that the single end and aim of
Creation was the happiness of his creatures,
is not only not justified by any evidence,
but is a conclusion in opposition to such
evidence as we have. If the motive of
the Deity for creating sentient beings
was the happiness of the beings he
created, his purpose, in our corner of
the universe at least, must be pro
nounced, taking past ages and all
countries and races into account, to
have been thus far an ignominious
failure; and if God had no purpose but
our happiness and that of other living
creatures, it is not credible that he would
have called them into existence with the
prospect of being so completely baffled.
If man had not the power by the exercise
of his own energies for the improvement
both of himself and of his outward
circumstances to do for himself and
other creatures vastly more than God
had in the first instance done, the Being
who called him into existence would
deserve something very different from
thanks at his hands. Of course, it may
be said that this very capacity of improv
ing himself and the world was given to
him by God, and that the change which
he will be thereby enabled ultimately to
effect in human existence will be worth
purchasing by the sufferings and wasted
lives of entire geological periods. This
may be so; but to suppose that God
could not have given him these blessings
at a less frightful cost is to make a
very strange supposition concerning the
Deity. It is to suppose that God could
not, in the first instance, create anything
better than a Bosjesman or an Andaman
islander, or something still lower; and
yet was able to endow the Bosjesman or
the Andaman islander with the power of
raising himself into a Newton or a
Fenelon. We certainly do not know
the nature of the barriers which limit
the divine omnipotence; but it is a very
odd notion of them that they enable the
Deity to confer on an almost bestial
creature the power of producing by a
succession of efforts what God himself
had no other means of creating.
Such are the indications of Natural
Religion in respect to the divine benevo
lence. If we look for any other of the
moral attributes which a certain class of
philosophers are accustomed to distin
guish from benevolence, as, for example,
Justice, we find a total blank. There is
no evidence whatever in nature for
�IMMORTALITY
divine justice, whatever standard of
justice our ethical opinions may lead us to
recognise. There is no shadow of justice
in the general arrangements of nature;
and what imperfect realisation it obtains
in any human society (a most imperfect
realisation as yet) is the work of man
himself, struggling upwards against
immense natural difficulties into civilisa
tion, and making to himself a second
nature, far better and more unselfish
than he was created with. But on this
point enough has been said in another
essay, already referred to, on Nature.
These, then, are the net results of
Natural Theology on the question of the
divine attributes. A Being of great but
limited power, how or by what limited
Part
83
we cannot even conjecture; of great,
and perhaps unlimited intelligence, but
perhaps, also, more narrowly limited than
his power; who desires, and pays some
regard to, the happiness of his creatures,
but who seems to have other motives of
action which he cares more for, and who
can hardly be supposed to have created
the universe for that purpose alone.
Such is the Deity whom Natural Re
ligion points to; and any idea of God
more captivating than this comes only
from human wishes, or from the teaching
of either real or imaginary Revelation.
We shall next examine whether the
light of nature gives any indications con
cerning the immortality of the soul and
a future life.
III.—IMMORTALITY
The indications of immortality may be
considered in two divisions—those which
are independent of any theory respecting
the Creator and his intentions, and those
which depend upon an antecedent belief
on that subject.
Of the former class of arguments
speculative men have in different ages
put forward a considerable variety, of
which those in the Phcedon of Plato are
an example; but they are for the most
part such as have no adherents, and
need not be seriously refuted, now.
They are generally founded upon pre
conceived theories as to the nature of
the thinking principle in man, considered
as distinct and separable from the body,
and on other preconceived theories re
specting death. As, for example, that
death, or dissolution, is always a separa
tion of parts ; and the soul being without
parts, being simple and indivisible, is
not susceptible of this separation.
Curiously enough, one of the interlo
cutors in the Phcedon anticipates the
answer by which an objector of the
present day would meet this argument—
namely, that thought and consciousness,
though mentally distinguishable from
the body, may not be a substance
separable from it, but a result of it,
standing in relation to it (the illustration
is Plato’s) like that of a tune to the
musical instrument on which it is
played; and that the arguments used
to prove that the soul does not die with
the body would equally prove that the
tune does not die with the instrument,
�84
THEISM
but survives its destruction and con
tinues to exist apart. In fact, those
moderns who dispute the evidences of
the immortality of the soul do not, in
general, believe the soul to be a sub
stance per se, but regard it as the name
of a bundle of attributes, the attributes
of feeling, thinking, reasoning, believing,
willing, etc.; and these attributes they
regard as a consequence of the bodily
organisation, which, therefore, they argue,
it is as unreasonable to suppose surviving
when that organisation is dispersed as
to suppose the colour or odour of a
rose surviving when the rose itself has
perished. Those, therefore, who would
deduce the immortality of the soul from
its own nature have first to prove that
the attributes in question are not attri
butes of the body, but of a separate
substance. Now, what is the verdict of
science on this point ? It is not per
fectly conclusive either way. In the
first place, it does not prove, experi
mentally, that any mode of organisation
has the power of producing feeling or
thought. To make that proof good it
would be necessary that we should be
able to produce an organism, and try
whether it would feel—which we cannot
do; organisms cannot by any human
means be produced, they can only be
developed out of a previous organism.
On the other hand, the evidence is wellnigh complete that all thought and feel
ing has some action of the bodily
organism for its immediate antecedent
or accompaniment; that the specific
variations, and especially the different
degrees of complication of the nervous
and cerebral organisation, correspond to
differences in the development of the
mental faculties; and though we have
no evidence, except negative, that the
mental consciousness ceases for ever
when the functions of the brain are
at an end, we do know that diseases
of the brain disturb the mental functions,
and that decay or weakness of the brain
enfeebles them. We have, therefore,
sufficient evidence that cerebral action
is, if not the cause, at least, in our
present state of existence, a condition
sine qua non of mental operations; and
that, assuming the mind to be a distinct
substance, its separation from the body
would not be, as some have vainly
flattered themselves, a liberation from
trammels and restoration to freedom,
but would simply put a stop to its
functions and remand it to unconscious
ness, unless and until some other set of
conditions supervenes, capable of re
calling it into activity, but of the exist
ence of which experience does not give
us the smallest indication.
At the same time, it is of importance
to remark that these considerations only
amount to defect of evidence; they
afford no positive argument against
immortality. We must beware of giving
a priori validity to the conclusions of
an a posteriori philosophy. The root of
all a priori thinking is the tendency to
transfer to outward things a strong asso
ciation between the corresponding ideas
in our own minds; and the thinkers
who most sincerely attempt to limit
their beliefs by experience, and honestly
believe that they do so, are not always
sufficiently on their guard against this
mistake. There are thinkers who regard
it as a truth of reason that miracles are
impossible; and in like manner there
are others who, because the phenomena
of life and consciousness are associated
in their minds by undeviating experi
ence with the action of material organs,
think it an absurdity per se to imagine it
possible that those phenomena can exist
�IMMORTALITY
under any other conditions. But they
should remember that the uniform co
existence of one fact with another does
not make the one fact a part of the
other, or the same with it. The relation
of thought to a material brain is no
metaphysical necessity, but simply a
constant co existence within the limits
of observation. And when analysed to
the bottom on the principles of the
Associative Psychology, the brain, just
as much as the mental functions, is, like
matter itself, merely a set of human
sensations either actual or inferred as
possible—namely, those which the anato
mist has when he opens the skull, and
the impressions which we suppose we
should receive of molecular or some
other movements when the cerebral
action was going on, if there were no
bony envelope and our senses or our
instruments were sufficiently delicate.
Experience furnishes us with no example
of any series of states of consciousness
without this group of contingent sensa
tions attached to it; but it is as easy to
imagine such a series of states without
as with this accompaniment, and we
know of no reason in the nature of
things against the possibility of its being
thus disjoined. We may suppose that
the same thoughts, emotions, volitions,
and even sensations which we have
here, may persist or recommence some
where else under other conditions, just
as we may suppose that other thoughts
and sensations may exist under other
conditions in other parts of the universe.
And in entertaining this supposition we
need not be embarrassed by any meta
physical difficulties about a thinking
substance. Substance is but a general
name for the perdurability of attributes ;
wherever there is a series of thoughts con
nected together by memories, that consti
85
tutes a thinking substance. This absolute
distinction in thought and separability
in representation of our states of con
sciousness from the set of conditions
with which they are united only by con
stancy of concomitance is equivalent in
a practical point of view to the old
distinction of the two substances, Matter
and Mind.
There is, therefore, in science no
evidence against the immortality of the
soul but that negative evidence, which
consists in the absence of evidence in
its favour. And even the negative evi
dence is not so strong as negative
evidence often is. In the case of witch
craft, for instance, the fact that there is
no proof which will stand examination
of its having ever existed is as conclu
sive as the most positive evidence of its
non-existence would be ; for it exists, if
it does exist, on this earth, where, if it
had existed, the evidence of fact would
certainly have been available to prove
it. But it is not so as to the soul’s
existence after death. That it does not
remain on earth and go about visibly or
interfere in the events of life is proved
by the same weight of evidence which
disproves witchcraft. But that it does
not exist elsewhere there is absolutely
no proof. A very faint, if any, presump
tion is all that is afforded by its dis
appearance from the surface of this
planet.
Some may think that there is an
additional and very strong presumption
against the immortality of the thinking
and conscious principle, from the analysis
of all the other objects of Nature. All
things in Nature perish, the most beau
tiful and perfect being, as philosophers
and poets alike complain, the most
perishable. A flower of the most ex
quisite form and colouring grows up
�86
THEISM
from a root, comes to perfection in
weeks or months, and lasts only a few
hours or days. Why should it be other
wise with man? Why, indeed. But
why, also, should it not be otherwise ?
Feeling and thought are not merely
different from what we call inanimate
matter, but are at the opposite pole of
existence, and analogical inference has
little or no validity from the one to the
other. Feeling and thought are much
more real than anything else; they are
the only things which we directly know
to be real, all things else being merely
the unknown conditions on which these,
in our present state of existence, or in
some other, depend. All matter apart
from the feelings of sentient beings has
but an hypothetical and unsubstantial
-existence; it is a mere assumption to
account for our sensations ; itself we do
not perceive, we are not conscious of it,
but only of the sensations which we are
said to receive from it; in reality it is a
mere name for our expectation of
sensations, or for our belief that we can
have certain sensations when certain
other sensations give indication of them.
Because these contingent possibilities
of sensation sooner or later come to
an end and give place to others, is it
implied in this that the series of our
feelings must itself be broken off? This
would not be to reason from one kind of
substantive reality to another, but to
draw from something which has no
reality except in reference to something
else, conclusions applicable to that
which is the only substantive reality.
Mind (or whatever name we give to
what is implied in consciousness of a
continued series of feelings) is, in a
philosophical point of view, the only
reality of which we have any evidence;
and no analogy can be recognised or
comparison made between it and other
realities, because there are no other
known realities to compare it with.
That is quite consistent with its being
perishable; but the question whether it
is so or not is res integra, untouched by
any of the results of human knowledge
and experience. The case is one of
those very rare cases in which there is
really a total absence of evidence on
either side, and in which the absence of
evidence for the affirmative does not, as
in so many cases it does, create a strong
presumption in favour of the negative.
The belief, however, in human immor
tality in the minds of mankind generally
is probably not grounded on any scien
tific arguments either physical or meta
physical, but on foundations with most
minds much stronger—namely, on one
hand the disagreeableness of giving up
existence (to those at least to whom it
has hitherto been pleasant), and on the
other the general traditions of mankind.
The natural tendency of belief to follow
these two inducements, our own wishes
and the general assent of other people,
has been in this instance reinforced by
the utmost exertion of the power of
public and private teaching; rulers and
instructors having at all times, with the
view of giving greater effect to their
mandates, whether from selfish or from
public motives, encouraged to the utmost
of their power the belief that there is a life
after death, in which pleasures and suffer
ings far greater than on earth depend
on our doing or leaving undone while
alive what we are commanded to do in
the name of the unseen powers. As
causes of belief these various circum
stances are most powerful. As rational
grounds of it they carry no weight at all.
That what is called the consoling
nature of an opinion—that is, the pleasure
�IMMORTALITY
we should have in believing it to be true—
can be a ground for believing it is a
doctrine irrational in itself, and which
would sanction half the mischievous
illusions recorded in history or which
mislead individual life. It is sometimes,
in the case now under consideration,
wrapped up in a quasi-scientific language.
We are told that the desire of immor
tality is one of our instincts, and that
there is no instinct which has not corre
sponding to it a real object fitted to
satisfy it. Where there is hunger there
is somewhere food, where there is sexual
feeling there is somewhere sex, where
there is love there is somewhere some
thing to be loved, and so forth : in like
manner, since there is the instinctive
desire of eternal life, eternal life there
must be. The answer to this is patent
on the very surface of the subject. It
is unnecessary to go into any recondite
considerations concerning instincts, or to
discuss whether the desire in question
is an instinct or not. Granting that
wherever there is an instinct there
exists something such as that instinct
demands, can it be affirmed that this
something exists in boundless quantity,
or sufficient to satisfy the infinite craving
of human desires ? What is called the
desire of eternal life is simply the desire
of life; and does there not exist that
which this desire calls for? Is there not
life? And is not the instinct, if it be
an instinct, gratified by the possession
and preservation of life? To suppose
that the desire of life guarantees to us
personally the reality of life through all
eternity is like supposing that the desire
of food assures us that we shall always
have as much as we can eat through
our whole lives, and as much longer as
we can conceive our lives to be pro
tracted to.
The argument from tradition or the
general belief of the human race, if we
accept it as a guide to our own belief,
must be accepted entire : if so, we are
bound to believe that the souls of
human beings not only survive after
death, but show themselves as ghosts to
the living; for we find no people who
have had the "one belief without the
other. Indeed, it is probable that the
former belief originated in the latter,
and that primitive men would never have
supposed that the soul did not die with
the body if they had not fancied that it
visited them after death. Nothing could
be more natural than such a fancy ; it is,
in appearance, completely realised in
dreams, which in Homer, and in all ages
like Homer’s, are supposed to be real
apparitions. To dreams we have to add
not merely waking hallucinations, but the
delusions, however baseless, of sight and
hearing, or, rather, the misinterpreta
tions of those senses, sight or hearing
supplying mere hints from which imagi
nation paints a complete picture and
invests it with reality. These delusions
are not to be judged of by a modern
standard: in early times the line be
tween imagination and perception was
by no means clearly defined; there was
little or none of the knowledge we now
possess of the actual course of nature,
which makes us distrust or disbelieve
any appearance which is at variance
with known laws. In the ignorance of
men as to what were the limits of nature,
and what was or was not compatible
with it, no one thing seemed, as far
as physical considerations went, to be
much more improbable than another.
In rejecting, therefore, as we do, and as
we have the best reason to do, the tales
and legends of the actual appearance of
disembodied spirits, we take from under
�88
THEISM
the general belief in mankind in a life
after death, what in all probability was
its chief ground and support, and
deprive it of even the very little value
which the opinion of rude ages can ever
have as evidence of truth. If it be said
that this belief has maintained itself in
ages which have ceased to be rude, and
which reject the superstitions with which
it once was accompanied, the same may
be said of many other opinions of rude
ages, and especially on the most im
portant and interesting subjects, because
it is on those subjects that the reigning
opinion, whatever it may be, is the most
sedulously inculcated upon all who are
born into the world. This particular
opinion, moreover, if it has on the whole
kept its ground, has done so with a
constantly increasing number of dis
sentients, and those especially among
cultivated minds. Finally, those culti
vated minds which adhere to the belief
ground it, we may reasonably suppose,
not on the belief of others, but on
arguments and evidences; and those
arguments and evidences, therefore, are
what it concerns us to estimate and
judge.
'Fhe preceding are a sufficient sample
of the arguments for a future life which
do not suppose an antecedent belief in
the existence, or any theory respecting
the attributes, of the Godhead. It re
mains to consider what arguments are
supplied by such lights, or such grounds
of conjecture, as Natural Theology affords
on those great questions.
We have seen that these lights are but
faint; that of the existence of a Creator
they afford no more than a preponder
ance of probability; of his benevolence,
a considerably less preponderance ; that
there is, however, some reason to think
that he cares for the pleasures of his
creatures, but by no means that this is
his sole care, or that other purposes do
not often take precedence of it. His
intelligence must be adequate to the
contrivances apparent in the universe,
but need not be more than adequate
to them, and his power is not only not
proved to be infinite, but the only real
evidences in Natural Theology tend to
show that it is limited, contrivance being
a mode of overcoming difficulties, and
always supposing difficulties to be over
come.
We have now to consider what infer
ence can legitimately be drawn from
these premises, in favour of a future life.
It seems to me, apart from express
revelation, none at all.
The common arguments are, the good
ness of God; the improbability that he
would ordain the annihilation of his
noblest and richest work, after the greater
part of its few years of life had been
spent in the acquisition of faculties
which time has not allowed him to turn
to fruit; and the special improbability
that he would have implanted in us an
instinctive desire of eternal life, and
doomed that desire to complete dis
appointment.
These might be arguments in a world
the constitution of which made it pos
sible without contradiction to hold it for
the work of a Being at once omnipotent
and benevolent. But they are not argu
ments in a world like that in which we
live. The benevolence of the divine
Being may be perfect, but, his power
being subject to unknown limitations,
we know not that he could have given
us what we so confidently assert that he
must have given ; could (that is) without
sacrificing something more important.
Even his benevolence, however justly
inferred, is by no means indicated as the
�IMMORTALITY
interpretation of his whole purpose; and
since we cannot tell how far other pur
poses may have interfered with the
exercise of his benevolence, we know
not that he would, even if he could, have
granted us eternal life. With regard to
the supposed improbability of his having
given the wish without its gratification,
the same answer may be made: the
scheme which either limitation of power,
or conflict of purposes, compelled him to
adopt may have required that we should
have the wish, although it were not
destined to be gratified. One thing,
however, is quite certain in respect to
God’s government of the world : that he
either could not, or would not, grant to
us everything we wish. We wish for
life, and he has granted some life; that
we wish (or some of us wish) for a
boundless extent of life, and that it is not
granted, is no exception to the ordinary
modes of his government. Many a
man would like to be a Croesus or an
Augustus Caesar, but has his wishes
gratified only to the moderate extent of a
pound a week or the secretaryship of his
Trade Union. There is, therefore, no
assurance whatever of a life after death,
on grounds of natural religion. But to
any one who feels it conducive either to
his satisfaction or to his usefulness to
hope for a future state as a possibility,
there is no hindrance to his indulging
that hope. Appearances point to the
existence of a Being who has great
power over us—all the power implied in
the creation of the Kosmos, or of its
organised beings at least—and of whose
goodness we have evidence, though not
of its being his predominant attribute;
and as we do not know the limits either
of his power or of his goodness, there is
room to hope that both the one and the
other may extend to granting us this
gift, provided that it would really be
beneficial to us. The same ground
which permits the hope warrants us in
expecting that, if there be a future life, it
will be at least as good as the present,
and will not be wanting in the best
feature of the present life—improvability
by our own efforts. Nothing can be
more opposed to every estimate we can
form of probability than the common
idea of the future life as a state of
rewards and punishments in any other
sense than that the consequences of our
actions upon our own character and sus
ceptibilities will follow us in the future as
they have done in the past and present.
Whatever be the probabilities of a future
life, all the probabilities in case of a
future life are that such as we have been
made or have made ourselves before the
change, such we shall enter into the life
hereafter; and that the fact of death will
make no sudden break in our spiritual
life, nor influence our character any
otherwise than as any important change
in our mode of existence may always be
expected to modify it. Our thinking
principle has its laws, which in this life
are invariable, and any analogies drawn
from this life must assume that the same
laws will continue. To imagine that a
miracle will be wrought at death by the
act of God making perfect every one
whom it is his will to include among his
elect, might be justified by an express
revelation duly authenticated, but is
utterly opposed to every presumption
that can be deduced from the light of
Nature.
�THEISM
90
Part
IV.—REVELATION
The discussion in the preceding pages
respecting the evidences of Theism has
been strictly confined to those which
are derived from the light of Nature. It
is a different question what addition has
been made to those evidences, and to
what extent the conclusions obtainable
from them have been amplified or modi
fied, by the establishment of a direct
communication with the Supreme Being.
It would be beyond the purpose of this
essay to take into consideration the
positive evidences of the Christian or
any other belief which claims to be a
revelation from Heaven. But such
general considerations as are applicable,
not to a particular system, but to
Revelation generally, may properly find
a place here, and are, indeed, necessary
to give a sufficiently practical bearing
to the results of the preceding investi
gation.
In the first place, then, the indications
of a Creator and of his attributes which
we have been able to find in Nature,
though so much slighter and less con
clusive even as to his existence than the
pious mind would wish to consider
them, and still more unsatisfactory in
the information they afford as to his
attributes, are yet sufficient to give to the
supposition of a Revelation a standing
point which it would not otherwise have
had. The alleged Revelation is not
obliged to build up its case from the
foundation; it has not to prove the very
existence of the Being from whom it
professes to come. It claims to be a
message from a Being whose existence,
whose power, and to a certain extent
whose wisdom and goodness, are, if not
proved, at least indicated with more or
less of probability by the phenomena of
Nature. The sender of the alleged
message is not a sheer invention; there
are grounds independent of the message
itself for belief in his reality; grounds
which, though insufficient for proof, are
sufficient to take away all antecedent
improbability from the supposition that
a message may really have been received
from him. It is, moreover, much to the
purpose to take notice that the very
imperfection of the evidences which
Natural Theology can produce of the
Divine attributes removes some of the
chief stumbling blocks to the belief
of a Revelation; since the objections
grounded on imperfections in the Reve
lation itself, however conclusive against
it, if it is considered as a record of
the acts or an expression of the wisdom
of a Being of infinite power combined
with infinite wisdom and goodness, are
no reason whatever against its having
come from a Being such as the course of
nature points to, whose wisdom is pos
sibly, his power certainly, limited, and
whose goodness, though real, is not
likely to have been the only motive
which actuated him in the work of
Creation. The argument of Butler’s
Analogy is, from its own point of view,
conclusive : the Christian religion is open
to no objections, either moral or intel
lectual, which do not apply, at least,
equally to the common theory of Deism;
the morality of the Gospels is far higher
and better than that which shows itself
in the order of Nature; and what is
�REVELATION
morally objectionable in the Christian
theory of the world is objectionable only
when taken in conjunction with the
doctrine of an omnipotent God; and
(at least as understood by the most
enlightened Christians) by no means im
ports any moral obliquity in a Being
whose power is supposed to be restricted
by real though unknown obstacles,
which prevented him from fully carrying
out his design. The grave error of
Butler was that he shrank from admit
ting the hypothesis of limited powers ;
and his appeal consequently amounts
to this : The belief of Christians is
neither more absurd nor more immoral
than the belief of Deists who acknow
ledge an Omnipotent Creator; let us,
therefore, in spite of the absurdity and
immorality, believe both. He ought to
have said : Let us cut down our belief
of either to what does not involve
absurdity or immorality; to what is
neither intellectually self-contradictory
nor morally perverted.
To return, however, to the main sub
ject : on the hypothesis of a God, who
made the world, and in making it had
regard, however that regard may have
been limited by other considerations, to
the happiness of his sentient creatures,
there is no antecedent improbability in
the supposition that his concern for
their good would continue, and that he
might once, or oftener, give proof of it
by communicating to them some know
ledge of himself beyond what they were
able to make out by their unassisted
faculties, and some knowledge or pre
cepts useful for guiding them through
the difficulties of life. Neither on the
only tenable hypothesis, that of limited
power, is it open to us to object that
these helps ought to have been greater,
or in any way other than they are. The
91
only question to be entertained, and
which we cannot dispense ourselves from
entertaining, is that of evidence. Can
any evidence suffice to prove a Divine
Revelation ? And of what nature, and
what amount, must that evidence be ?
Whether the special evidences of
Christianity, or of any other alleged
revelation, do or do not come up to the
mark, is a different question, into which
I do not propose directly to enter. The
question I intend to consider is, what
evidence is required; what general con
ditions it ought to satisfy; and whether
they are such as, according to the known
constitution of things, can be satisfied.
The evidences of Revelation are com
monly distinguished as external or in
ternal. External evidences are the testi
mony of the senses or of witnesses. By
the internal evidences are meant the
indications which the Revelation itself
is thought to furnish of its divine origin ;
indications supposed to consist chiefly in
the excellence of its precepts, and its
general suitability to the circumstances
and needs of human nature.
The consideration of these internal
evidences is very important, but their
importance is principally negative : they
may be conclusive grounds for rejecting
a Revelation, but cannot of themselves
warrant the acceptance of it as divine.
If the moral character of the doctrines
of an alleged Revelation is bad and
perverting, we ought to reject it from
whomsoever it comes, for it cannot come
from a good and wise Being. But the
excellence of their morality can never
entitle us to ascribe to them a super
natural origin; for we cannot have con
clusive reason for believing that the
human faculties were incompetent to find
out moral doctrines of which the human
faculties can perceive and recognise the
�92
THEISM
excellence. A Revelation, therefore,
cannot be proved divine unless by ex
ternal evidence—that is, by the exhibi
tion of supernatural facts. And we
have to consider whether it is possible
to prove supernatural facts, and, if it
is, what evidence is required to prove
them.
This question has only, so far as I
know, been seriously raised on the
sceptical side by Hume. It is the ques
tion involved in his famous argument
against miracles—an argument which
goes down to the depths of the subject,
but the exact scope and effect of
which (perhaps not conceived with per
fect correctness by that great thinker
himself) have in general been utterly
misconceived by those who have at
tempted to answer him. Dr. Campbell,
for example, one of the acutest of his
antagonists, has thought himself obliged,
in order to support the credibility of
miracles, to lay down doctrines which
virtually go the length of maintaining
that antecedent improbability is never a
sufficient ground for refusing credence
to a statement, if it is well attested. Dr.
Campbell’s fallacy lay in overlooking a
double meaning of the word “impro
bability”; as I have pointed out in my
Logic, and, still earlier, in an editorial
note to Bentham’s treatise on Evidence.
Taking the question from the very
beginning, it is evidently impossible to
maintain that, if a supernatural fact really
occurs, proof of its occurrence cannot be
accessible to the human faculties. The
evidence of our senses could prove this
as it can prove other things. To put
the most extreme case : Suppose that I
actually saw and heard a Being, either
of the human form or of some form
previously unknown to me, commanding
a world to exist,, and a new world
actually starting into existence and com
mencing a movement through space,
at his command. There can be no
doubt that this evidence would convert
the creation of worlds from a speculation
into a fact of experience. It may be
said I could not know that so singular
an appearance was anything more than
a hallucination of my senses. True,
but the same doubt exists at first re^
specting every unsuspected and surpris
ing fact which comes to light in our
physical researches. That our senses
have been deceived is a possibility which
has to be met and dealt with, and we do
deal with it by several means. If we
repeat the experiment, and again with
the same result; if at the time of the
observation the impressions of our senses
are in all other respects the same as
usual, rendering the supposition of their
being morbidly affected in this one par
ticular extremely improbable; above all,
if other people’s senses confirm the testi
mony of our own; we conclude, with
reason, that we may trust our senses.
Indeed, our senses are all that we have
to trust to. We depend on them for the
ultimate premises even of our reason
ings. There is no other appeal against
their decision than an appeal from the
senses without precautions to the senses
with all due precautions. When the
evidence on which an opinion rests is
equal to that upon which the whole con
duct and safety of our lives is founded,
we need ask no further. Objections
which apply equally to all evidence are
valid against none. They only prove
abstract fallibility.
But the evidence of miracles, at least
to Protestant Christians, is not, in our
own day, of this cogent description. It
is not the evidence of our senses, but of
witnesses, and even this not at first
�REVELATION
hand, but resting on the attestation of
books and traditions. And even in the
case of the original eye-witnesses, the
supernatural facts asserted on their
alleged testimony are not of the trans
cendent character supposed in our ex
ample, about the nature of which, or
the impossibility of their having had a
natural origin, there could be little
room for doubt. On the contrary, the
recorded miracles are, in the first place,
generally such as it would have been
extremely difficult to verify as matters of
fact, and, in the next place, are hardly
ever beyond the possibility of having
been brought about by human means or
by the spontaneous agencies of nature.
It is to cases of this kind that Hume’s
argument against the credibility of
miracles was meant to apply.
His argument is: The evidence of
miracles consists of testimony. The
ground of our reliance on testimony
is our experience that, certain conditions
being supposed, testimony is generally
veracious. But the same experience
tells us that, even under the best condi
tions, testimony is frequently either inten
tionally or unintentionally false. When,
therefore, the fact to which testimony is
produced is one the happening of which
would be more at variance with experi
ence than the falsehood of testimony,
we ought not to believe it. And this
rule all prudent persons observe in the
conduct of life. Those who do not are
sure to suffer for their credulity.
Now, a miracle (the argument goes on
to say) is, in the highest possible degree,
contradictory to experience; for if it
were not contradictory to experience it
would not be a miracle. The very
reason for its being . regarded as a
miracle is that it is a breach of a law
of nature—that is, of an otherwise invari
93
able and inviolable uniformity in the
succession of natural events. There is,
therefore, the very strongest reason for
disbelieving it that experience can give
for disbelieving anything. But the men
dacity or error of witnesses, even though
numerous and of fair character, is quite
within the bounds of even common
experience. That supposition, therefore,
ought to be preferred.
There are two apparently weak points
in this argument. One is, that the evi
dence of experience to which its appeal
is made is only negative evidence, which
is not so conclusive as positive, since
facts of which there had been no pre
vious experience are often discovered,
and proved by positive experience to
be true. The other seemingly vulner
able point is this. The argument has
the appearance of assuming that the
testimony of experience against miracles
is undeviating and indubitable, as it
would be if the whole question was
about the probability of future miracles,
none having taken place in the past;
whereas the very thing asserted on the
other side is that there have been
miracles, and that the testimony of
experience is not wholly on the negative
side. All the evidence alleged in favour
of any miracle ought to be reckoned as
counter-evidence in refutation of the
ground on which it is asserted that
miracles ought to be disbelieved. The
question can only be stated fairly as de
pending on a balance of evidence: a
certain amount of positive evidence in
favour of miracles, and a negative pre
sumption from the general course of
human experience against them.
In order to support the argument
under this double correction, it has to be
shown that the negative presumption
against a miracle is very much stronger
�94
THEISM
than that against a merely new and sur
prising fact. This, however, is evidently
the case. A new physical discovery,
even if it consists in the defeating of a
well-established law of nature, is but the
discovery of another law previously un
known. There is nothing in this but
what is familiar to our experience; we
were aware that we did not know all the
laws of nature, and we were aware that
one such law is liable to be counteracted
by others. The new phenomenon, when
brought to light, is found still to depend
on law; it is always exactly reproduced
when the same circumstances are re
peated. Its occurrence, therefore, is
within the limits of variation in experi
ence, which experience itself discloses.
But a miracle, in the very fact of being
a miracle, declares itself to be a supersession, not of one natural law by
another, but of the law which includes
all others, which experience shows to be
universal for all phenomena—viz., that
they depend on some law ; that they are
always the same when there are the
same phenomenal antecedents, and
neither take place in the absence of
their phenomenal causes, nor ever fail to
take place when the phenomenal condi
tions are all present.
It is evident that this argument against
belief in miracles had very little to rest
upon until a comparatively modern
stage in the progress of science. A few
generations ago the universal depen
dence of phenomena on invariable laws
was not only not recognised by mankind
in general, but could not be regarded by
the instructed as a scientifically estab
lished truth. There were many pheno
mena which seemed quite irregular in
their course, without dependence on
any known antecedents ; and though, no
doubt, a certain regularity in the occur
rence of the most familiar phenomena
must always have been recognised,
yet even in these the exceptions which
were constantly occurring had not yet,
by an investigation and generalisation of
the circumstances of their occurrence,
been reconciled with the general rule.
The heavenly bodies were from of old
the most conspicuous types of regular
and unvarying order; yet even among
them comets were a phenomenon
apparently originating without any law,
and eclipses, one which seemed to take
place in violation of law. Accordingly,
both comets and eclipses long continued
to be regarded as of a miraculous nature,
intended as signs and omens of human
fortunes. It would have been impossible
in those days to prove to anyone that
this supposition was antecedently im
probable. It seemed more conformable
to appearances than the hypothesis of an
unknown law.
Now, however, when, in the progress
of science, all phenomena have been
shown by indisputable evidence to be
amenable to law, and even in the cases
in which those laws have not yet been
exactly ascertained, delay in ascertaining
them is fully accounted for by the special
difficulties of the subject; the defenders
of miracles have adapted their argument
to this altered state of things by main
taining that a miracle need not neces
sarily be a violation of law. It may,
they say, take place in fulfilment of a
more recondite law, to us unknown.
If by this it be only meant that the
Divine Being, in the exercise of his
power of interfering with and suspending
his own laws, guides himself by some
general principle or rule of action, this,
of course, cannot be disproved, and is
in itself the most probable supposition.
But if the argument means that a
�RE VELA TION
95
It will perhaps be said that a miracle
miracle may be the fulfilment of a law
in the same sense in which the ordinary <does not necessarily exclude the inter
events of Nature are fulfilments of laws, it vention of second causes. If it were the
seems to indicate an imperfect concep will of God to raise a thunderstorm by
tion of what is meant by a law, and of miracle, he might do it by means of
winds and clouds. Undoubtedly; but
what constitutes a miracle.
When we say that an ordinary physical the winds and clouds were either suffi
fact always takes place according to cient when produced to excite the
some invariable law, we mean that it is thunderstorm without other divine assist
connected by uniform sequence or co ance, or they were not. If they were
existence with some definite set of not, the storm is not a fulfilment of law,
physical antecedents; that whenever that but a violation of it. If they were suffi
set is exactly reproduced the same pheno cient, there is a miracle, but it is not the
menon will take place, unless counter storm ; it is the production of the winds
acted by the similar laws of some other and clouds, or whatever link in the chain
physical antecedents; and that, when of causation it was at which the influence
ever it does take place, it would always of physical antecedents was dispensed
be found that its special set of antece with. If that influence was never dis
dents (or one of its sets if it has more pensed with, but the event called mira
than one) has pre-existed. Now, an culous was produced by natural means,
event which takes place in this manner and those again by others, and so on
is not a miracle. To make it a miracle from the beginning of things; if the
it must be produced by a direct volition, event is no otherwise the act of God
without the use of means; or, at least, than in having been foreseen and
of any means which, if simply repeated, ordained by him as the consequence of
would produce it. To constitute a the forces put in action at the Creation ;
miracle a phenomenon must take place then there is no miracle at all, nor
without having been preceded by any anything different from the ordinary
antecedent phenomenal conditions suffi working of God’s providence.
For another example : a person pro
cient again to reproduce it; or a pheno
fessing to be divinely commissioned
menon for the production of which
the antecedent conditions existed must cures a sick person by some apparently
be arrested or prevented without the in insignificant external application. Would
tervention of any phenomenal antece this application, administered by a person
dents which would arrest or prevent it not specially commissioned from above,
in a future case. The test of a miracle have effected the cure? If so, there is
is: Were there present in the case such no miracle; if not, there is a miracle,
external conditions, such second causes but there is a violation of law.
It will be said, however, that, if these
we may call them, that whenever these
be violations of law, then law is violated
conditions or causes reappear the event
will be reproduced? If there were, it is every time that any outward effect is
not a miracle; if there were not, it is a produced by a voluntary act of a human
miracle, but it is not according to law; being. Human volition is constantly
it is an event produced, without, or in modifying natural phenomena, not by
violating their laws, but by using their
spite of, law.
�96
THEISM
laws. Why may not divine volition do combination of physical antecedents and
the same ? The power of volitions over a physical consequent. But this, whether
phenomena is itself a law, and one of the true or not, does not really affect the
earliest known and acknowledged laws argument; for the interference of human
of nature. It is true the human will will with the course of Nature is only not
exercises power over objects in general an exception to law when we include
indirectly, through the direct power among laws the relation of motive to
which it possesses only over the human volition; and by the same rule interfer
muscles. God, however, has direct ence by the Divine will would not be an
power, not merely over one thing, but exception either, since we cannot but
over all the objects which he has made. suppose the Deity in every one of his
There is, therefore, no more a supposi acts to be determined by motives.
tion of violation of law in supposing that
The alleged analogy, therefore, holds
events are produced, prevented, or modi good; but what it proves is only what I
fied by God’s action, than in the suppo have from the first maintained—that
sition of their being produced, pre divine interference with nature could be
vented, or modified by man’s action. proved if we had the same sort of
Both are equally in the course of Nature, evidence for it which we have for
both equally consistent with what we know human interferences. The question of
of the government of all things by law.
antecedent improbability only arises be
Those who thus argue are mostly be cause divine interposition is not certified
lievers in Free Will, and maintain that by the direct evidence of perception,
every human volition originates a new but is always matter of inference, and,
chain of causation, of which it is itself more or less, of speculative inference.
the commencing link, not connected by And a little consideration will show that
invariable sequence with any anterior in these circumstances the antecedent
fact. Even, therefore, if a divine inter presumption against the truth of the
position did constitute a breaking-in inference is extremely strong.
upon the connected chain of events, by
When the human will interferes to
the introduction of a new originating produce any physical phenomenon, ex
cause without root in the past, this would cept the movements of the human body,
be no reason for discrediting it, since it does so by the employment of means,
every human act of volition does pre and is obliged to employ such means as
cisely the same. If the one is a breach are by their own physical properties
of law, so are the others. In fact, the sufficient to bring about the effect.
reign of law does not extend to the Divine interference by hypothesis pro
origination of volition.
ceeds in a different manner from this : it
Those who dispute the Free Will produces its effect without means, or with
theory, and regard volition as no excep such as are in themselves insufficient.
tion to the universal law of Cause and In the first case, all the physical phe
Effect, may answer, that volitions do not nomena, except the first bodily move
interrupt the chain of causation, but ment, are produced in strict conformity
carry it on, the connection of cause and to physical causation; while that first
effect being of just the same nature movement is traced by positive observa
between motive and act as between a tion to the cause (the volition) which
�REVELATION
produced it. In the other case the
event is supposed not to have been pro
duced at all through physical causation,
while there is no direct evidence to con
nect it with any volition. The ground on
which it is ascribed to a volition is
only negative, because there is no other
apparent way of accounting for its exist
ence.
But in this merely speculative explana
tion there is always another hypothesis
possible—viz., that the event may have
been produced by physical causes in a
manner not apparent. It may either be
due to a law of physical nature not yet
known, or to the unknown presence of
the conditions necessary for producing
it according to some known law. Sup
posing even that the event, supposed to
be miraculous, does not reach us through
the uncertain medium of human testi
mony, but rests on the direct evidence of
our own senses; even then, so long as
there is no direct evidence of its produc
tion by a divine volition, like that we
have for the production of bodily move
ments by human volitions—so long,
therefore, as the miraculous character of
the event is but an inference from the
supposed inadequacy of the laws of
physical nature to account for it—so
long will the hypothesis of a natural
origin for the phenomenon be entitled to
preference over that of a supernatural
one. The commonest principles of
sound judgment forbid us to suppose for
any effect a cause of which we have
absolutely no experience, unless all
those of which we have experience are
ascertained to be absent. Now, there
are few things of which we have more
frequent experience than of physical
facts which our knowledge does not
enable us to account for, because they
depend either on laws which observation,
97
aided by science, has not yet brought to
light, or on facts the presence of which
in the particular case is unsuspected by
us. Accordingly, when we hear of a
prodigy, we always in these modern times
believe that, if it really occurred, it was
neither the work of God nor of a demon,
but the consequence of some unknown
natural law or of some hidden fact. Nor
is either of these suppositions precluded
when, as in the case of a miracle
properly so called, the wonderful event
seemed to depend upon the will of a
human being. It is always possible that
there may be at work some undetected
law of nature which the wonder-worker
may have acquired, consciously or un
consciously, the power of calling into
action; or that the wonder may have
been wrought (as in the truly extraordi
nary feats of jugglers) by the employ
ment, unperceived by us, of ordinary
laws, which also need not necessarily be
a case of voluntary deception ; or, lastly,
the event may have had no connection
with the volition at all, but the coinci
dence between them may be the effect
of craft or accident, the miracle-worker
having seemed or effected to produce by
his will that which was already about to
take place, as if one were to command
an eclipse of the sun at the moment
when one knew by astronomy that an
eclipse was on the point of taking place.
In a case of this description the miracle
might be tested by a challenge to repeat
it; but it is worthy of remark that re
corded miracles were seldom or never
put to this test. No miracle-work er
seems ever to have made a practice of
raising the dead; that and the other
most signal of the miraculous operations
are reported to have been performed
only in one or a few isolated cases,
which may have been either cunningly
h
�98
THEISM
selected cases or accidental coincidences.
There is, in short, nothing to exclude
the supposition that every alleged miracle
was due to natural causes; and as long
as that supposition remains possible no
scientific observer, and no man of ordi
nary practical judgment, would assume
by conjecture a cause which no reason
existed for supposing to be real, save the
necessity of accounting for something
which is sufficiently accounted for with
out it.
Were we to stop here, the case against
miracles might seem to be complete.
But, on further inspection, it will be
seen that we cannot, from the above
considerations, conclude absolutely that
the miraculous' theory of the production
of a phenomenon ought to be at once
rejected. We can conclude only that
no extraordinary powers which have ever
been alleged to be exercised by any
human being over nature can be evidence
of miraculous gifts to any one to whom
the existence of a Supernatural Being
and his interference in human affairs is
not already a vera causa. The existence
of God cannot possibly be proved by
miracles, for, unless a God is already
recognised, the apparent miracle can
always be accounted for on a more
probable hypothesis than that of the
interference of a Being of whose very
existence it is supposed to be the sole
evidence. Thus far Hume’s argument
is conclusive. But it is far from being
equally so when the existence of a Being
who created the present order of Nature,
and, therefore, may well be thought to
have power to modify it, is accepted as
a fact, or even as a probability resting on
independent evidence. Once admit a
God, and the production by his direct
volition of an effect, which in any case
owed its origin to his creative will, is no
longer a purely arbitrary hypothesis to
account for the fact, but must be
reckoned with as a serious possibility.
The question then changes its character,
and the decision of it must now rest
upon what is known or reasonably sur
mised as to the manner of God’s govern
ment of the universe; whether this
knowledge or surmise makes it the more
probable supposition that the event was
brought about by the agencies by which
his government is ordinarily carried on,
or that it is the result of a special and
extraordinary interposition of his will in
supersession of those ordinary agencies.
In the first place, then, assuming as a
fact the existence and providence of
God, the whole of our observation of
Nature proves to us by incontrovertible
evidence that the rule of his government
is by means of second causes; that all
facts, or at least all physical facts, follow
uniformly upon given physical condi
tions, and never occur but when the
appropriate collection of physical condi
tions is realised. I limit the assertion
to physical facts, in order to leave the
case of human volition an open question;
though, indeed, I need not do so, for, if
the human will is free, it has been left free
by the Creator, and is not controlled by
him either through second causes or
directly, so that, not being governed, it
is not a specimen of his mode of govern
ment. Whatever he does govern, he
governs by second causes. This was
not obvious in the infancy of science ; it
was more and more recognised as the
processes of nature were more carefully
and accurately examined, until there
now remains no class of phenomena of
which it is not positively known, save
some cases which from their obscurity
and complication our scientific pro
cesses have not yet been able completely
�REVELATION
to clear up and disentangle, and in
which, therefore, the proof that they
also are governed by natural laws could
not, in i’ne present state of science, be
more complete. The evidence, though
merely negative, which these circum
stances afford that government by second
causes is universal, is admitted for all
except directly religious purposes to be
conclusive. When either a man of
science for scientific, or a man of the
world for practical, purposes inquires
into an event, he asks himself, What is
its cause ? and not, Has it any natural
cause? A man would be laughed at
who set down as one of the alternative
suppositions that there is no other cause
for it than the will of God.
Against this weight of negative evi
dence we have to set such positive
evidence as is produced in attestation of
exceptions; in other words, the positive
evidences of miracles. And I have al
ready admitted that this evidence might
conceivably have been such as to make
the exception equally certain with the
rule. If we had the direct testimony of
our senses to a supernatural fact, it might
be as completely authenticated and
made certain as any natural one. But
we never have. The supernatural cha
racter of the fact is always, as I have
said, matter of inference and specula
tion ; and the mystery always admits the
possibility of a solution not supernatural.
To those who already believe in super
natural power the supernatural hypo
thesis may appear more probable than
the natural one; but only if it accords
with what we know or reasonably surmise
respecting the ways of the supernatural
agent. Now, all that we know from the
evidence of nature concerning his ways
is in harmony with the natural theory and
repugnant to the supernatural. There
99
is, therefore, a vast preponderance of
probability against a miracle, to counter
balance which would require a very
extraordinary and indisputable congruity
in the supposed miracle and its circum
stances with something which we con
ceive ourselves to know, or to have
grounds for believing, with regard to the
divine attributes.
This extraordinary congruity is sup
posed to exist when the purpose of the
miracle is extremely beneficial to man
kind, as when it serves to accredit some
highly important belief. The goodness
of God, it is supposed, affords a high
degree of antecedent probability that he
would make an exception to his general
rule of government for so excellent a
purpose. For reasons, however, which
have already been entered into, any
inference drawn by us from the good
ness of God to what he has or has not
actually done, is to the last degree pre
carious. If we reason directly from God’s
goodness to positive facts, no misery,
nor vice, nor crime ought to exist in the
world. We can see no reason in God’s
goodness why, if he deviated once from
the ordinary system of his government
in order to do good to man, he should
not have done so on a hundred other
occasions ; nor why, if the benefit aimed
at by some given deviation, such as the
revelation of Christianity, was transcen
dent and unique, that precious gift
should only have been vouchsafed after
the lapse of many ages; or why, when it
was at last given, the evidence of it
should have been left open to so much
doubt and difficulty. Let it be remem
bered also that the goodness of God
affords no presumption in favour of
a deviation from his general system of
government unless the good purpose
could not have been attained without
�IOO
THEISM
deviation. If God intended that man of the wonderful stories, such multitudes
kind should receive Christianity or any of which were current among the early
other gift, it would have agreed better Christians; but when they do, excep
with all that we know of his government tionally, name any of the persons who
to have made provision in the scheme of were the subjects or spectators of the
creation for its arising at the appointed miracle, they doubtless draw from tradi
time by natural development; which, let tion, and mention those names with
it be added, all the knowledge we now which the story was in the popular mind
possess concerning the history of the (perhaps accidentally) connected; for
human mind tends to the conclusion whoever has observed the way in which
that it actually did.
even now a story grows up from some
To all these considerations ought to small foundation, taking on additional
be added the extremely imperfect nature details at every step, knows well how,
of the testimony itself which we possess from being at first anonymous, it gets
for the miracles, real or supposed, which names attached to it; the name of some
accompanied the foundation of Chris one by whom, perhaps, the story has
tianity and of every other revealed re been told being brought into the story
ligion. Take it at the best, it is the itself first as a witness, and still later
uncross-examined testimony of extremely as a party concerned.
ignorant people, credulous as such
It is also noticeable, and is a very im
usually are, honourably credulous when portant consideration, that stories of
the excellence of the doctrine or just miracles only grow up among the igno
reverence for the teacher makes them rant, and are adopted, if ever, by the
eager to believe; unaccustomed to draw educated when they have already be
the line between the perceptions of come the belief of multitudes. Those
sense and what is superinduced upon which are believed by Protestants all
them by the suggestions of a lively ■originate in ages and nations in which
imagination; unversed in the difficult there was hardly any canon of proba
art of deciding between appearance and bility, and miracles were thought to be
>
reality, and between the natural and the ;among the commonest of all phenomena.
supernatural; in times, moreover, when 'The Catholic Church, indeed, holds as
no one thought it worth while to con- £an article of faith that miracles have
tradict any alleged miracle, because it inever ceased, and new ones continue to
was the belief of the age that miracles in Ibe now and then brought forth and
themselves proved nothing, since they I
believed, even in the present incredulous
could be worked by a lying spirit as well e —yet if in an incredulous generation
age
as by the spirit of God. Such were the c
certainly not among the incredulous
witnesses; and even of them we do not portion of it, but always among people
f
possess the direct testimony; the docu- v
who, in addition to the most childish
ments of date long subsequent, even on i;
ignorance, have grown up (as all do who
the orthodox theory, which contain the a
are educated by the Catholic clergy)
only history of these events, very often t
trained in the persuasion that it is a duty
do not even name the supposed eye- ti believe and a sin to doubt; that it is
to
witnesses. They put down (it is but d
dangerous to be sceptical about anything
just to admit) the best and least absurd v
which is tendered for belief in the name
�RE VELA TION
of the true religion; and that nothing is
so contrary to piety as incredulity. But
these miracles which no one but a
Roman Catholic, and by no means every
Roman Catholic, believes, rest frequently
upon an amount of testimony greatly
surpassing that which we possess for any
of the early miracles; and superior, espe
cially in one of the most essential points
—that in many cases the alleged eye
witnesses are known, and we have their
story at first hand.
Thus, then, stands the balance of
evidence in respect to the reality of
miracles, assuming the existence and
government of God to be proved by
other evidence. On the one side, the
great negative presumption arising from
the whole of what the course of nature
discloses to us of the divine government,
as carried on through second causes and
by invariable sequences of physical
effects upon constant antecedents. On
the other side, a few exceptional in
stances, attested by evidence not of a
character to warrant belief in any facts
in the smallest degree unusual or impro
bable ; the eye-witnesses in most cases
unknown, in none competent by charac
ter or education to scrutinise the real
nature of the appearances which they
may have seen,1 and moved, moreover,
by a union of the strongest motives
which can inspire human beings to per
suade, first themselves, and then others,
that what they had seen was a miracle.
The facts, too, even if faithfully reported,
are never incompatible w’ith the sup
1 St. Paul, the only known exception to the
ignorance and want of education of the first
generation of Christians, attests no miracle but
that of his own conversion, which of all the
miracles of the New Testament is the one which
admits of the easiest explanation from natural
causes.
IOI
position that they were either mere co
incidences, or were produced by natural
means, even when no specific conjecture
can be made as to those means, which
in general it can. The conclusion I
draw is that miracles have no claim
whatever to the character of historical
facts, and are wholly invalid as evidences
of any revelation.
What can be said with truth on the
side of miracles amounts only to this:
Considering that the order of nature
affords some evidence of the reality of a
Creator, and of his bearing goodwill to
his creatures, though not of its being the
sole prompter of his conduct towards
them: considering, again, that all the
evidence of his existence is evidence also
that he is not all-powerful, and consider
ing that in our ignorance of the limits of
his power we cannot positively decide
that he was able to provide for us by the
original plan of Creation all the good
which it entered into his intentions to
bestow upon us, or even to bestow any
part of it at any earlier period than that
at which we actually received it—con
sidering these things, when we consider
further that a gift, extremely precious,
came to us which, though facilitated,
was not apparently necessitated by what
had gone before, but was due, as far as
appearances go, to the peculiar mental
and moral endowments of one man, and
that man openly proclaimed that it did
not come from himself, but from God
through him, then we are entitled to say
that there is nothing so inherently im
possible or absolutely incredible in this
supposition as to preclude any one from
hoping that it may perhaps be true. I
say from hoping; I go no further; for I
cannot attach any evidentiary value to
the testimony even of Christ on such a
subject, since he is never said to have
�102
THEISM
declared any evidence of his mission
(unless his own interpretations of the
Prophecies be so considered) except in
ternal conviction; and everybody knows
that in pre-scientific times men always
supposed that any unusual faculties
which came to them, they knew not
how, were an inspiration from God; the
best men always being the readiest to
ascribe any honourable peculiarity in
themselves to that higher source rather
than to their own merits.
pART V.—GENERAL RESULT
Brom the result of the preceding exami
nation ol the evidences of Theism, and
(Theism being pre-supposed) of the evi
dences of any Revelation, it follows that
the rational attitude of a thinking mind
towards the supernatural, whether in
natural or in revealed religion, is that of
scepticism as distinguished from belief
on the one hand, and from Atheism on
the other; including in the present case
under Atheism the negative as well as
the positive form of disbelief in a God—
viz., not only the dogmatic denial of his
existence, but the denial that there is
any evidence on either side, which, for
most practical purposes, amounts to the
same thing as if the existence of a God
had been disproved. If we are right in
the conclusions to which we have been
led by the preceding inquiry, there is
evidence, but insufficient for proof, and
amounting only to one of the lower
degrees of probability. The indication
given by such evidence as there is points
to the creation, not, indeed, of the
universe, but of the present order of it, by
an Intelligent Mind, whose power over
the materials was not absolute, whose
love for his creatures was not his sole
actuating inducement, but who, never
theless, desired their good. The notion
of a providential government by an
Omnipotent Being for the good of his
creatures must be entirely dismissed.
Even of the continued existence of the
Creator we have no other guarantee than
that he cannot be subject to the law of
death which affects terrestrial beings,
since the conditions that produce this
liability wherever it is known to exist are
of his creating. That this Being, not
being omnipotent, may have produced a
machinery falling short of his intentions,
and which may require the occasional
interposition of the Maker’s hand, is a
supposition not in itself absurd nor
impossible, though in none of the cases
in which such interposition is believed to
have occurred is the evidence such as
could possibly prove it; it remains a
simple possibility, which those may
dwell on to whom it yields comfort to
suppose that blessings which ordinary
human power is inadequate to attain
may come not from extraordinary human
power, but from the bounty of an intelli
gence beyond the human, and which
continuously cares for man. The possi
bility of a life after death rests on the
same footing—of a boon which this
powerful Being who wishes well to man
may have the power to grant, and which,
�GENERAL RESULT
if the message alleged to have been sent
by him was really sent, he has actually
promised. The whole domain of the
supernatural is thus removed from the
region of Belief into that of simple
Hope; and in that, for anything we can
see, it is likely always to remain; for we
can hardly anticipate either that any
positive evidence will be acquired of the
direct agency of Divine Benevolence in
human destiny, or that any reason will
be discovered for considering the realisa
tion of human hopes on that subject as
beyond the pale of possibility.
It is now to be considered whether
the indulgence of hope, in the region of
imagination merely, in which there is no
prospect that any probable grounds of
expectation will ever be obtained, is
irrational, and ought to be discouraged
as a departure from the rational principle
of regulating our feelings as well as
opinions strictly by evidence.
This is a point which different thinkers
are likely, for a long time at least, to
decide differently, according to their
individual temperament. The principles
which ought to govern the cultivation
and the regulation of the imagination—
with a view on the one hand of prevent
ing it from disturbing the rectitude of
the intellect and the right direction of
the actions and will, and on the other
hand of employing it as a power for in
creasing the happiness of life and giving
elevation to the character—are a subject
which has never yet engaged the serious
consideration of philosophers, though
some opinion on it is implied in almost
all modes of thinking on human character
and education. And I expect that this
will hereafter be regarded as a very im
portant branch of study for practical
purposes, and the more in proportion as
the weakening of positive beliefs respect
103
ing states of existence superior to the
human leaves the imagination of higher
things less provided with material from
the domain of supposed reality. To me
it seems that human life, small and con
fined as it is, and as, considered merely
in the present, it is likely to remain even
when the progress of material and moral
improvement may have freed it from the
greater part of its present calamities,
stands greatly in need of any wider
range and greater height of aspiration
for itself and its destination, which the
exercise of imagination can yield to it
without running counter to the evidence
of fact; and that it is a part of wisdom
to make the most of any, even small,
probabilities on this subject, which furnish
imagination with any footing to support
itself upon. And I am satisfied that the
cultivation of such a tendency in the
imagination, provided it goes on pari
passu with the cultivation of severe reason,
has no necessary tendency to pervert the
judgment; but that it is possible to form
a perfectly sober estimate of the evidences
on both sides of a question and yet to
let the imagination dwell by prefer
ence on those possibilities which are at
once the most comforting and the most
improving without in the least degree
overrating the solidity of the grounds
for expecting that these rather than any
others will be the possibilities actually
realised.
Though this is not in the number of
the practical maxims handed down by
tradition and recognised as rules for the
conduct of life, a great part of the hap
piness of life depends upon the tacit
observance of it. What, for instance, is
the meaning of that which is always
accounted one of the chief blessings of
life—a cheerful disposition? What but
the tendency, either from constitution or
�104
THEISM
habit, to dwell chiefly on the brighter
side both of the present and of the
future ? If every aspect, whether agree
able or odious of everything, ought to
occupy exactly the same place in our
imagination which it fills in fact, and
therefore ought to fill in our deliberate
reason, what we call a cheerful disposi
tion would be but one of the forms of
folly, on a par except in agreeableness
with the opposite disposition in which
the gloomy and painful view of all things
is habitually predominant. But it is not
found in practice that those who take
life cheerfully are less alive to rational
prospects of evil or danger and more
careless of making due provision against
them than other people. The tendency
is rather the other way, for a hopeful
disposition gives a spur to the faculties
and keeps all the active energies in good
working order. When imagination and
reason receive each its appropriate
culture they do not succeed in usurping
each other’s prerogatives. It is not
necessary for keeping up our conviction
that we must die, that we should be
always brooding over death. It is far
better that we should think no further
about what we cannot possibly avert,
than is required for observing the rules
of prudence in regard to our own life and
that of others, and fulfilling whatever
duties devolve upon us in contemplation
of the inevitable event. The way to
secure this is not to think perpetually of
death, but to think perpetually of our
duties, and of the rule of life. The true
rule of practical wisdom is not that of
making all the aspects of things equally
prominent in our habitual contempla
tions, but of giving the greatest promi
nence to those of their aspects which
depend on, or can be modified by, our
own conduct. In things which do not
depend on us, it is not solely for the sake
of a more enjoyable life that the habit
is desirable of looking at things and at
mankind by preference on their pleasant
side; it is also in order that we may be
able to love them better and work with
more heart for their improvement. To
what purpose, indeed, should we feed
our imagination with the unlovely aspect
of persons and things ? All unnecessary
dwelling upon the evils of life is at best
a useless expenditure of nervous force:
and when I say unnecessary, I mean all
that is not necessary either in the sense
of being unavoidable, or in that of being
needed for the performance of our duties
and for preventing our sense of the
reality of those evils from becoming
speculative and dim. But if it is often
waste of strength to dwell on the evils of
life, it is worse than waste to dwell
habitually on its meannesses and base
nesses. It is necessary to be aware of
them; but to live in their contemplation
makes it scarcely possible to keep up in
oneself a high tone of mind. The
imagination and feelings become tuned
to a lower pitch ; degrading instead of
elevating associations become connected
with the daily objects and incidents of
life, and give their colour to the thoughts,
just as associations of sensuality do in
those who indulge freely in that sort of
contemplations. Men have often felt
what it is to have had their imaginations
corrupted by one class of ideas, and I
think they must have felt with the same
kind of pain how the poetry is taken out
of the things fullest of it, by mean asso
ciations, as when a beautiful air that had
been associated with highly poetical
words is heard sung with trivial and
vulgar ones. All these things are said in
mere illustration of the principle that in
the regulation of the imagination literal
�GENERAL RESULT
truth of facts is not the only thing to be
considered. Truth is the province of
reason, and it is by the cultivation of the
rational faculty that provision is made
for its being known always, and thought
of as often as is required by duty and
the circumstances of human life. But
when the reason is strongly cultivated,
the imagination may safely follow its own
end, and do its best to make life
pleasant and lovely inside the castle, in
reliance on the fortifications raised and
maintained by Reason round the outward
bounds.
On these principles it appears to me
that the indulgence of hope with regard
to the government of the universe and
the destiny of man after death, while we
recognise as a clear truth that we have
no ground for more than a hope, is
legitimate and philosophically defensible.
The beneficial effect of such a hope is
far from trifling. It makes life and
human nature a far greater thing to the
feelings, and gives greater strength as
well as greater solemnity to all the senti
ments which are awakened in us by our
fellow-creatures, and by mankind at
large. It allays the sense of that irony
of Nature which is so painfully felt when
we see the exertions and sacrifices of a
life culminating in the formation of a
wise and noble mind, only to disappear
from the world when the time has just
arrived at which the world seems about
to begin reaping the benefit of it. The
truth that life is short and art is long is
from of old one of the most discourag
ing parts of our condition ; this hope
admits the possibility that the art em
ployed in improving and beautifying the
soul itself may avail for good in some
other life, even when seemingly useless
for this. But the benefit consists less in
the presence of any specific hope than in
105
the enlargement of the general scale of
the feelings; the loftier aspirations being
no longer in the same degree checked
and kept down by a sense of the insignifi
cance of human life—by the disastrous
feeling of “ not worth while.” The gain
obtained in the increased inducement to
cultivate the improvement of character
up to the end of life is obvious without
being specified.
There is another and a most impor
tant exercise of imagination which, in
the past and present, has been kept up
principally by means of religious belief,
and which is infinitely precious to man
kind, so much so that human excellence
greatly depends upon the sufficiency of
the provision made for it. This con
sists of the familiarity of the imagination
with the conception of a morally perfect
Being, and the habit of taking the
approbation of such a Being as the
norma or standard to which to refer
and by which to regulate our own
characters and lives. This idealisation
of our standard of excellence in a Person
is quite possible, even when that Person
is conceived as merely imaginary. But
religion, since the birth of Christianity,
has inculcated the belief that our highest
conceptions of combined wisdom and
goodness exist in the concrete in a living
Being who has his eyes on us and cares
for our good. Through the darkest and
most corrupt periods Christianity has
raised this torch on high—has kept this
object of veneration and imitation before
the eyes of man. True, the image of
perfection has been a most imperfect,
and, in many respects, a perverting and
corrupting one, not only from the low
moral ideas of the times, but from the
mass of moral contradictions which the
deluded worshipper was compelled to
swallow by the supposed necessity of
�io6
THEISM
complimenting the Good Principle with
the possession of infinite power. But it
is one of the most universal, as well as
of the most surprising, characteristics of
human nature, and one of the most
speaking proofs of the low stage to
which the reason of mankind at large
has ever yet advanced, that they are
capable of overlooking any amount of
either moral or intellectual contradic
tions and receiving into their minds
propositions utterly inconsistent with
one another, not only without being
shocked by the contradiction, but with
out preventing both the contradictory
beliefs from producing a part at least of
their natural consequences in the mind.
Pious men and women have gone on
ascribing to God particular acts and a
general course of will and conduct in
compatible with even the most ordinary
and limited conception of moral good
ness, and have had their own ideas of
morality, in many important particulars,
totally warped and distorted, and not
withstanding this have continued to con
ceive their God as clothed with all the
attributes of the highest ideal goodness
which their state of mind enabled them
to conceive, and have had their aspira
tions towards goodness stimulated and
encouraged by that conception. And it
cannot be questioned that the undoubt
ing belief of the real existence of a Being
who realises our own best ideas of per
fection, and of our being in the hands of
that Being as the ruler of the universe,
gives an increase of force to these feel
ings beyond what they can receive from
reference to a merely ideal conception.
This particular advantage it is not
possible for those to enjoy who take a
rational view of the nature and amount
of the evidence for the existence and
attributes of the Creator. On the other
hand, they are not encumbered with the
moral contradictions which beset every
form of religion which aims at justifying
in a moral point of view the whole
government of the world. They are,
therefore, enabled to form a far truer
and more consistent conception of Ideal
Goodness than is possible to anyone who
thinks it necessary to find ideal good
ness in an omnipotent ruler of the world.
The power of the Creator once recog
nised as limited, there is nothing to dis
prove the supposition that his goodness
is complete, and that the ideally perfect
character in whose likeness we should
wish to form ourselves, and to whose
supposed approbation we refer our
actions, may have a real existence in a
Being to whom we owe all such good as
we enjoy.
Above all, the most valuable part of
the effect on the character which Chris
tianity has produced by holding up in a
Divine Person a standard of excellence
and a model for imitation is available
even to the absolute unbeliever, and can
never more be lost to humanity. For it
is Christ, rather than God, whom Chris
tianity has held up to believers as the
pattern of perfection for humanity. It
is the God incarnate, more than the
God of the Jews or of Nature, who, being
idealised, has taken so great and salutary
a hold on the modern mind. And what
ever else may be taken away from us by
rational criticism, Christ is still left; a
unique figure, not more unlike all his
precursors than all his followers, even
those who had the direct benefit of his
personal teaching. It is of no use to
say that Christ as exhibited in the
Gospels is not historical, and that we
know not how much of what is admir
able has been superadded by the tradi
tion of his followers. The tradition of
�GENERAL RESULT
followers suffices to insert any number
of marvels, and may have inserted all
the miracles which he is reputed to have
wrought. But who among his disciples
or among their proselytes was capable of
inventing the sayings ascribed to Jesus,
or of imagining the life and character
revealed in the Gospels? Certainly not
the fishermen of Galilee; as certainly
not St. Paul, whose character and
idiosyncrasies were of a totally different
sort; still less the early Christian writers,
in whom nothing is more evident than
that the good which was in them was
all derived, as they always professed that
it was derived, from the higher source.
What could be added and interpolated
by a disciple we may see in the mystical
parts of the Gospel of St. John, matter
imported from Philo and the Alexandrian
Platonists and put into the mouth of the
Saviour in long speeches about himself
such as the other Gospels contain not the
slightest vestige of, though pretended to
have been delivered on occasions of the
deepest interest and when his principal
followers were all present; most promi
nently at the last supper. The East was
full of men who could have stolen any
quantity of this poor stuff, as the multi
tudinous Oriental sects of Gnostics after
wards • did. But about the life and
sayings of Jesus there is a stamp of
personal originality combined with pro
fundity of insight which, if we abandon
the idle expectation of finding scientific
precision where something very different
was aimed at, must place the Prophet of
Nazareth, even in the estimation of those
who have no belief in his inspiration, in
the very first rank of the men of sublime
genius of whom our species can boast.
When this pre-eminent genius is com
bined with the qualities of probably the
greatest moral reformer, and martyr to
107
that mission, who ever existed upon
earth, religion cannot be said to have
made a bad choice in pitching on this
man as the ideal representative and
guide of humanity; nor, even now,
would it be easy, even for an unbeliever,
to find a better translation of the rule of
virtue from the abstract into the concrete
than to endeavour so to live that Christ
would approve our life. When to this
we add that, to the conception of the
rational sceptic, it remains a possibility
that Christ actually was what he sup
posed himself to be—not God, for he
never made the smallest pretension to
that character, and would probably have
thought such a pretension as blasphe
mous as it seemed to the men who con
demned him—but a man charged with
a special, express, and unique commis
sion from God to lead mankind to truth
and virtue; we may well conclude that
the influences of religion on the character
which will remain after rational criticism
has done its utmost against the evidences
of religion are well worth preserving,
and that what they lack in direct strength
as compared with those of a firmer belief
is more than compensated by the greater
truth and rectitude of the morality they
sanction.
Impressions such as these, though not
in themselves amounting to what can
properly be called a religion, seem to me
excellently fitted to aid and fortify that
real, though- purely human, religion,
which sometimes calls itself the Religion
of Humanity and sometimes that of
Duty. To the other inducements for
cultivating a religious devotion to the
welfare of our fellow-crtatures as an
obligatory limit to every selfish aim, and
an end for the direct promotion of which
no sacrifice can be too great, it superadds
the feeling that, in making this the rule
�10S
THEISM
of our life, we may be co-operating with
the unseen Being to whom we owe all
that is enjoyable in life. One elevated
feeling this form of religious idea admits
of, which is not open to those who
believe in the omnipotence of the good
principle in the universe, the feeling of
helping God—of requiting the good
he has given by a voluntary co-operation
which he, not being omnipotent, really
needs, and by which a somewhat nearer
approach may be made to the fulfilment
of his purposes. The conditions of
human existence are highly favourable
to the growth of such a feeling, inasmuch
as a battle is constantly going on, in
which the humblest human creature is
not incapable of taking some part,
between the powers of good and those
of evil, and in which every, even the
smallest, help to the right side has its
value in promoting the very slow and I
often almost insensible progress by which
good is gradually gaining ground from
evil, yet gaining it so visibly at consider
able intervals as to promise the very
distant, but not uncertain, final victory of
God. To do something during life, on
even the humblest scale if nothing more
is within reach, towards bringing this
consummation ever so little nearer, is
the most animating and invigorating
thought which can inspire a human
creature; and that it is destined, with or
without supernatural sanctions, to be the
Religion of the Future I cannot entertain
a doubt. But it appears to me that
supernatural hopes, in the degree and
kind in which what I have called rational
scepticism does not refuse to sanction
them, may still contribute not a little to
give to this religion its due ascendancy
over the human mind.
The next R. P. A. Cheap Reprint will be W. R. Greg’s CREED OF CHRIS
TENDOM, carefully revised by Dr. W. R. Washington Sullivan, who will
also contribute an Introduction to the work.
�AD VERTISEMENTS
109
SOME PUBLICATIONS OF THE R.P.A.
♦
ANONYMOUS.
Mr. Balfour’s Apologetics Critically
Examined.
232 pp.; cloth, 3s. 6d. net, by post 3s. iod.
Comprising a careful analysis of the Pre
mier’s “ Philosophic Doubt” in its bearings
on his religious belief.
“A piece of thorough good work : exhaustive,
demolishing, and withal high-toned ”—Edward
Clodd.
BITHELL, RICHARD, B.Sc., Ph.D.
A Handbook of Scientific Agnosticism.
64 pp.; cloth, 2s., by post 2s. 3d.; paper,
is., by post is. 2d.
BUCHNER, Professor LUDWIG.
Last Words on Materialism,
Kindred Subjects.
Translated by Joseph McCabe. With Por
trait of the Author and Biographical Sketch
by his brother, Professor Alex Buchner.
xxxiv.-299 pp.; cloth, 6s. net; cheaper
edition, 2s. 6d. net, by post 2s. iod.
and
GORHAM, CHARLES T.
The Ethics of the Great French
Rationalists.
is., by post is. 2d.; cloth, 2s., by post
2s. 3d.
This little work comprises brief biogra
phical sketches of Charron, Condorcet,
Montaigne, Rousseau, Voltaire, Michelet,
Comte, Renan, and others, with carefullychosen selections from their writings on
Religion and Ethics.
GOULD, F. J.
Concise History of Religion.
3 vols. Vol. I., 2s. 6d.; Vol. II., 3s. 6d.;
Vol. III., 5s.
The First Volume treats of the super
stitions of savages and primitive man,
and delineates the characteristics of the
religions of America, Finland, China,
Egypt, Arabia, Chaldaea, Syria, India,
Japan, Persia, the Kelts, Greeks, and
Romans. The Second Volume takes to
pieces the whole of the Old Testament
literature, and explains the origin of the
various parts. The last chapter describes
the Religious Environment of Early Chris
tianity. The Third Volume traces the
growth of the Christian movement, the lives
of Paul and Jesus (with due separation of
the mythical elements), and affords a
Rationalistic analysis of the whole of the
New Testament books.
The Agnostic Island.
124 pp.; cloth, 2s.,by post 2s. 3d.; boards,
is., by post is. 2d.
A tale of an Agnostic Settlement in the
remote waters of New Guinea visited by
three missionaries from Exeter Hall.
The Children’s Book of Moral Lessons.
First and Second Series. Each series, 2s.,
by post 2s. 3d.; the two series post free
4s.
The Religion of the First Christians.
Beautifully bound, gold lettered, 2s. 6d.
“Absorbingly interesting... .We strongly recom
mend the perusal of this enlightening book. Mr.
Gould’s style is characterised by lucidity and logic.
He achieves the chief end of all literature—to make
your subject interesting.”—Reynolds’s.
Tales from the Bible.
103 pp.; cloth, 9d. net, by post nd.;
boards, 6d. net, by post 8d.
Tales from the New Testament.
176 pp.; cloth, is. net, by post is. 3d.
The Building of the Bible.
Showing the Chronological Order in which
the Books of the Old and New Testaments
appeared according to Recent Biblical
Criticism ; with Notes on Contemporary
events. 24 pp.; 3d., by post 4d.
The New Conversion.
14 pp.; 2d., by post 2j^d.
The Ethical Riches.
14 pp.; 2d., by post 2j^d.
GLANVILLE, W. (ex-Baptist Minister).
The Web Unwoven;
or, The Dolus Theory of the Book of Acts,
as presented in a Critique of Chapters X.,
XI., and XII. of same. 3d. net, by post
5<*-
�A D VER TISEMENTS
I IO
GODFREY, W. S.
Theism Found Wanting.
ROBERTSON, JOHN M.
Christianity and Mythology.
2<1. by post 3d.
xviiL-484 pp.; 8s. 6d. net, by post 9s.
“An exceptionally acute, sane, dispassionate,
and closely-reasoned thesis.”—Agnostic Journal.
“Whether one agrees or not with the conclusions
of the book, one is bound to respect the fine quali
ties of the author, and to give him patient hear
ing.”—Liverpool Review.
‘‘This magnificent work will be welcomed....
It is a reference library in itself upon the subjects
with which it deals. The reading, the research, *he
critical comparisons shown, are a matter for envy
and undoubted admiration.”—The Reformer.
HOLYOAKE, G. J.
The Origin and Nature of Secularism;
Showing that where Freethought commonly
ends Secularism begins. 136 pp.; cloth,
is. net, by post is. 3d.
The Logie of Death.
With cover, 3d., by post 3%d.; without
cover, on thin paper, id., by post i%d.
Two Great Preachers;
or, Appreciation Distinct from Concurrence.
15 pp.; 3d., by post 3^d.
HUXLEY, THOMAS HENRY.
Possibilities and Impossibilities.
14 pp.; 3d., by post 3^d.
JEKYLL, M.A., WALTER.
The Bible Untrustworthy.
A Critical Comparison of Contradictory
Passages in the Scriptures, with a View of
Testing their Historical Accuracy. xii.2S4 pp.; cloth, 3s. 6d. net, by post 3s. iod.
McCABE, J.
(lately Very Rev. Father Antony, O.S.F.).
From Rome to Rationalism;
or, Why I Left the Church.
32 pp.; 4d., by post 5d.
Modern Rationalism;
Being a Sketch of the Progress of the
Rationalistic Spirit in the Nineteenth Cen
tury. 193 pp.; cloth, 2s. 6d. post free;
paper covers, is., by post is. 3d.
In a succession of six informing sketches
Mr. McCabe delineates the work of the
critical or Agnostic spirit.
The Religion of the Twentieth Century.
is., by post is. 2d. Contents:—The Right
and Duty of Reason—The Effect of Science
on Religion—Rational Analysis of the Old
Faith—Authority an Impossible Basis—
Morality as a Connecting Link—A New
and a Firmer Faith.
Pagan Christs:
Studies in Comparative Hierology. 8s. 6d.
net, by post 9s.
This volume is designed to complement
and complete the author’s undertaking in
Christianity and Mythology. That was a
mythological analysis, introduced by a dis
cussion of the rationale of mythology : the
present volume aims at a constructive his
torical synthesis of Christian origins, intro
duced by a discussion of the rationale of
religion as it is variously presented by Mr.
Frazer, Mr. Jevons, and other writers.
“ It is impossible not to admire the learning and
the courage of a man who does not shrink from
correcting the most eminent specialists in their own
fields, and who does it, moreover, with an ability of
which they are bound to take account.”—Daily
Chronicle.
A Short History of Christianity.
400 pp.; cloth, 6s. net, by post 6s. 4d.
In this work the author endeavours to
present dispassionately a coherent theory of
the true origins of the Christian cult, and
to explain its growth in terms of all the
sociological elements of the case.
Letters on Reasoning.
xxviiL-248 pp.; cloth, 3s. 6d. net, by post
3s. iod.
“ To the non-academic, home student a work like
this one is invaluable.”—Reynolds's.
SPILLER, GUSTAV (Compiled by).
Hymns of Love and Duty for the Young.
80 pp.; 8d. net, by post 9d.
Comprising 90 hymns and two sets of
responses—one on ethical ideas and duties,
the other on the Sacred Books of the World.
The book is in use in various Ethical
Classes in London, the Leicester Secular
Sunday-school, etc.
WATTS, CHARLES.
The Miracles of Christian Belief.
A Reply to the Rev. Frank Ballard's
Miracles of Unbelief. Cloth, is. net, by
post is. 3d.; paper covers, 6d. net, by
post 7d.
AGENTS FOR THE RATIONALIST PRESS ASSOCIATION, LIMITED :
WATTS & CO., 17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.
�AD VERTISEMENTS
hi
Cloth, xvi.-i68 pp., 2S. 6d. net, by post 2s. iod.
THE HAMMURABI CODE
AND THE SINAITIC LEGISLATION.
WITH A
COMPLETE TRANSLATION OF THE GREAT BABYLONIAN
INSCRIPTION DISCOVERED AT SUSA.
By CHILPERIC EDWARDS,
Author of “ The Witness of Assyria," etc.
There have been issued several books dealing with the famous Hammurabi Codeeach in its way valuable; but the present work may fairly claim to be the hand
book of the moment. It is clearly and legibly printed, has the complete
text, and expounds the relation of the Code to the Mosaic laws.
Its price is much below that of all its competitors, except one;
and the get-up generally is everything that could be desired.
The author has had access to the same sources of
knowledge as the other writers on the subject, and
full authorities are given for the more im
portant conclusions.
Cloth, 2s. 6d. net, by post 2s. iod.
An Easy Outline
of Evolution.
By DENNIS HIRD,
Principal of Ruskin College, Oxford.
Written in the simplest possible language and referring to the latest researches,
this work is intended to aid the busy general reader to grasp the
arguments in favour of Evolution as they now stand.
AGENTS FOR THE RATIONALIST PRESS ASSOCIATION, LIMITED:
WATTS & CO., 17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.
�112
AD VER TISEMENTS
A MARVEL OF CHEAPNESS.
” Decisive, trenchant, and far-reaching.”—Rt. Hon. John Mori.ey.
Now Re\dy, xvL-920 pp., cloth, 6s. net, by post 6s. 6d.
POPULAR EDITION OF
Supernatural Religion:
AN INQUIRY INTO THE REALITY OF DIVINE
REVELATION.
Thoroughly Revised and brought up to date by the Author, in some cases
entirely fresh sections being added.
“To say anything new, at this time of day, of the learning massed in Supernatural Religion is
impossible. Few of us, indeed, would venture to assume that our praise in such a case is good
enough to count. For myself, I can but say that I know of no great critical treatise which follows
up its purpose with such invincible industry, such all-regarding vigilance, such constant soundness of
judgment, such perfect fairness and candour, and such complete command of the whole special litera
ture of the subject. True to his early devotion of himself to the single-hearted search for truth,
the author has revised his whole work, bringing it abreast of the latest developments of criticism
and the latest documentary discoveries...... The book, in short, is a marvel of mere commercial
value, the production of which does honour to the printers no less than to the publishing Associa
tion. Cheapness and good form cannot be carried further in combination.”
—J. M. Robertson, in '■'■The Literary Guide."
Half morocco, gilt edges, 10s. net, by post 10s. 6d.
Cloth, 5s., post free.
The Faith of an Agnostic;
Or, First Essays in Rationalism.
By GEORGE FORESTER
“ The author’s position is well and cleverly defended, and he writes with an evident sincerity
that commands respect.”—Liverpool Mercury.
“ The Faith of an Ag tostic is one of those books of inestimable value to all intelligent and
serious persons who take any real interest in the momentous questions of life and death. The
author, Mr. George Forester, has a delightfully lucid style........ This yidispensable book.”—
Reynolds' s Newspaper.
“What is best in the book, perhaps, is its atmosphere of honesty and kindness. The reader
who disagrees will find no cause to accuse its author of any lack of earnestness or reverence. The
humanitarian teaching of the book, especially in a chapter headed ‘Thoughts in a Meat Market,’
will interest even those who have no turn for metaphysics.”—Morning Leader.
AGENTS FOR THE RATIONALIST PRESS ASSOCIATION, LIMITED :
WATTS & CO., 17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.
�UNIFORM WITH THE R.P.A. REPRINTS.
Now Ready, 160 pp., price 6d., by post 8j^d.; Cloth, is., by post is. 3d.
INGERSOLL’S
Lectures apd Essays.
(A SELECTION.)
CONTENTS
THE TRUTH.
THE GODS.
ABOUT THE HOLY BIBLE.
WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED?
LIBERTY OF MAN, WOMAN, AND CHILD.
A THANKSGIVING SERMON.
THE GHOSTS.
HOW TO REFORM MANKIND.
ART AND MORALITY.
With fine Portrait of Author.
WATTS & CO., 17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.
80 large pages, price 6d., by post 7^d.
THE AGNOSTIC ANNUAL
FOR 1905.
Contents:—■
“ A Septuagenarian ”
THE PASSING OF CHRISTIANITY
SPIRIT
Professor W. H. Hudson
THE SATANIC
DOES DETERMINISM DESTROY RESPONSIBILITY? Dr. Charles Callaway
THE FORMATION OF OPINION AND THE VALUE OF DOUBT
Charles Watts
AFTER THE CHURCH
- Geoffrey Mortimer
William G. Hutchison
RENAN AS A DRAMATIST J. M. Robertson
LESSING’S THESIS OF PROGRESSIVE REVELATION
AN APPRECIATION OF COMTE
- F. J. Gould
A WORLD WITHOUT GOD : AN ANTICIPATION
- J. McCabe
RATIONALISM IN THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH
- H. Dundas
To order of all Booksellers, or direet from
WATTS & CO., 17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.
�4„'/r
'
*
' if
•'.Wk
V
fl ■
■
f
OV&R 630,000 SOLD
*
R.P.A. Cl?eap Repripts
(WITH POR^AIT IN EACH CASE).
1. HUXLEY’S LECTURESAND
ESSAYS. (A Selection.) With
Autobiography.
2. THE PIONEERS OF EVO
LUTION. By EDWARD CLODD.
3. MODERN SCIENCE AND
MODERN THOUGHT. By
SAMUEL LAING. With Illustrations.
4. LITERATURE AND DOGMA.
By MATTHEW ARNOLD.
5. THE RIDDLE OF THE UNI
VERSE. By Professor ERNST
HAECKEL.
6. EDUCATION : Intellectual,
Moral, and Physical. By
HERBERT SPENCER.
7. THE EVOLUTION OF THE
IDEA OF GOD. By grant
ALLEN.
8. HUMAN ORIGINS. By SAMUEL
LAING.
10. TYN^
L
LECTURES
ANL
ASAYS. (A Selection.)
11. THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES.
By Cx. RLES DARWIN.
12. EMERSON’S ADDRESSES
AND ESSAYS. With Introduc
tion by Dr. STANTON COIT.
13. ON LIBERTY. By J. s. MILL.
14. THE STORY OF OREA
TfON. By EDWARD CLODD.
15. AN
AGNOSTIC’S
APO
LOGY. By Sir LESLIE STEPHEN
16. THE LiFE OF JESUS. Bv
ERNEST RENAN.
17. A MODERN ZOROASTRIAN. BySAjVl-UEL LAING.
18- AN INTRODUCTION TO
THE PHILOSOPHY OF
HERBERT SPENCER. By
Professor-W. H. HUDSON.
19. TH REE ESSAYS N RELI
GlON. .By JOH$ E
RT MILL.
J. COTTER MORISON.
6d. each, by post 8d.; Nos. 1 to 19 post free 9s. 6d.
9. THE SERVICE OF MAN. By
Nos. I, 2, 3, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10, II, 12, 13, 16, 17, 18, and 19 may be had ip- cloth, is. each, by post
is. 3d.; or the 15 post paid, 15s.
R.P.A. EXTRA SERIES.
1. JESUS CHRIST: His Apostles and
Disciples in the Twentieth Century.
By Count CAMILLE DE RENESSE.
2. HAECKEL’S CRITICS AN
SWERED. By JOSEPH McCABE.
4. NEW LIGHT ON OLD PRO
BLEMS.
s on Science,
Theology, an;
SON, M".A.
)PJN WIL
5. ETHICS OF
RELIGIONS.
GREAT
10RHAM.
3. SCIENCE AND SPECULA 6. A NEW CAT*'M. M. MANGAS
TION. By G. H. LEWES.
6d. each, by post 8d.; Cloth, Is., by post Is
'
’
M.
By
(The six post free, in paper covers, 3s.; cloth, 6s.)
AGENTS FOR THE RATIONALIST PRESS ASSOCIATION,
WATTS & CO., 17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STRE
PRINTED BY WATTS.AND CO., 17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, To
rDU
L<
E.C.
x4, E.C.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Nature, the utility of religion, and theism
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Mill, John Stuart [1806-1873]
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 112 p. ; 22 cm.
Series title: R.P.A. Cheap Reprints
Series number: 19
Notes: Printed in double columns. First published 1874. Publisher's advertisements on last four numbered pages at the end, and continue on endpaper and on back cover. Issued for the Rationalist Press Association, Limited. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Watts & Co.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1904
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
G756
RA1634
N485
Subject
The topic of the resource
Religion
Nature
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Nature, the utility of religion, and theism), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Nature
NSS
Religion
Religion-Philosophy
Theism
-
https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/0939765c9caa2a47c2f959f89840f4f4.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=AXZnMi4EVFgIM3ktEeyzZmjTSQg%7EKdD3oghwRAELxUsEAwPHafKKSZha0gVA7I6qHGip36L5iVk9RThnNdM89%7EzIEKXnQrStXKAOvHkLcHdAnXfEjnWkWfvnLn%7EN3r93A4Q2sTtPn%7EWcIpOFPzDhZPmGrcA2iD%7EkwC0lM%7E4WjmG75HHq7XuFNFGYipBkvdSGYUb0Cdf7jrdyzfOPfUYWniZOw0us9PThbfuPT%7EQFV4BPqxf15Q8z17thtcOleXg9YWbWlx-Dz96j3WT1L6pZ1f1i%7EFBsU7vFLaLP1jsyn3yFSBjd11o7R6c3SlznjWXsLC7qzXfj76r5x-OY1sGqvQ__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
64554358d2538f524e6f285ac17fc5a2
PDF Text
Text
A SERMON,
PREACHED AT ST. GEORGE’S HALL, LANGHAM PLACE,
MAY 11th, 1873, by the
REV. CHARLES VOYSEY.
[From the Eastern Post, May 17th, 1873.]
On Sunday (May 11), at St. George’s Hall, the Rev. C.
Voysey took his text from John i., 9., “ That was the true light,
which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.”
The religious differences which have made, and are yet making,
such fierce discord in the world lie far deeper down than the mere
surface of various doctrine. The real root of these differences is
to be found in the method of enquiry into religious truth, in the
means by which it is believed to be discoverable. So long as men
keep on trying to substitute one set of dogmas for another, and to
impose, as dogma, any new doctrine because it is less false or more
true than its predecessor, so long shall we have the strife oftongues
and the endless confusion of conflicting sects. Not until we have
perceived the only true basis of unity, shall we cease to fight with
one another for the ascendancy of our own particular beliefs.
The votaries of all religions in turn claim that in their own creeds
lies the only pathway to God, and it stands on the face of it, that
when these creeds are opposed to each other, they cannot all be
true, though they may be all false. If one be true, who can test
its truth ? What witness could we have that would be infallible
to make the choice for us out of so many claimants ? Moreover,
if only one be true, and only one lead to God, what a frightful
injustice is done to the millions on millions who have no access to
it, who by the accidents of birth and education, have been not
only shut out from hearing of it, but have had their minds pre
occupied from childhood by false beliefs, and have been prejudiced
�2
against all other beliefs, (and among them, of course, the true
belief) by the most solemn sanctions ! Then again, supposing that
the truest belief were discoverable to day, and enforced upon a
growing and advancing posterity in consequence, posterity would
be hampered by our decrees, fettered and enslaved by our creeds
and articles, kept tied and bound in swaddling clothes instead of
having the freedom of men. What to us had served all the pur
poses of truth, because it was the truest we could discover, would
inflict all the hardship and hindrance of falsehood upon our child
ren’s children. Look at it how w’e will, in dogma and creed we
find no sure resting place for our anxious souls, no safe road to lead
us heavenward, no sure light to bring us to God. But we have
not therefore been left in darkness because errors and falsehoods
have clouded our sky. God hath not left himself without witness,
because we have neither infallible Bible, nor infallible Pope, nor
infallible heresy. Still brightly shines over us, still leads us ever
onward and upward, the true light which lighteth every man that
cometh into the world. For all purposes of a true redemption—or
to speak more correctly—of a true progress towards God, men have
now as ever the light of life, the steady burning gleam that draws
us ever onwards, and guards our wayward and storm-tost souls from
wreck and ruin.
But I should be sailing under false colours were I to use the
text which I have chosen without disowning the sense in which it
is generally understood. I quite agree with the writer in this,
that that only is the true light which is universal—•“ which lighteth
every man that cometh into the world.” Any light which fails
thus to illumine all hearts is not the true light, and cannot safely
be trusted. A partial light may serve its purpose for a while, just as
we use a lantern in the darkness while the wanton earth turns her
face from the sun, but its weak and slender rays can only lighten
a narrow circle, and by its flickering may even add to our error
and perplexity.
As the rush-light to the sun, so are the various systems of belief
to that true light which God has sent to lighten every man that
cometh into the world. But some will tell us that the author of
this text meant that Christ was that true light; and I do not see
how we can deny this to have been his meaning. In the opening
�verses of this gospel the author unmistakeably refers to the Alexan
drine doctrine of the Logos which some one has aptly termed “Pla
tonism spoilt.” He speaks of the true light as “ he” and “ him;
as “ coming into the world,” as “being received,” and being rejected
as having the glory of the Great Father, and yet as being made
flesh and dwelling visibly among men. Now we unhesitatingly
refuse to accept Christ as the true light, on the simple ground that
he does not answer to the definition, he certainly does not lighten
every man that cometh into the world. He did not lighten a
single soul of the countless generations before him, nor many
millions of his fellow-creatures in his own generation. Whatever
liaht they wanted down in Judea that Christ could give (and we
do not hesitate in saying that that light was great and glorious)
they wanted also in the uttermost parts of the, earth and in the
Antipodes to Galilee, of the very existence of which Christ had no
conception. No one who is not a theologian would attempt the
folly of making-believe that Christ was the light that was
lighting every man all over the world at the very time that he was
wandering over the hills of Capernaum or disputing with Pharisees
in the streets of Jerusalem. That the soul of Jesus, and in like
manner, the souls of the rest of the world’s greatest men shed a
glorious light over humanity, wherever their names and histories
have travelled, is undeniably true; but it is not at all the same
thing as being a universal light, or even an infallible one. For
whether Christ could help it or not, there was more than one dark
band on his spectrum, and some have been led into darkness, and
even despair by sayings attributed to him by his friends. No one
human being, no one human life, has ever been bright enough to
lighten all mankind, nor sufficiently clear and unclouded never to
lead them astray. If there is one thing that God has stamped
upon all his works, and especially upon his noblest work—man, it
is the stamp of imperfection. Nothing is absolutely perfect—
though He may behold everything which He has made and say
“ It is very good. It is exactly what I intended it then and there
to be and so far very good,” He can never say “ It is perfect, “ It
is finished,” “ It is incapable of improvement.” This must ever be
the difference between the Creator and the created. While He
alone is absolutely perfect and incapable of change or progress—
�4
the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever—all we his creatures are
in the very infancy of our existence, and have an eternity oi
change and growth before us. So the “ brightest and best of the
sons of the morning ” are each in turn displaced by a brighter and
better successor. However vast the interval between their rising
over the world’s darkness, the glory that has set is eclipsed by the
glory that has arisen anew. However, long and glad may have
been the zenith of such a star, its turn for fading lustre will surely
come, and a more brilliant orb shall take its place.
With the deepest reverence for the excellency of Jesus of
Nazareth, and with sincere gratitude for what light he brought
into the world, we, nevertheless, deliberately say of him as the
Evangelist said of John the Baptist. “ He was not that light,
but was sent to bear witness of that light.” Christ was not the
true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world,
but was only one among the great cloud of witnesses on whom the
true light shone, and by whom it was most splendidly reflected.
It that light was not Moses, nor Menu, nor Christ, nor Paul, nor
Confucius, nor Sakya Mouni, nor Odin, nor Zoroaster, nor Socrates,
nor Mahommed, nor any one, nor all of the great world teachers,
because none of them were universal, what is the true light ? It
is not far to seek if the definition be accepted. If the true light
really lightens every man that cometh into the world—
ever did, ever does, and ever will give him all the light he
can ever get—then it must be found in man, in men universally,
and neither outside of them, nor in only a few rare specimens
of the race. And this is easy to find j for as in water face
answereth to face, so the heart of man to man.
We
know humanity by knowing ourselves—know it very imper
fectly, but what we do know is truth' and fact. And in
human nature we find an universal principle, instinct or affection,
call it what you will, which is the love of truth and right. In spite
of all the texts and Confessions and Catechisms, I affirm that the
heart of man is not “ desperately wicked above all things,” but,
on the contrary, is almost the only thing about him that is
thoroughly sound and good. Man, at heart, is good, because he
loves goodness, and true because he loves truth. As soon as ever
he discovers that there is such a distinction as good and evil, or
�5
truth and falsehood, his inmost heart turns with desire towards
goodness and truth. Of the idiotic and insane I here say nothing
because I know nothing; they are not only beyond the reach of
adequate tests, but they are so exceptional, and abnormal, as to
form no solid objection to the universality of the statement that
all men love goodness and truth. Of the great bulk of humanity,
from the best to the worst, from the most cultured to the most
ignorant, from the holiest saint to the most depraved sinner, it is
only the honest truth to say that they all at heart love goodness
and truth. They may love them in varying degrees, for the more
goodness and truth are known by practice, the more they are
loved, the less men know of goodnesss and truth, the less they
care for them. But at heart every sane man has some love for
goodness and truth. No man ever yet believed a lie knowing or
even suspecting it to be a lie. It is a contradiction in terms.
However false may be a man’s conviction, it is his conviction only
because it seems to him to be true. All he cares to get hold of
is truth and fact j and though he should seem to us to hold the
most absurd fancies, or cherish, even unto dying for them, beliefs
which we cannot but scorn, yet to him they are sacred, because
they seem true and because he has not begun to question or sus
pect their accuracy. From the darkest days of Fetichism, through
all the corrupt fables of Polytheism, and down the turbid stream
of Christendom to this hour, men have been ever loyal to truth—
loyal to such truth as they could discover. They have toiled to
find it; and when found, as they think, they would fight for it
and die for it, giving up all this world below and risking all that
world above for the sake of it. They might have been happy
together as one family, but no ; they loved the truth better than
peace; and they welcomed the fire and sword which laid waste
their lands and made their streets run blood rather than sacrifice
the sacred treasure which they believed God had entrusted to their
keeping. Could they have done this, could they have suffered
what was far worse than the crusader’s steel, the cruel rupture of
their domestic love, for what they thought to be a lie 1 Impossible 2
a thousand times No ! They bore it all for truth, for what they
believed to be true. But what of the persecutors ? Greater still
was the sacrifice for truth which some of these men made. The
�6
persecutors forced themselves to trample on their holiest affections
and tenderest instincts before they could put their fellow-men to
torture and cruel death. They had to stiflle every relenting sigh,
to crush their pitying breasts against the stone walls of misguided
conscience, and to train themselves to the maddening sport of
witnessing horrors of torment without a flinching eye or a quiver
ing lip. They had to lay down their manhood for the time, and
clothe themselves in the fury—not of beasts, never was wild beast
so cruel as man—but in the fury of fiends, and all for truth !
What will not men do for truth ? In spite of all counterfeits
which claim our regard, in spite of all usurpers of her rightful
throne, men are loyally, though blindly, bent on serving truth ' on
finding it if they can, and on believing it, and living and dying,
and becoming devils for it, when found.
.And as of truth so of goodness, it is true that men at heart love
goodness. It is no answer to point to the enormous crimes that
have been done and are still being done; at the vices which infest
our fields and markets and towns, our highways and byways alike;
it is no answer to take me to the prisons and galleys, and to the
dark places of the earth, where evil reigns unchecked by such
means of restraint and discipline. I still tell you these men are
not lovers of evil for evil’s sake, as you suppose, but they are
mistaken utterly mistaken—lovers of goodness. Do you suppose
God has made man such a fool as to prefer evil to good if he knows
it ? Why, even the most fiendish of all human passions—revenge__
is a thirst for gratification, for something which seems to him
exquisitely desirable in itself, or the man would not seek it. It
is at the very root of it an excessive love of justice, an exaggerated
and therefore mistaken desire for what is right. I know that men
do wrong, knowing it to be wrong, and liking it for the passing
pleasure that it may afford; but I never knew one such who
loving it called it evil, or hating it called it good. Men hate the
evil in themselves, and think that they would be better if they
could. Men’s ideas of what is good or evil may be as numerous as
the stars. Some condemning what others approve ; but they are
all alike in condemning wrong as wrong, and upholding goodness
as goodness. If a man approves what I condemn, the difference is
not a moral one, but one of judgment. To him it seems right, and
�7
he can call it by no other name. To me it is evil and I cannot call
it good. Every man in one respect is a law unto himself, however
deficient he may be in what is called ethical science, however,
outwardly indifferent he may be to the well-being of otheis, he is
nevertheless, at heart, convinced that goodness is right and evil is
wrong, and up to the dim intelligence of his feeble mind would
bear his modicum of testimony on the side of goodness.
Now what have not these instincts for goodness and truth done
for man ? They are the very foundations of all civilization, the very
root of all religion. All the progress of the world, from the first
dawn of humanity, is due to the desire after goodness and truth.
Only try to realise the changes through which our race has passed
and you can come to only one conclusion, that 11 the true light
which lighteth every man that cometh into the world,” is this love
of right and truth by which we have ever been led onwards. Have
not we been mending since the world of man began ? Have not
we often and often learnt to change our moral code according as
experience or circumstance showed that it was good and right so
to do ? Do we not condemn what our forefathers deemed innocent,
and add to the number or cogency of pre-existing rules? We
could only do this, because our aim was goodness, and not mere
reverence for past law-givers. Is not the standard of virtue for
ever rising, not merely by improving on the models of the past, but
by leading us to think with greater reverence of their noblest
traits ? It is only because we love goodness, and carry with us the
true light which sheds light on that which has gone as well as on
that which is to come. Religious beliefs have come and gone in
like manner, perpetually but imperceptibly being modified by our
love of truth. The love of truth ever remains, no matter what the
creed with which it is associated. The false is hugged so long
as it is thought to be true j but [once exposed as falsehood, its
day is over. Down, down, it must go ; first into lower strata of
humanity who catch it and clutch at it as it falls, and then at last
to the very lowest ground on which human feet can tread and be
trampled into dust. A new or unfamiliar truth dawns on the
horizon, and straightway the foremost lovers of truth lift their
thirsting eyes to greet its advent, and welcome it with shouts of
joy. But some will shut their eyes, and hide themselves in their
�§
inner chambers, lest it should make them dissatisfied with the old
truths which they have loved so long; and so the world becomes
divided into foes and factions, each partizan forgetting the tie that
really binds them all—their common love of truth. Let them rail
at each other’s notions as much as they please. We are barbarians
still, and know no better mode of pressing on progress, or of
keeping it within a safe rate of movement; but while we do this,
let us not forget that we are both alike loyal 'to the truth which
neither of us has really found; that we, with our more con
spicuous sacrifices for the new truth, are not alone in our costly
virtue, but they, too, have much to bear and much to lose in the
perilous and somewhat ignoble task of fighting for a mummy, and
exposing their names to the ridicule of posterity for a mere shadow.
Let it be understood on both sides that both alike love truth and
goodness, and our contests of opinion will soon lose all their bitter
ness, and our controversies their sting.
But best of all is the assurance that however wicked and erring
men have been and are, God has made them to love goodness and
truth. The time will come when that deep seated love of goodness
will assert its mastery over the whole man, and present us fault
less before the Eternal Throne, just as that radical love of truth
will bring every one at last into that glorious region where
falsehood and error are unknown.
Then shall be fulfilled that grand old prophecy, “ After those
days, saith the Lord, I will put my law into their inward parts, and
write it in their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be
my people. And they shall teach no more, every man his neigh
bour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord : for they
shall all know me from the least of them even unto the greatest.”
EASTERN POST Steam Printing Works, 89, Worship Street Finsbury, E.C.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
The true light: a sermon, preached at St. George's Hall, Langham Place, May 11th, 1873
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Voysey, Charles [1828-1912]
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: [London]
Collation: 8 p. ; 19 cm.
Notes: Printed by Eastern Post May 17th, 1873. Part of Morris Miscellaneous Tracts 6.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
[Eastern Post]
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
[1873]
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
G3417
Subject
The topic of the resource
Religion
Sermons
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The true light: a sermon, preached at St. George's Hall, Langham Place, May 11th, 1873), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Morris Tracts
Religion
Sermons
-
https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/2b42f56333c4e7d735a8d036aad339a3.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=VyFnIWW00AJWMDjuN3xFZXF8Rda7jlQ6pVM1JXNuIbvaWNmT0X%7EYrBy2-TY1bHQf3QIbbM%7EwWADOBztS99rTrywkh2FczP4Rb9fOEgatz9hFsPDqC44WTOwMJJp6BkO4oKB5-fiA171iIRopYJsjZceu-32Eo0394u0BhcVnSsqTjc4so69TA7M67c6I4YKRGdscSBpXuL6qNIkORC4cbwCRuPOSP5Z-JaxpnDJYZmDe8HnO-oWzAEnbTcmC0cNJcI6AxGrDCYWtNNM8fA0cP%7EYaToduHhValXFDTl%7E9iio41CjDDXddXt5LKd675PXemCFKG-z2W5boAd06dk5iEQ__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
2eedebd4b55ef471925d202983cedc17
PDF Text
Text
■ THE EXAMINER:
A Monthly Review of Religious and Humane Questions,
and of Literature.
Vol. I. —FEBRUARY, 1871. —No. 3.
Article I.— Unitarian Leaders.
[These sketches were written while watching the pro
ceedings of the recent meeting of the Unitarian National
Conference. Though slight, and hastily set down, they
aim to be just. They refer in part to persons who were not
present in the meeting alluded to.]
REV. DR. BELLOWS
Is well known to the general public. In the Conference
he appeared as the President of the Council of Ten, which
is the executive committee of the organization! His report
in this capacity opened the work of the conference! In
several respects Dr. Bellows stands in a position almost
pontifical. His abundant energy, his large and broad
intelligence in ethical and religious matters, his usual cath
olicity of spirit, the exceptional warmth and vigor of his
fraternal sympathies, and his great gifts as a writer and
preacher, have justly entitled him to a position not accorded
to any other among the leaders of Unitarianism. It is at
the same time to be said, that a somewhat pontifical temper
is thought by many of Dr. Bellows’s brethren to detract
unhappily from his usefulness as unofficial primate of the
denomination, while his long-time habit of giving way to
LIBRARY
South Place Ethical Society
Kgsjx indiyidu^i.......
xosKac.articles______
uot...indexe.d.......
Class .....................................
Congress, in the year 1871, by Edward C. Towne, in the OfT.ce of the
Librarian of Congress, at Washington.
I
�202
Unitarian Leaders.
extreme inspirations, now in the direction of unrestricted
liberty, and now as entirely in the opposite direction, gives
great uneasiness to the less eminent but more consistent
managers of denominational affairs. The more radical
repress with difficulty their dissatisfaction with the conces
sions which Dr. Bellows has made to extreme conservatism.
On the other hand, the more conservative entertain un
feigned disgust at the equal concessions which their primate
has made to radicalism. It cannot be denied by any, how
ever, that in the report made by Dr. Bellows he stood
between the two extreme which divide his brethren, and
*
even stood above them, both in the gentleness and firmness
of his entirely Christian spirit, and in his sincere effort to
state the common ground occupied by the widely separated
elements pf the caflamunion, that of faith in God, whether
through the Christ off God or the Spirit of God, Christian
union justly frecogjiized between all who believe in “the
God behind both Christ and Spirit.”
REV. E. E. HALE,
, The popular preacher and magazinist of Boston, represents
the onljheecognized denominational publication, “ Old and
New,” of which Mr. Hale is the editor. Five thousand
dollars was given by the American Unitarian Association
towards establishing “ Old and New,” and some benevolent
individuals gave the venerable “ Christian Examiner ”
thirty-five hundred dollars to “ go up higher,” and it went,
leaving the field.to Mr. Hale’s enterprise. In the opinion
of some of the more thoughtful and scholarly of the Unita
rian divines, Mr. Hale has not met just expectations.
Not a few—Rev, Dr. Hedge for example—deem “ Old and
New” of little off no account to any serious religious work,
its notes of really religious utterance are so few and feeble.
Some go so far as to energetically stigmatize the publica
tion as unpardonably superficial, a sugared mush of pleasant
words which can be liked once, can be endured a few times,
but cannot be accepted for a moment as the latest literary
�Unitarian Leaders.
203
legacy of Unitarianism to the American people. These
would gladly give a handsome sum to induce “ Old and
New ” to follow the “ Christian Examiner ” “ up higher.”
Even Dr. Bellows, in his calm, judicious report to the Con
ference, did not hesitate to mingle with kindly praise of his
beloved friend’s labors, an earnest intimation that Mr. Hale
had not yet done what he was supposed to be under a pledge
to do, and decided warning that further disappointment on
the part of the denomination would hardly be borne with
patience. It is but just to say for Mr. Hale, that he has
both consulted the market, which makes but a limited
demand for any other than cheap work in popular maga
zines, and his own genius, which is essentially genial rather
than thoughtfull and interested more in strewing pleasure
in the everyday path of common people, than in leading
the march of the saints and thinkers, or heading the fray
of zealous faith.
REV. CHARLES LOWE,
The popular secretary of the American Unitarian Associa
tion, is a remarkable illustration of modest powers used
with a wisdom hardly ever associated with a more striking
and more daring order of genius. Of delicate physical
constitution, of a peculiar sweetness of spirit and gentle
ness of manner, cautious in thought and unambitious in
action, he yet goes so directly to the point of every matter
with which he has to deal, and takes his stand so conscien
tiously and firmly, with such breadth of spirit and such
profound sympathy with all things lovely and of good
report, as to find himself recognized as one at least of the
pillars of the Gate Beautiful of the Urratarian communion,
if not in fact, in himself alone, the most exact contempo
rary expression of the Christian Liberty through which
Channing taught his disciples to seek entrance to the king
dom of God.
JWES FREEMAN CLARKE,
As he likes to be called, without his titles, was the Secretary
�204
Unitarian Leaders.
of the Association, now represented by Mr. Lowe, during
a p^iod ten years ago, when the seeds of present agitation
were being sown; and at that time no one could have more
nobly held up the Unitarian standard of spiritual freedom.
As an earnest friend of Theodore Parker, and a sufferer
from insisting upon Christian recognition of that great
heresiarch, before Unitarianism had begun to build his
monument,—when in fact it was still stoning him,—Mr.
Clarke earned a most honorable fame among the earliest
friends of the progress which has now become intensely
radical, and this he did not in any respect forfeit during
the period of his secretaryship in the American Unitarian
Association. It was, however, always the case that Mr.
Clarke belonged by his most cherished beliefs to orthodox
Unitarianism. Few of Theodore Parker’s critics have
appreciated his theology less than Mr. Clarke, or have
more positively questioned that radical reformer’s success
as a seeker for Christian truth. The recent eminence of
Mr. Clarke,—now Dr. Clarke,—as a preacher and denomi
national writer, has brought his theological conservatism
into particular prominence, and has given the impression
that age is cooling the more liberal sympathies of his
earlier career. It can be pretty confidently said, neverthe
less, that any wanderer from the stricter churches, or any
fugitive from the darker faiths of the modern world, who
may come to the Gate Beautiful alluded to above, will find
himself passing very close to the ever-warm heart of one
of the purest and noblest men now living, James Freeman
Clarke.
REV. F. H. HEDGE, D.D.,
Rarely presses to the front in any assemblage of liberal
Christians, though he should be recognized as the finest
thinker and ablest writer the denomination has had since
Mr. Emerson withdrew to an exclusively literary position.
Like Dr. Clarke, Dr. Hedge is in one direction conserva
tive—that of a strenuous demand for close connection with
the Christianity of the past; yet he is essentially a trans-
�Unitarian Leaders.
20.5
cendentalist by the greatness of his intellect, a calm seer
who looks out with clear eyes over the highest summits of
human thought, and views both discussions and conclusions
in the purest light of unclouded heavenly reason. Not
even Mr. Emerson has more deeply penetrated the mystic
secrets of divine reason, nor more happily separated in the
spectrum of his thought the elements of the uncreated light
which is to all religious minds the essence of revelation.
If any man now living is competent to report to the ear of
this generation the best echoes of eighteen Christian centu
ries, and in fact the utterances of the “still small voice” in
all ages and places of human faith, Dr. Hedge is entitled to
such rank.
REV. C. A. BARTOL, D.D.,
The successor of Dr. Lowell, in that watch-tower of spirit
ual edification, the pulpit of the West Church, Boston, is
one of the beloved and distinguished leaders of Unitarianism, in spite of his life-long determination to abstain from
all sectarian connection. He is a rare example of the spir
itual insight which makes a. successful preacher, the power
to look through forms to sympathies, and touch the deeper
chords of feeling, in the vibration of which the Christian
heart most readily recognizes the visitation of the divine
compassion. Had he so chosen, Dr. Bartol might have cul
tivated, with eminent success, the difficult field of theologi
cal speculation, and he does not, with all his simplicity and
gentleness, lack the robust qualities necessary to the high
controversy of religious opinion. It was his deliberate
choice to entirely devote himself to edification through
pulpit ministry and pastoral labor, and here he stands
second to none among his brethren.
REV. WM. H. FURNESS, D.D.,
Of Philadelphia, is in the same category as Dr. Bartol: he
1 is a Unitarian leader, without ever meddling with the con
duct of denominational affairs. The most genial of natures
is in him matured by thorough and varied culture in litera-
�206
Unitarian Leaders.
ture, art, and social graces, until he justly ranks among the
most charming masters of the interpretation and illustra
tion of Christian grace and truth. It has been the single
study of Dr. Furness, through all his active life, and by
many successive efforts, to reproduce the true likeness of
ideal humanity, as he reads it in the person of Christ. The
consummate art of the painter appears in every stroke of
his work, but, with most readers, it is less easy to be sure
of the historical fidelity of the picture. The latest, and
probably the final attempt of Dr. Furness to interpret the
person and career of Christ to the modern world, will be
found in a new book from his pen, bearing the simple title
“ Jesus,” which has just issued from the press of J. B.
Lippincott & Co.
REV. W. P. TILDEN,
Who conducted the opening service of the Conference, and
gave to that service a tone of profound faith in the broadest
communion,—through the presence of the indwelling
Father, in the children now, as in the Master eighteen cen
turies ago, “ God in us as in him,”—deservedly ranks with
the leaders of the denomination, for his single-hearted fer
vor of faith, and hope, and charity, and his zealous labors
for the promotion of practical Christianity. Originally a
New England ship-carpenter, his largeness of spiritual
nature and irrepressible enthusiasm for humanitarian and
religious work, pointed him out to Rev. Caleb Stetson, one
of the eminent Unitarian leaders of the last generation, as
peculiarly qualified for effective service in the liberal pulpit;
and this anticipation has been fully justified by all the
events of Mr. Tilden’s career. Without attempting to share
the special labors of Unitarian learning and thought, Mr.
Tilden, who is now among the elder men of the body, has
established a just claim to be considered one of the practi
cal apostles of the work and fellowship of Unitarianism.
And in the same category should be set that worthiest of
good men, and most excellent and earnest of fathers in the
church,
�Definitions from Carlyle.
207
REV. SAMUEL J. MAY,
"Whose long life has beautifully exemplified the power of
zealous goodness, and the charm which always attaches to
a character of which simplicity, sincerity, and the fervor of
unmixed kindness are the chief elements. Mr. May was
magna pars of the great anti-slavery conflict, and has lately
embodied in an interesting and valuable volume, his “ Rec
ollections” of that holy war. In ripe old age, he is as
fresh in fervor as if youth still kept the fountain of his life,
and almost promises to stay here indefinitely, unless the
powers up higher repeat in full, as they have in great part,
the experiment of the patriarch who walked with God, and
was not, for God took him.
Article II.—Definitions, from Carlyle, of Religion, of Pa
ganism, and of Christianity.
“ Religion. . m The thing a man does practically believe
(and this is often without asserting it even to himself, much
less to others); the thing a man does practically lay tc
heart, and know for certain, concerning his vital relations
to this mysterious Universe, and his duty and destiny
there.”
“ Recognition of the divineness of nature 1 sincere com
munion of man with the mysterious invisible Powers visi
bly seen at work in the world around him, . . is the essence
of all Pagan mythology, H. . sincerity the great character
istic of it, . . . looking into nature with open eye and soul:
most earnest, honest!childlike, and yet manlike; with a
great-hearted simplicity and depth and freshness, in a true,
loving, admiring, unfearing way. . . . Such recognition of
Nature one finds to be the chief element of Paganism : rec
ognition of man, and his moral Duty, comes to be the chief
element only in purer forms of religion ; . . here indeed is
a great distinction and epoch in Human Beliefs; a great
landmark in the religious development of Mankind. Man
�208
“ Jesus Christ an Inferior Man.”
first puts himself in relation with Nature and her Powers;
not till a later epoch does he discern that all Power is Moral,
that the grand point is the distinction for him of Good and
Evil, of Thou shalt and Thou shalt not.”
“ Pagan Religion is indeed an Allegory, a symbol of
what men felt and knew about the Universe; and all relig
ions are symbols of that, altering always as that alters.”
“ Christianism; faith in an Invisible, not as real only,
but as the only reality; Time, through every moment of it,
resting on Eternity; Pagan empire of Force displayed by a
nobler supremacy, that of Holiness.”
“ The germ of Christianity, . . is hero-worship, heartfelt
prostrate admiration, submission, burning, boundless, for a
noblest, godlike Form of Man, . . for the great man, with
his free force direct out of God’s own hand, as the indis
pensable saviour of his epoch . . Christianity is the highest
instance of Hero-Worship.”
Article III. — “Jesus Christ an Inferior Man.” — Inde
pendent.
The Independent of November 24 devoted its leading
editorial to the topic, Jesus Christ an Inferior Man. It
placarded this sentiment where it met the eyes of we know
not how many scores of thousands of persons. It rung
the changes upon it until it had repeated the epithet of
contempt twenty-one times, through a column and a half
of feeble rhetoric or feebler snuffle. Appealing to pi pus
fiction, to sacred myth, to goody incident, and goodish
anecdote, and to various historical characters, reputable
and disreputable, it frantically cried shame on the shame
less Examiner for calling Jesus “an inferior man.” The
old pagan, Constantine, and “another emperor, immortal
for infamy,” with that modern master of selfishness, whose
imperial line reached the finale of its infamy at Sedan the
other day, it grouped effectively round Dr. Kane, while the
latter planted a toy cross on “ the northernmost iceberg of
�‘‘ Jesus Christ gin Inferior Man.”
209
the frozen sea,” a “ beautiful, dreary, and perilous cere
mony,” which we, forsooth, could not look on with even
“ a faint pulse of sympathy,” because of our “little criti
cism ” about the “ inferior man 1 ”
This representation of what we were said to have said
about the popular man-image of God has gone the rounds
of the religious press, in editorials and paragraphs, and
probably reached an audience a hundred times as large as
we could reach, or even a thousand times as large, and with
an effect towards breaking down faith in the Christian idol
very much greater than The Examiner, by any circulation
whatever, could have produced. The Independent conspicu
ously posted the intelligence that Jesus Christ had been
thrust ignominiously out of Christianity, had been tumbled
like a heathen idol out of the temple of religion, by a man
who professes Christian faith ! It was very stupid if it
supposed that such an announcement could fail to have a
most disastrous effect upon common faith in Jesus as a
supposed express image of God. For it is not calm argu
ment, nor labored appeal, which have most effect on the
average mind, but sharp, strong assertion, pithy catchwords,
keen epithets,—-just like this which the Independent has
placarded, Jesus Christ an inferior man. Bold to rudeness
or profanity though it be, it is all the more a blow the force
of which cannot be parried. In passing it round, the reli
gious weeklies offer themselves to their enemy as the ass’s
colt offered his back to the Lord Christ.
It is particularly interesting to an iconoclast to see his
work done for him, when the echo of his own word is the
only clear, strong point of the utterance. What do we
care for Kane on an iceberg, or Napoleon arrogantly pre
tending that he knew men, or Constantine guessing or
feigning he saw a cross in the sky, or t’other heathen, con
fessedly “ immortal for infamy,” who, perhaps, did finally
tremble before the “ Galilean,” as many a. wretch certainly
has? Theology is not the science of accidental confessions
of great scamps. Napoleon “knew men,” did he? Knew
�210
“Jesus Christ an Inferior Man.”
the divine side of man, did he? Was just the man to say,
“ I know men, and Jesus Christ was not a man?” Why
not consult the present Napoleon, and get his certificate
that Jesus was not a man ? These “ immortal-for-infamy ”
fellows have such an eye for deity, and can give such sure,
testimony to the godhead of a young Jew of eighteen
centuries since 1 It is really touching, isn’t it, to find how
handsomely they make out their useful certificates that
Jesus was not a man at alf and of course was not“ an inferior
man.”
But here we must say that the words placarded by the
Independent, in the article to which we have alluded, were
never used by The Examiner, nor any words like them.
The expression was copied by the Independent from a con
temptuous sentence of D. A. Wasson, whom we had asked
tor evidence of the “ imperial” greatness of Jesus, and who
eked out the meagreness and feebleness of his reply by sar
casm and sneers, intended to confute us by bringing us into
contempt. He professed to find in what we had said, the
theory that ‘‘Jesus was an inferior man, whom Providence
selected for the express purpose of showing what might be
made of an inferior man,” although in fact we said that
u the child of Joseph and Mary fairly obtained, and must
always hold among men on earth, one of the greatest prov
idential places of human history.” If we also said that his
life was “ simple and humble,” and that he was “ without
any particular greatness of intellect or character,” we said
this in the course of a protest against Mr. Abbot’s attempt
to stand outside a definite relation to him ” as “ the stand
ard bearer of a great movement of mankind.” The words
which Mr. Wasson used were worse than contemptuous,
therefore; they told one of those half truths which are
worse than downright falsehoods. We had not intended to
say this, and should not have done so had not the Indepen
dent given so wide a circulation to Mr. Wasson’s gibe. To
the Independent we beg to say, Beware of second-hand learn
ing, for, from the day that there began to be stories afloat
�Mr. Wasson’s “Medicines.”
211
about the young rabbi of Nazareth, to this present time,
second-hand knowledge has made the current Christianity
a fabric more of fiction than of fact. For instance, Jesus
was not the original author of anything contained in the
Sermon on the Mount. As a distinguished Hebraist of our
time has said, that discourse was perfectly familiar in the
streets of Jerusalem before it was delivered by Jesus; and
both the truths of it and its spirit may be referred to the
truly great Hillel much more justly than to the young
master who was but a pupil and a child, when a rash ambi
tion cost him his life.
Article IV.—Mr. Wasson’s “ Medicines” or IIow to “ See
Jesus.”
In one of the shorter articles of our first issue, we said
that “ it would give us great pleasure to seethe evidence on
which Mr. Wasson pronounces Jesus ‘ an imperial soul,’
and the historical ground for his assumption that the young
Nazarene enthusiast expected ‘ a reign of morals pure and
simple,’ not the reign of an individual, nor of a nation. ”
Mr. Wasson has made a reply to this demand, in the
Liberal Christian. In this reply he first alleges, That we
are in the condition of De Quincey, when he pronounced
Socrates and Plato a pair of charlatans, “ betraying the
extent to which his judgments might be dictated by his
humors,” and presenting a case of “ disease, to be contro
verted with medicines; not with logic and testimony. ”
But what medicines will suffice to prove that Jesus is “ an
imperial soul ?” Is it by calomel or ipecac, by vomit or by
purge, that we may arrive at Mr. Wasson’s view? It is
truly very unkind in our friend to refer us to promiscuous
drugs. We might retire on a dose of blue pill for example,
and wake up Calvinist, as fierce as Fulton, who glories in
having “preached hell in Boston ” to so much purpose ; or’
having distressed our stomach with an emetic, we might
bring ourselves to a condition requiring the small beer and
�212
Mr. Wasson’s “ Medicines ’’
water-gruel Christology of brother Tilton. To proof num
ber one, therefore, alleged by Mr. Wasson, we beg to ask
the particular medicines he would recommend.
In the second place, Mr. Wasson, in reply to our demand
for proof of the “ imperial ” greatness of Jesus, alleges
this: “I see in Jesus an amazing elevation of soul; Mr.
Towne looks on the same picture, and beholds only a daub,
or, at best, a work of little merit. The question, accord
ingly, what Jesus was in character and quality of spirit, is
one which I cannot discuss with him.” Which is, in other
words, “I am right, evidence or no evidence.” Mr. Was
son says, we “ do not entertain the question, which of us
two sees more truly.” But that is exactly the question we
do entertain, and the settlement of which we hoped to
reach, by hearing Mr. Wasson’s evidence, and by contro
verting it with other and weightier proof. We asserted our
belief that Mr. Wasson depended more on imagination than
on historical proof, and here we convict him of it. lie
avows that Jesus is an amazing picture to him, and that we
do not see it as he does, simply because we have not the
eye for it. Very well, but Mr. Wasson’s eye is not histori
cal evidence. He glorified the first disciples, as “ large
popular imaginations,” expressly ascribing their recognition
of Jesus to the largeness and the popular quality of their
imagination. And now he confesses that it is all in his
eye. Medicines and imagination, then, are, so far, what
Mr. Wasson recommends to us, if we would “ see Jesus.”
But Mr. Wasson goes a step further. He names Nicolas
and Colani. He avows that he makes certain “ discrimina
tions,” and we look with care to see what they are. He
rejects the Fourth Gospel. So far, good. The Fourth
Gospel is a theological story, and a poor one at that, though
some of the finest things are preserved in it. Again, he
rejects “ the most extended and explicit of the Messianic
passages in the Synoptical Gospels,” “ upon the showing of
M. Colani.” If he means that he clears Jesus of the charge
of Messianic pretension in a Jewish sense, merely on the
�Or “ How io See Jesus.”
'
213
showing of Colani, he rests, as we feared he did, on the very
narrow basis of insufficient investigation. Not a tithe of
the weight of modern scholarship is on that side. The one
fact most surely proven in regard to Jesus is, that he under
took to be the king of the Jews, and lost his life in conse
quence. To cite. Colani as evidence of the contrary, is to
cite the opinion of a worthy preacher—not the indorsement
of a real scholar; much like quoting Dr. J. F. Clarke.
Mr. Wasson disposes of this point in five lines. He merely
states that Colani has satisfied him. But this is the key of
the controversy, the question whether Jesus entertained a
false Messianic ambition. If Colani has satisfied Mr. Was
son that he did not, either potent drugs or a “ large popular
imagination’'’ must have assisted the effect of Colani’s
superficial and unsatisfactory handling of the subject.
In/the third place, Mr. Wasson feels sure that oral tradi
tion, assuming that the Christ must have put forth claims,
ascribed to him pretension of which he was not guilty.
In fact, however, the evidence still existing, that Jesus put
forth these claims, cannot be set aside by this or any other
imagination of what may or must have been ; while, if Jesus
did undertake and failed, every motive to drop out of sight
the evidence of the abortive undertaking, must have worked
during the years through which the tradition was oral, thus
making it almost certain, that whatever evidence of this
has survived, is to be regarded as peculiarly significant and
weighty. So far, therefore, from throwing out the evidence
that Jesus was a pretender to Messiahship, we ought to
regard it as more strictly historical than anything else in
the record. It is by imagination here, also, not by sound
scholarship, that Mr. Wasson reaches his conclusion.
And, finally, Mr. Wasson thinks it certain, that Jesus
was greater than his immediate followers knew him to be,
and that we must assume, on the one hand, that the best
things reported were not lent him by the disciples, who had
nothing to give, and that other things not so good, were
due to their failure to comprehend. But the fact is, that
�214
Mr. Wasson's “ Medicines.”
the story of Jesus was worked over by oral report, after a
supposed resurrection was thought to have proved him to
have been the Messiah. “Large popular imaginations”
had charge of it, and made what they chose of it. And
the good things of the story (the ethical and spiritual
truths') were current, just as much before. Jesus and apart
from him, as they could be after him. Or if he brought
them together, he did not originate them. Hillel was as
much greater than Jesus as Channing than Chadwick, or
Theodore Parker than Mr. Morse. We intend to speak
exactly. And Hillel’s spirit was, as that of Jesus was not,
fully and invariably that of the best things in the Sermon
on the Mount. He gave to Christianity the Golden RuleHis school of teaching and influence was as much more
important than that of Jesus, as his years, and learning,
and character surpassed those of the young enthusiast
whose dreams interrupted the course of human progress,
from Judaism onward, with eighteen centuries of worship
of a man, and untold inhumanities wrought in the propaga
tion of his pretension. On the one hand then, the belief
that Jesus had been proved the Messiah, moved his disciples
to make the best story they could, and, on the other hand,
they could copy fine truths from current teaching, just as
easily as to repeat them from Jesus, who had but copied
them at the best, so that we are bound to assume, not that
Jesus lost in the story of him, but that he gained in it
immensely, so much so as to be more the creature of it)
than a fact of history. Thus, briefly, do we dispose of Mr.
Wasson’s “ discriminations,” on the basis of which he says
he has made up a critical judgment. We find every one of
these, except the first, unscholarly to a lamentable degree.
But if we had not done this, it would be easy to show
the vice of Mr. Wasson’s conclusion. Por he says that he
proceeds “ to make up a critical judgment,” by “ endeavor
ing first to catch the tune of his mind, his action and char
acter, by meditating upon those sayings of his, and those
incidents of his life which are of such a quality as to carry
�John Brown on the Scaffold.
215
their own credentials.” Imagination, again ! Sayings and
incidents which carry their own credentials ! The Qolden
Rule, for example, or other fine truths, proof of the charac
ter of Jesus, because they are so fine, when, to a certainty
Jesus did not originate either the terms or the tone of the
purest Christian teaching, and did originate the baleful
pretension of his own claim to divine position ! Mr. Was
son must try again. He has not given us a scrap of evi
dence that Jesus was eminently great, either in thought or
in principle. We do not wonder that he began with recom
mending drugs, and then offered the use of his eye, for cer
tainly his “ discriminations” are of no weight whatever, nor
is his “ critical judgment ” entitled to any authority. It
is very well to have read Nicolas, and what there is of
Colani may be looked at with profit, especially if one looks
and passes on, but neither Mr. Wasson nor any other advo
cate of an exploded superstition can afford to be contemptu
ous in a matter of scholarship, on so meagre a support.
We ask Mr. Wasson again for evidence, and hope he will
give us more on the main point than he does when he says,
“I am satisfied on the showing of M. Colani.”
Article V.—John Brown on the Scaffold and Jesus on the
Cross.
Before secession, civil war, and emancipation, had shown
the leader of the Harper’s Ferry enterprise to have been the
providential herald of the greatest overturning of modern
times, there were few persons who would not have been
shocked at the mere suggestion of comparing John Brown
with the most remarkable prophet-judges and prophet
chieftains of familiar Hebrew story. The most plausible
view at first was that he was a crack-brained fanatic, who
might even escape the penalty of his mad crime under the
plea of insanity. It soon became evident, however, that
this madness had more method and character than the
sanity of ordinary men] Two bitterly prejudiced witnesses
said of the hero of Harper’s Ferry :
�216
;
;
,
I
I
I
,
John Brown on the Scaffold
“It is vain to underrate either the man or the conspiracy.
Captain John Brown is as brave and resolute a man as ever
headed an insurrection, and, in a good cause, and with a
sufficient force, would have been a consummate partisan
commander. He has coolness, daring, persistency, the stoic
faith and patience, and a firmness of will and purpose unconquerable. He is the farthest possible remove from the
ordinary ruffian, fanatic, or madman. Certainly it was one
of the best planned and best executed conspiracies that ever
*
failed.
“ They are themselves mistaken who take him to be a
madman. He is a bundle of the best nerves I ever saw,
cut, and thrust, and bleeding, and in bonds. He is a man
of clear head, of courage, fortitude, and simple ingenuousness. He is cool, collected, and indomitable. . . . lie
inspired me with great trust in his integrity, as a man of
truth. . . . Colonel Washington says that he was the cool
est and firmest man he ever saw in defying danger and
death. With one son dead by his side, and another shot
through, he felt the pulse of his dying son with one hand
and held his rifle with the other, and commanded his men
with the utmost composure, encouraging them to be firm,
and to sell their lives as dearly as they could.”f
The opinion of the martyr himself upon the proposal to
put in the plea of insanity on his behalf was unequivocal
and indignant. In addressing the court before his trial he
said : “I look upon it (the plea in question) as a miserable
artifice and pretext of those who ought to take a different
course in regard to me, if they took any at all, and I view
it with contempt more than otherwise. ... I am perfectly
unconscious of insanity, and I reject, as far as I am capable,
any attempts to interfere on my behalf on that score.” To
this we may add the convincing allusion of one of his latest
letters : “I may be very insane, and I am so if insane at all.
But, if that be so, insanity is like a pleasant dream to me.
* C. L. Vallandigliam.
f Henry A. Wise.
�And Jesus on the Cross.
217
I am not in the least degree conscious of my ravings, of my
fears, or of any terrible visions whatever; but fancy my
self entirely composed ; and that my sleep, in particular, is as
sweet as that of a healthy, joyous little infant. I pray G od that
he will grant me a continuance of the same calm but de
lightful dream, until I come to know of those realities which
eyes have not seen, and ears have not heard.” Mary
Brown, who had always been the sharer of her husband’s
plans, said emphatically : “I couldn’t say, if I were called
upon, that my husband was insane—even to save his life;
because he wasn’t.] She declared that if her husband were
. insane he had been consistent in his insanity from the first
moment she knew him.
But more than all else the perfectly grand manifestation
of character, made to the whole world during John Brown’s
forty-two days before the gallows, settled the question of
his mental condition. The conversations, speeches in court
and letters from prison, of John Brown, convict him of any
thing but mental weakness. Beginning with the precious
• fragment of autobiography written for the young son of Mr.
George L. Stearns, the recorded utterances of this uncul
tured man of the people have a fine literary quality which
indicates remarkable purity of intellectual tone. Their
style alone speaks a man of clear head and pure taste. And
x their moral elevation is so complete, the sentiments which
they report are so good and so great, that we are forced to
confess ourselves in presence of a miracle of character.
There seems to us no doubt that John Brown, shepherd,
tanner, wool merchant,farmer, Kansas chieftain, provisional
constitution maker, and Harper’s Ferry commander, must
be classed with the greatest characters of history, because
of his remarkable union of clear vision, pure conscience,
and perfect courage,—the insight of a prophet, the most un
compromising love of right, and absolute intrepidity in
action. In amount of quality he stands with the very few
supreme men of the race, the founders for mankind of civil
ity and religion. And for combination of the grand types
VOL. I.—NO. 3.
2
�218
John Brown on the Scaffold
of character, is it too much to say that, as we see him in
his transfiguration before the scaffold, his figure is nobler
than that of any earlier hero of our race — the wisest,
purest, bravest of mankind ? Standing on this latest stage
of time, instructed, chastened and inspired by a situation
quite beyond any hitherto arranged in history, it was in the
order of Providence that the mount of this martyr should
plant the standard of our march above Calvary, as Calvary
planted it above Sinai. Not that we compare, in respect to
nature, the now deified Christ of Galilee and the’ just now
despised fanatic of Harper’s Ferry. They were equally
common men. We compare only the Jewish figure with
the American figure, the man on the cross with the man
on the scaffold, and say confidently that in John Brown on
his scaffold, Eternal God has lifted the standard of human
advancement higher than it was lifted in the Christ of Cal
vary. Or to put it in other words, and words justified by
that which Jesus himself said, the true Christ-Son of God,
Heaven-anointed soul, which was manifested in Jesus, and
was to be manifested in his humblest disciple, the least of
these his brethren, is manifested to-day in the American
martyr as it was not, and could not be manifested in the
Messiah.
The eindmce is close at hand. At this moment let it suf
fice to present one point of this, the point which is most
important and most conclusive. The world knows the
story of the trial of Jesus—not the trial before Pilate, but
the trial in his own soul. Theological ingenuity has been
exhausted in the attempt to explain this without damage to
the orthodox theory that Jesus was a person of the deity;
but in vain. Give Jesus no more benefit of ingenious
hypothesis and pious prepossession than we give Socrates,
Paul, Giordano Bruno, and John Brown, and we are com
pelled to say that either one had a courage which Jesus did
not possess. Estimate fairly the mental anguish of Savon
arola and of Edward Irving, who died unvisited by the super
natural intervention they had with absolute faith looked
�And Jesus on the Cross.
219
for, the one hung up in chains in the flames after forty-two
days of torture, the other wasted by distressing disease
through days and months of unanswered agonizing prayer,
and it cannot be denied that their trial was far heavier than
that of Jesus. It is idle to ascribe to the Jewish martyr a
superhuman sensibility to evil; for if superhuman at all, he
was superhuman in courage and endurance not less than in
sensibility. If he were not equal to perfect endurance, as
he plainly was not, we but make his weakness the greater
the more we lift him above humanity. The anguish of his
prayer and the wail of the cross, on the lips of a mere child
of Galilee, wrung from the heart of a peasant-Messiah, when
he had really looked for intervention by miracle which did
not come, can be readily explained, without denying the
spiritual elevation of Jesus. We say, then, that in forecast
ing events, and in meeting the turns of fate, he fell short of
the perfection possible to human nature. We recognize
that it was not his mission to do all the things which man
in his most heroic mood can perform, that he represents a
stage in the elevation of our race, by no means our final
attainment. And we confidently compare facts to show
that the American martyr was, in respect to courage under
the heavy blows of fate, superior to the man of Nazareth.
In the garden of Gethsemane we see Jesus “ in distress and
anguish,”—as Mark puts it, “ in great consternation and
anguish,”—and hear him say to his disciples, “ I am in ex
ceeding distress, ready to die.” The bare existence of this
fact is significant; the communication of it, especially to
disciples who could not help himkif they would, marks a
mind utterly shaken out of self-possession. And how con
clusive to the same effect is the prayer, thrice repeated, of
Jesus: He fell upon his face and prayed, saying, “My
Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. But net
as I will, but as thou wilt.” A second time he prayed, sav
ing, “My Father, if this cup cannot pass from me, but I
must drink it, thy will be done.” Still again he prayed
a third time, saying the same words.
r
�220
John Brown on the Scaffold, Etc.
Setting aside the theory that Jesus was not what he
seemed to be, we have here a man engaged in an almost
desperate effort to meet his fate. The effort of submission
is sincere and grand; it lifts Jesus into the position of a
leader of mankind; considering especially his Jewish limi
tations, how naturally he had looked for supernatural inter
vention, how purely and nobly too he had desired this as
the true coming of God to man, and how really to his eyes
the power of healing the body, with inspiration which
enabled him to instruct and control the mind, had seemed to
him the beginning of miracle, we may'justly see in this
effort, so distinctly conceived and so resolutely attempted, a
manifestation of the very divinity of human nature; but it
is vain to deny that effort is a stage behind attainment. Not
only does the consternation of an experience like that of
Jesus argue a failure to foresee possible duty, but still more
the agonizing effort to accept the situation shows a decided
deficiency of heroic equipment. This deficiency, we repeat,
admits of an explanation, in the case of Jesus, whose em
inence was of purity more than of force, which does not
pluck him from his lofty position of anointed master of the
Christian ages. By the usage of his people Jesus had barely
come of age; he was contemplative rather than executive
in his temperament, more spiritual than practical, and al
most without other education than that of meditation and
prayer. He was in fact an inspired child of Nazareth; more
than that, he had the heart of a pure girl in the breast of a
Galilean peasant. Thus he naturally enough failed to meet
his fate with the serenity of prepared courage, but the ex
planation of the failure does not explain it away. He failed
conspicuously, and as conspicuously John Brown, bringing
back the great example of Socrates, did not fail.
�Theodore Parker’s Antagonism, Etc.
221
Article VI. — Theodore Parker’s Character and Ideas.
■ Chap. III.—His Antagonism with the Religious World.
We come now to the question of Theodore Parker’s
“ antagonism with the religious world.” The reviewer,
whose judgment our discussion starts from, regrets that Mr.
Parker was not “ thrown into intimate relations with Evan
gelical scholars,” and says “ it is singular how rarely he met
such, and how kindly he spoke of them, as of Professors
Stuart, Porter and Woolsey.”
That Theodore Parker found but three or four evangeli
cal scholars who gave him occasion to speak kindly of them,
is doubtless a singular fact, considering the fundamental
principles of Christian religion. Perhaps it is not so sin
gular a fact that Theodore Parker spoke kindly, very kindly,
of these exceptions to the rule. I wish the reviewer had
given a list of the evangelical scholars with whom Mr.
Parker might have had relations of intimate Christian broth
erhood. He mentions Stuart, Woolsey, and Porter, neither
of whom ever pretended to consider Parker a Christian
man and brother. The little intercourse which took place
between Theodore Parker and Stuart, Woolsey, Porter,and
the chief of the New Haven school of theology, Dr. Taylor,
was marked by a manly effort of good will on their part,
and by generous appreciation on his part; but it would be
a great mistake to suppose that these men, the best of their
class, ever felt at liberty to do justice to Theodore Parker.
Their honest principles forbade it. They could suppress, in
his presence, the unbrotherly severity of their judgment
upon him, but they could not offer him Christian brother
hood. And it was not merely that they assumed that he
did not want fellowship. If he had wanted it ever so much,—
and no man has borne the cross of lonely service with a
deeper sense of the value of brotherly fellowship,—they
must in conscience have dropped the mask of generous
courtesy, and shown him all the resolute hardness of their
hearts. Prof. Porter discussed Mr. Parker’s opinions with
�222
Theodore Parker’s Antagonism
charity, and reviewed him with kindness. But even he, so
exceptionally gentle and just, must have resisted, to the last
degree of bitterness even, any attempt to remove the limits
of communion, and make Christian fellowship broad enough
to include the great heretic. President Woolsey could not
fail to act the Christian gentleman in any intercourse with
such a man as Theodore Parker, for by nature and by cul
ture, he is very noble, but even he can feel and show con
tempt for unorthodox struggles in a sincere soul. As to
Dr. N. W. Taylor, who was at once the ablest divine and
the noblest gentleman of all that New Haven circle, I have
heard him tell of his interview with Parker, and how they
crossed broad-swords, and whose head came off. It was in
the spirit of Prof. Park, in the great Boston Council, wnen
he said, “ A man who has studied theology three years, and
has read the Bible in the original languages, and is not a
Calvinist, is not a respectable man.”
I know-what the orthodox spirit in the best men is capa
ble of attempting. I know how the conscience of a solitary
thinker, without help in men or books, may be set upon
and tormented by evangelical surroundings. I have had
said to me, “as a heathen man and a publican”—a hard word
for which there is supposed to be pretty good evangelical
authority. No doubt the souls in whom there is great out
break of new faith and radical thought do sometimes sin
grievously against the pure fitness of things in their demon
strations, but that is not all of their hard case; they not
only become obnoxious in that way, by their own fault, but
they almost invariably become criminals and outlaws, in
the view of the evangelical world, from the hardness and
bitterness of the evangelical spirit. Not only are they dealt
with very harshly for errors which are treated tenderly
where no heresy exists, but they are terribly punished for
that innocent and pure faith which is in them the profound
necessity of a sincere conscience.
It is plain to me that Theodore Parker’s critic does not
consider how infinite is the bitterness of the cup which
�With the Religious World.
K
223
evangelicalism, in all its common forms^ presses to the lips
of one who has stripped himself of precious dogmatic beliefs
to undertake a more daring, more heroic exercise of faith
in God and labor of love than the current Christianity per
mits. Therefore I beg to assure him, upon abundant expe
rience, that a man confessing heresy heartily, must have a
face of brass to presume on “ intimate relations with evan
gelical scholars,” except as a relic of very close youthful
friendship. And if he had the shining qualities of an arch
angel on earth, and withal bore his cross honestly in the
world, doing with his might the work given him to do, he
could not but seem, to evangelical scholars of strict convic
tion, of “ no form nor comeliness—no beauty that they
should desire him.” No worse men than President Wool
sey have thought the dungeon and the fagot needful in the
discipline of demonstrative departure from orthodoxy. The
spirit of the age has, indeed, reduced marvelously the tem
per of orthodox defence of the faith, but the time has hardly
come, certainly had not come in the day of Mr. Parker’s
encounter with the religious world, when liberality could
be consistently practiced by evangelical scholars.
It is, I trust, one result of the appearance of Mr. Parker,
to disclose to some of the wiser defenders of correct tradi
tional faith, the necessity of adjusting their position once
more, to conform more closely to the demand of the Chris
tian spirit. Possibly the day is not far off when the scholars
our critic wishes Mr. Parker might have met, will be
able to accept, within evangelical limits, absolute liberality.
That is to say, holding firmly to the evangelical doctrine of
redemption, its necessity, plan, and operation, they will
relax the severity of their dogmatic convictions upon minor
points, so far as to make character the ground of human
fellowship, and to leave to God alone, the searcher of hearts,
all judgment as to the amount and style of creed necessary
to start either a soul on the road to heaven, or a teacher of
Truth on the way of the knowledge of God. It is easy for
me to think of liberality thus carried to perfection, within
�224
Theodore Parker's Antagonism
evangelical limits. Let our vain decisions as to the times
and seasons of God’s grace and power, be wholly set aside.
Say, if we must, that God hath appointed this way and no
other, the literal gospel of Christ, but leave the administra
tion of this way to Him with whom a thousand years are as
one day.
There is no Biblical evidence to compel acceptance of the
dogma of limited probation. Insist on the possibility of
the worst with the evil and the disobedient, but with the
honest, earnest and faithful seeker for Truth and lover of
God, insist as strongly on the certainty of the best. Go
down to deep below deep, in the experience of true men,
until you find for them a saving tie to God’s administration
of true redemption, rather than suffer our human judgment
to pronounce that there is little or no hope for an honest
soul misguided by an erring intellect. The possibility of
final loss may be, indeed, urged, and the whole terror of
absolute peril brought to bear, to persuade to deeper hon
esty, more serious inquiry, and more humble crying unto
the spirit of Truth, b,ut let it be in love, in hope, in firm
faith, so that the Christian spirit may bind all in one, and
the Holy Spirit, if it may possibly be, bind all to that mercy
seat before which we are all one in absolute need.
It is possible for this to be. It only requires to believe,
as humanity and divinity, even within the strictest evangeli
cal limits, require, that for those who seek there is no closing
of the chances, no limit of opportunity, no inadequacy of
eternal divine providence. Grant that the path is beset
with perils; grant that the abyss of final loss may receive
us at the next step; but say this of all, because of sins
and unworthiness of a moral sort; never say it with a lim
itation to the case of “ that publican,” who is such only by
reason of intellectual error. I heard the New Haven Dr.
Taylor say, very near the close of his life, that he knew he
might fail of heaven. Let this be the form in wlfich we
doubt as to human chances of acceptance with God. Let
this humility penetrate and bind in one all who feel the
�'With the Religious World.
225
burden of moral evil. Then it will be easy to feel that the
grace which is extended to sinners, will not need to be fur
ther extended to embrace all who try to come unto the God
and Saviour of squIs, whatever may be the fault, or, as our
critic says, the “vice” of their conception and confession
of the things of God.
It would be a noble enterprise if eminent evangelical
scholars would unite in, we will say, an Academy of Chris
tian Studies, the aim and use of which should be to vindi
cate the principle of liberality, to throw the shield of Chris
tian charity and Christian encouragement over all honest
and capable pursuits of divine Truth. In two ways espe
cially would this improve exceedingly the position of the
evangelical school. It would provide Christian discipline
for radicalism; and it would show to the world that evan
gelical faith is not afraid of inquiry. Radicalism is forced
to exaggerate the individualism of its method, because the
hand of every man is against it. Give it a place, its due
place, in the school of Christian studies, and at once its
temper must become more moderate, and its demonstra
tions less dangerous to the order of the religious world.
Had Mr. Parker been treated in this way from the begin
ning, there is every reason to believe that his mind would
have acted, upon questions of dogma, with none of that vol
canic energy which made him seem to the evangelical world
a tremendous engine of destruction! And instead of
becoming the leader and hero, not only of elect believers in
whom the spirit and the life had wrought profound convic
tion, but of the throng of deniers in whom serious convic
tion was less developed, he would have stood forth the
exponent of the modern tendency of the Christian faith.
I anticipate the reply to this, that at his best Mr. Parker
would have been an enemy. But I think the assumption of
this reply a mistake. Grant that the best of Mr? Parker’s
belief was erroneous. I go back of his dogmatic convic
tions, then, to his moral and spiritual tendencies, and un
hesitatingly affirm the necessity of accepting these as suffi
�226
Theodore Parker’s Antagonism, Etc.
cient, under the ample providence of the power and grace
of God, for cordial Christian fellowship. Let Professor
Park and President Woolsey have said to Mr. Parker,
“ Brother, we differ with you entirely in doctrinal method
and convictions, but in allegiance to the law of love and to
the spirit of Truth and of Holiness we agree; the soul, and
the soul’s union with God in moral loyalty and spiritual
yearning and devotion, are the foundation,—the Christian
foundation ; in that we meet, alike putting on the new man;
now let us reason together, and labor in one spirit of love
to God and love to man, with good hope in the eternal
providence of God with us, until we all come in the unity
of the faith unto a perfect man,”—let this have been said,
and realized in the attitude of the evangelical school, and
the modern world would have lost its great heresiarch, the
Christian world, so-called, would have gained a great apos
tle of natural religion.
Mr. Parker’s great work in Boston, and in America, had
never been undertaken if even his own sect, the Unitarian,
had had the liberality it ought to have had. In his letter to
his first parish, upon leaving them for Boston, to which he
was called solely to vindicate freedom of religious teaching,
Mr. Parker said:
“ If my brethren of the Christian ministry had stood by
me, nay, if they had not themselves refused the usual min
isterial fellowship with me, then I should have been spared
this painful separation, and my life might have flowed on
in the channel we have both wished for it.”—Life, vol. I,
p. 26L
In a letter to Rev. Mr. Niles, written the year before his
removal to Boston, Mr. Parker states what no one can rea
sonably doubt, that he had no choice but to accept individ
ualism or abdicate his own manhood. He says:
“I must of course have committed errors in reasoning
and in conclusion. I hoped once that philosophical men
would point out both; then I would confess my mistake
and start anew. But they have only raised a storm about
my head; and in a general way a man wraps his cloak
�A Letter of Theodore Parker.
227
about him in a storm and holds on the tighter.”—Life, vol.
Z, p. JfhO.
Now I ask, is it not evident that a divine design, work
ing through the robust nature of this Socratic Samson of
truth and righteousness, wrought deliberately and wisely
the rough antagonism of Theodore Parker to the popular
churches, in order to convict them, one and all, of want of
the Christian spirit, and to utter, in tones that should ring
round the world, the demand of that spirit, in this new
time, for a liberality in religion adequate to sustain, with
all honest believers and teachers, a true Christian fellow
ship ? Theodore Parker, nailing the new theses of human
ity on the doors of recognized Christian communion,
though he made the very walls of the temple tremble to their
foundation, was no lawless destructive, no mad troubler
of communion, but the providential sign of a new reforma
tion in Christendom, the Luther of emancipated faith, the
angel of a new resurrection of that holy spirit which was
the truth in .Tesus, and has been the truth in the Christian
ages, and shall be, in redeemed humanity, sole author and
authority of pure and undefiled religion.
Article VII.—A Letter of Theodore Parker.
Rev. John T. Sargent, who was intimately associated
with Theodore Parker, writes to us as follows :
I welcome your articles just opening in The Examiner
on Theodore Parker. It may interest you to know that I
have large files of letters from him, which have a value so
far as they might illustrate your main topics, bis “ charac
ter and ideas.” Most of them, it is true, are of that pri
vate and social character not intended for the public, 'and
were occasioned by that peculiar relation into which I was
thrown in consequence of my exchange of pulpits with him,
when such an expression of fellowship was looked upon
with distrust, even by the so called “ Liberal” Unitarians.
But there are others so expressive of his well known sympa-
�228
A Leiter of Theodore Parker.
thics for all the great interests of humanity, that portions of
them at least ought to be seen. Take, for instance, the
following extracts which I copy from one under date of
September 18th, 1859, when he was abroad in Montreux,
Canton de Vaud, Switzerland :
“It is Sunday, to-day, and my thoughts turn homeward
with even a stronger flight than on any other days of the
week, so I shall write a little to one of my dear old friends
— ‘ a friend indeed,’ also a brother in the same ministry.
It is the day when the services at the Music Hall are to
begin again I believe, but where I shall no more stand; for
I sent in my letter of resignation some days ago, as duty
and necessity compelled. But my affection will always go
with the dear old friends who gather there, and on Sundays,
when the Music Hall is open, I always come as a silent
minister to look at the congregation, and have ‘ sweet com
munion together,’ though we no longer ‘walk to the house
of God in company.’ It is a tender bond which gets thus
knit by years of spiritual communion :—I think not to be
broken in this life. But here, as you know, Sunday is quite
different from what it is in New England; devoted more
to gaiety and to social festivity of a harmless character.
But to-day is the Annual Fast all over Switzerland, and the
land is as still as with us in the most quiet town in New
England. I like these Swiss people. They are industrious,
thrifty and economical to an extraordinary degree,—intelli
gent, and happy. I sometimes think them the happiest
people in Europe, perhaps happier than even we in Massa
chusetts, for they are not so devoured by either pecuniary
or political ambition. * * * What a condition the
Unitarians are in just now I They put Huntington in the
place of Dr. Henry Ware, and he turns out to be orthodox,—
and, as I understand, won’t go into the Unitarian pulpit of
Brooklyn, N. Y., but officiates in the great orthodox
Plymouth church hard by. Then brother Bellows comes
out with his ‘ Broad (T) church,’ and, while talking of the
‘ Suspense of Faith,’ represents the little sect in no very
�A Letter of Theodore Parker.
229
pleasant light. Meantime, The Examiner—(certainly the
ablest journal in America,) reports to the denomination
the most revolutionary theologic opinions, and this, too,
with manifest approbation thereof. Witness the half-dozen
articles within so many years, by Frothingham, Jr., some
of Alger’s, that of Scherb’s on the Devil, and the three on
India, China, and Asiatic Religions, by an orthodox mis
sionary, now living in Middletown, Conn.; a noble fellow
too. What is to become of us ? To me it is pretty clear
the Progressive party will continue to go ahead in a circu
itous course, for Progress is never in a straight line. No
progressive party will go back describing a line with analo
gous curves.
“ It is beautiful to see the gradual development of religion
in the world, especially among su h a people as our own,
where the government puts no yoke on men’s shoulders.
Little by little they shake off the old traditionary fetters,
get rid of their false ideas of man and God, and come to
clear, beautiful views and forms of religion. No where in
the world is this progress so rapid as in America, because,
in our Northern States, the whole mass of the people is
educated and capable of appreciating the best thoughts of
the highest minds. Of course, foolish things will be done,
and foolish words spoken, but on the whole the good work
goes on, not slowly and yet surely. I am glad the Catho
lics have the same rights as the Protestants;—if they had
not I should contend for the Catholics as I now do for the
negroes. But I think that, after Slavery, Catholicism is
the worst and most dangerous institution in America; and
I deplore the growth of its churches. I know the power of
an embodied class of men with unity of sentiment, unity of
idea, and unity of aim, and when the aim, the idea, and
the sentiment are what we see and know, and the men are
governed by such rules, I think there is danger. Still, it is
to be met, not by Bigotry and Persecution, but by Wisdom
and Philanthropy. I don’t believe Catholicism thrives very
well even in a Republic, but it loves the soil a despot sticks
�230 '
A Letter of Theodore Parlier.
his bayonet into. Since Louis Napoleon has been on the
throne of France, the worst class of Catholic priests have
come more and more into power ; that miserable order, the
Capauchins, has been revived and spreads rapidly. More
than 300 new Convents have been established since the
‘ Coup d’ Etat,’ and are filled with more than 30,000 devo
tees already. But in liberally governed Switzerland, Cathol
icism does not increase, but falls back little by little. No
Jesuits are allowed to actin the land. In a few generations
we shall overcome the ignorance, stupidity, and superstition
of the Irish Catholics in America, at least in the North, but
before that is done, we shall have a deal of trouble. Soon
Boston will be a Catholic city if the custom continues of
business men living in the country; and we know what use
a few demagogues can make of the Catholic voters. It
only requires that another capitalist offer the Bishop $1,500
or so if he will tell his subjects to vote against a special
person or a special measure. All the Catholics may be
expected to be on the side of Slavery, Fillibustering, and
Intemperance. I mean, all in a body; this Romanism will
lead them to support Slavery;—the Irishmen to encourage
Fillibustering and Drunkenness. But good comes out of
evil. I think the Irish Catholics with their descendants,
could not so soon be emancipated in any country as in our
own dear blessed land. So, we need not complain, but only
fall to and do our duty,—clean, educate and emancipate the
‘gintieman from Corrk.’
“ How goes it with the ‘ Poor ?’ and with the ‘ Boston
Provident Association,’ with which you are officially con
nected ? All well, I hope. I am not quite sorry the ‘ Reform
School’ at Westboro is burnt down. The immediate loss
to the State is, to be sure, a great one, but the ultimate loss
would have been far more, for it was a school for crime,
and must graduate villains. I wonder men don’t see that
they can never safely depart from the natural order which
God has appointed. Boys are born in families ; they grow
up in families, a few in each household, mixed with girls
�The Index on Christianity Again.
231
and with their elders. How unnatural to put 500 or 600
boys into a great barn and keep them there till they are one
and twenty years of age, and then expect them to turn out
well and become natural men, after such unnatural treat
ment ! At the beginning, Dr. Howe, really one of the
most enlightened philanthropists I ever met in America or
Europe, proposed a ‘ Central Bureau,’ with a house of tem
porary deposit for boys, and that an agent should place them
in families throughout the country. A quarter of the
money thus spent, would have done a deal of good. I
wonder if you have ever been up to the ‘ Industrial School
for Girls,’ at Lancaster. To me this is one of the most
interesting institutions in the good old State. If I were
Governor of Massachusetts, I think I shouldn’t often dine
with the 1 Lancers,’ or the 1 Tigers,’ or even the ‘Ancients
and Honorables,’ but I should know exactly the condition
of every jail, and ‘ House of Correction,’ in the State, and
of all the institutions for preventing crime and ignorance.
If Horace Mann had been Governor, I think he would have
done so. Here in Europe my life is dull, and would be
intolerable were it not introductory to renewed work on
earth or another existence in Heaven. I am necessarily
idle here, or busy only with trifles which seem only a stren
uous idleness. Such is the state of my voice that I aril
constrained to silence, and so fail to profit by the admirable
opportunity of intercourse with French, German, and Rus
sian people who now fill up the house. I do not complain
of this, but think myself fortunate to be free from pain.”
Article VIII.—'The Index on Christianity Again.
In the Index of January 7th, Mr. Abbot prints a “ synop
sis of Free Religion,” which commences with a criticism of
“ Christianity as a System,” some of the points of which
surprise us more than anything Mr. Abbot has previously
said. What, for example, is he thinking about when he
says, “ Regarded as to its universal element, Christianity is
�232
The Index on Christianity Again.
a beautiful but imperfect presentation of natural morality ?”
His own opinion may separate morality from faith in God,
and make the former only the universal element of religion,
• but no Christianity that ever was, has separated these two
universal elements, or thought of presenting religion, in its
general aspect, as other than the two-fold passion of the soul
of man, towards man and duty on the one hand, and
towards God and heaven on the other.
But this is not the worst of what we deem our friend’s
misrepresentation of “ Christianity as a System.” Having,
as we have seen, made Christianity to consist, as to its uni
versal element, in a “ presentation of natural morality,” he
then states that, “ Regarded as to its special element, Chris
tianity is a great completed system of faith and life,” and
that “ the chief features of this system are the doctrines of
the Fall of Adam, the Total Depravity of the human race,
the Everlasting Punishment of the wicked, and Salvation
by Christ alone,” and that “ it is the worst enemy of liberty,
science, and civilization, because it is organized Despair of
Man.” He then goes on to define “Free Religion as a
System,” and finds it to be “ organized Faith in Man.”
Between the two there exists, he asserts, “ an absolute con
flict of principles, aims, and methods.” He declares that
“ the one ruled the world in the Dark Ages of the past,”
and that “ the other will rule the world in the Light Ages
of the future,” while “ their battle-ground is the Twilight
Age of the present.”
To us this is scandalously unfair. It is no more true that
Christianity is despair of man than it is that free religion is
faith in man. But granting Mr. Abbot his definition of
free religion,—which to us, and to the majority at least of
free religionists, leaves out the religion of Free Religion,—
it is an amazing disregard of the simplest and plainest facts
which permits the statement just quoted, of the sum and
substance of Christianity. Christianity is not organized
despair, but the contrary. One of the means generally
adopted by Christian propagandists to rouse men to “ come
�The Index on Christianity Again.
233
to Christ,” is the preaching of despair, but our friend
knows perfectly well that this is a means only, employed by
teachers of a religion whose chief word is hope, and that
this means is not employed except to induce mankind to
accept the “ hope” which Christianity teaches as her great
lesson. Christianity has never been preached as simple
despair of man, and Mr. Abbot owes it to his honorable
devotion to truth to withdraw the conspicuous assertion that
it consists in so dark and dreadful a thing. “ The worst
enemy of liberty, science, and civilization !” It connot be
said with a particle of justice. Of 79sei«7o-Christianity, the
darker human side of historical Christianity, Mr. Abbot can
speak as harshly as he chooses, without provoking our chal
lenge, but of “ the great completed system of faith and life,”
which, in his own words, Christianity is, he ought never, it
seems to us, to speak as he now speaks in his “Synopsis of
Free Religion.”
We beg him to tell us why he omits from his view of
Christianity as a “ great completed system of faith and life”
everything which constitutes it, in the general opinion of
mankind, except the four dogmas named by him as its
“ chief features.” And in particular, why does he remove
from their universally admitted place, as features of Chris
tianity chief above all others, the two supreme Christian
tenets that God is and that he is Our Father, and that
man is the offspring of God and all men members one of
another in human brotherhood? Even the false side of
historical Christianity contains other chief features than the
four doctrines named by Mr. Abbot, such, for example, as
the doctrines of a special revelation of redemption made
through the Bible, and of the Godhead of Jesus as the agent
of this redemption, and of the administration of this re
demption' by special divine influences, and these doctrines,
however false they may be, cannot be summed up in despair
of man, but intend rather great hope for man; and in all
fair judgment they stand above the darker dogmas of Fall,
Depravity, Punishment, and Limitation of redemption, and
vol.
i.—no. 3.
3
�234
The Index on Christianity Again.
are more entitled than these to give distinctive character to
Christianity, as Mr. Emerson recognizes when he sums up
Christianity in “ faith in the infinitude of man.”
The deplorable fact is that Mr. Abbot, in this instance,
defines Christianity by the darker half of its darker side,
not only leaving out of sight its great and glorious prin
ciples of God’s Fatherhood and man’s brotherhood, its two
supreme rules of love to God and love to man, which make
its bright side, but also leaving out entirely .the more
humane and hopeful of its false dogmas. There would be
nothing at all of Free Religion if it were defined thus by
the worst aspects of its worse side. Nothing that ever was
on earth can bear judgment so grossly unjust. The con
trasts drawn by Mr. Abbot are not legitimate. The past
has not been given up to “ the worst enemy of liberty,
science, and civilization,” nor will the future be ruled by
“the best friend of progress of every kind.” There has
been a vast deal of human freedom in religion before now,
and there will be a vast deal of bondage to authority in the
religion of the future. Not all men have been deceived in
the past, and not all escape delusion now. We heartily
approve vigorous, positive assertion of convictions, but we
must regard some of our friend Abbot’s dogmatizing as not
one whit more respectful towards human freedom than the
least warranted assertions of the popular creeds, inasmuch
as it is not based in evident truth, but in very serious neglect
and disregard of true facts, and does not stop a moment to
consider that its assumptions are generally denied, but lays
down the law of individual opinion precisely as if it were
the law of divine authority. We trust we speak with mod
eration, and with due respect for our friend’s eminence as a
religious teacher, but really we know of nothing in the
movements of religion at the present time more to be
regretted, than Mr. Abbot’s attempt to prove that Christi
anity is all blank despair, and Free Religion all pure faith.
Neither one nor the other is true.
�Why does Mr. Abbot Object, Etc.
235
Article X.— Why Does Mr. Abbot Object to Mr. Sen’s Faith
in God?
We could hardly name two more genuine religious believ
ers and teachers than Keshub Chunder Sen, the Indian
reformer and prophet, and our friend Abbot, at Toledo, the
editor of The Index. The latter has as deep, as pure, as
earnest faith in God as can be anywhere found. Such
sentences as the following are gems of spiritual truth:
“ My whole religion centres in the fact of this perennial,
this unutterable revelation of Eternal Being in the soul of
man;”—“Life is lifted into heaven, in proportion as we
repose in this embrace of the All-Encompassing Soul;”—
“ It is the conception of Nature as the living self-manifes
tation of God, that keeps trie fires of faith still burning in
the inward temple of the soul;” “Pure Religion is itself
the presence of the Infinite Spirit, making itself felt in the
soul of man;”—“The great task of Free Religion is to
prove the ability of each soul to draw its nutriment from its
native soil, dispensing with mediation, and coming into
primary relations with the All-Permeating Deity;’-—“ That
which calls out all high and pure affection is the divine
element, the God in man ;”—“ The lofty and tender senti
ment, the divine sympathy in eternal things, which marks
the completest unity of allied natures, is rooted in the con
sciousness of God;”—“That consciousness of the One
Divine which makes possible to us our loftiest intercourse
with congenial minds, lies also at the root of the sentiment
of the universal brotherhood of man ;”—“ The same repose
in the universal life of God which enables two friends to
enjoy the pure delight of spiritual fellowship, enables, nay,
compels them, to recognize the fundamental unity of their
race, and to cherish that inner consciousness of it which is
the true love of man ;”—“ In the love of God we become
friends to each other, and, in a large sense, friends of man
kind as well; and in this broadening out of the private into
the public, of the individual into the universal, friendship
�236
Why does Mr. Abbot Object to
achieves its highest perfection, and crowns, itself with wor
ship of the Divine.”
To every word of this Mr. Sen would say a hearty amen,
and it would seem as if the two men, being so agreed,
i could walk together in the closest brotherhood. The dis
position of the pious and eloquent leader of the Brahmo
Somaj, of India, was expressed quite recently in a letter to
the Free Religious Association, printed in The Index of
November 24. In that letter Mr. Sen said, “I am sure
that in the fulness of time all the great nations in the East
and in the West will unite and form a vast Theistic Brother
hood, and I am sure that America will occupy a prominent
place in that grand confederation. Let us then no longer
keep aloof from each other, but co-work with unity of heart,
that we may supply each other’s deficiencies, strengthen
each other’s hands, and with mutual aid build up the house
of God. Please take this subject into consideration, and
let me know if you have any suggestions to make whereby
a closer union may be brought about between the Brahmo
Somaj and the Free Religious Association,—between India
and America,—and a definite system of mutual intercourse
and co-operation may be established between our brethren
here and those in the New World. Such union is desirable,
and daily we feel the need of it more and more. Let us
sincerely pray and earnestly labor in order that it may be
realized under God’s blessing in due time.”
To this brotherly word of one who “ crowns friendship
with worship of the Divine,” Mr. Abbot called attention in
the following editorial, printed in the same number of The
Index, under the head, “ A Vital Difference.”
“ An interresting letter, addressed to Mr. Potter by
Keshub Chunder Sen, of India, will be found in the
‘ Department of the Free Religious Association ? This
native reformer, whose late visit to England attracted so
much attention, is desirous of ‘mutual intercourse and
co-operation ’ between the Association and the Brahmo
Somaj. While most cordially reciprocating his brotherly
�Mr. Sen's Faith in G-od?
237
sentiments, we feel constrained to point out an important
difference in their bases of organization. The Brahmo
Somaj, as its name implies, has a Theistic creed as its bond
of union ; the F. R. A. has its bond of union in the simple
principle of Freedom, in Fellowship. Theism, as a creed, is,
in our judgment, little, better than Tritheism. . . . The
friendliest and most brotherly relations should subsist
between the F. R. A. and the Brahmo Somaj; but we must
keep clearly before the public the all-important distinction
between creeded and creedless organization, and forbear, out
of sentiment or sentimentality, to swamp Free Religion in
a ‘ mush of concessions.’ ”
Imagine Mr. Sen receiving the Index, with his letter
printed in the department officially occupied by the Free
Religious Association, and finding that the same number
contained an editorial, warning the public against equal
recognition of him, as a swamping of Free Religion in a
mush of concessions I And that simply because he and
his companions have earnest faith in God!
It is mere words when Mr. Abbot objects to a creed.
No man living has more distinctly laid down, insisted on,
and fought for a creed, than Mr. Abbot. He made a creed
in fifty articles a year ago, and he has just made another
in thirty-two articles, which he calls a “ Synopsis of Free
Religion.” As long as he believes anything, which he
can state in articles, he will have a creed. As long as
*
he devises systems of assertions, and lays them down
nakedly and without qualification, he will have a creed of
the most positive character. We do not object to our
friend’s annual experiment of a downright creed, a set of
positive articles, bold and bald assertions, putting forward
* Creed.—“A definite summary of what is believed; a brief exposition of
important points, as in religion, science, politics, etc.; especially a summary
of Christian belief; a religious symbol.”
“ Symbol.—(Theol.) An abstract or compendium of faith or doctrine; the
creed, or a summary of the articles of religion.”—Webster.
Where does Mr. Abbot get the word “creeded?”
�238
Why does Mr. Abbot Object to
his individual opinion as absolute truth. It is one very
proper way of working on the human mind. But for a
man, who has made two creeds within thirteen months, to
object to Mr. Sen’s equal standing, because the former
believes in God, will not answer.
It happens that Mr. Abbot thinks religion possible with
out faith in God, while Mr. Sen finds the deepest truth of
religion in filial trust in God, and that the latter thinks
quite well of Christianity while the former does not think
well of it at all. But Mr. Abbot’s opinions here are just as
much part of a creed as Mr. Sen’s. Indeed the former
holds his notions on the subject far more rigidly, and asserts
them far more dogmatically than the latter holds and asserts
his views. We do not blame or bewail our friend’s dogma
tism ; let him drive ahead with all his might; but it is
absurd for him to accuse Mr. Sen of having a creed in regard
to God. We could not name a position recently taken in
the religious world which more emphatically merits what
ever stigma should attach to the most positive of creeds,
than our good friend’s position about God and Christianity
as neither of them essential to religion.
And this position not merely has the form and tone of a
creed, or articles of a creed, but it has the tenor, to us, of a
very bad creed. It is a sad enough thing to “ stand squarely
outside of Christianity,” because it involves so general a
refusal of good fellowship, but of thinking of religion with
express exclusion of faith in God, and trying to organize
the law and gospel, the rule and consolation of faith, with
out including the sentiment of the “ Our Father,” is to us
the most terrible of mistakes, not because we have any
aversion to honest atheism, or any wish to put a brand upon
candid infidelity (so called), but for the simple reason that,
in general, faith in God Our Father is the central and fruit
ful principle of blessed religion, and he who dissuades men,
or deters them, or debars them, as Mr. Abbot is doing, from
the exercise of unquestioning filial trust in the Divine Pater
�Mr. Sen’s Faith in God ?
239
nity, is doing the average soul more harm than all other
religious teaching can do him good.
We have given our friend’s new creed, in the Index of
January 7, a respectful study, and see how he arrives at
“ E PLURIBUS UNUM ”
as “ the great watchword of the ages/’ but to us, and we
think to mankind generally, “E PluHus Unum” will not
displace “ Our Father,fl nor any sense of what we are, in
onrselves, and to one another, take the place of the Con
sciousness of God, and the consolation derived from remem
bering HIM in whom we live, Mdflmove, and have our
being. To keep a lively sense of the being, and goodness,
and perfect power of the alone supreme and blessed God,
is not to swamp religion in a mush of concessions. Mr.
Sen’s wish for a Theistic Brottflrhood of all the great
nations, merited sympathy and respect from Mr. Abbot,
and these only. It was no more legitimate to object to it
than it would be to require the mass of childifln to limit
their interest in home pleasuBs to such as orphan asylums
can offer. And in the name of all that is sacred and consol
ing to the heart of man, we beg MiflAbbot to abate the
rigor with which he insists upomkccommodatwg religion to
atheism and to materialism. We will deal respectfully and
fraternally with these honest restrictions of human hope
and faith, but we cannot see wl®any man who has faith in
God and the blessed world of spirit should think it neces
sary to hide that faith, and to base a creed upon suspense of
natural happy trust. In general the atheists, materialists,
and professed “infidels,” are exceedingly positive in their
views, as well as frank and outspokenly Let them be so.
But on the other hand, let those who have firm faith in a
Living Soul of all things, and in Eternal blessed Life, stand
as frankly and firmly for their trust and their thought. If
Mr. Abbot does not care toflhus stand for his best thought
and faith, let him at least cease to insist upon suspense of
faith in our brotherly Bllowship, since the demand is wholly
�240
The Old and the New Christianity.
unreasonable and extremely hurtful. A “ Theistic Brother
hood” does not imply the exclusion of anybody, and not to
show what faith we have in God is to do great hurt to our fel
lows, as well as to be unfaithful to our own vision.
Article XI.— The Old and the New Christianity (Concluded).
Translated from the French of N. Vacherot.
*
After the first ecumenical councils, dogma having
received its constitution almost complete, it would seem
that its history must be finished, and it only remained to
pursue that of organization and church discipline. How
ever, the history of dogma still continues, if not for estab
lishing, at least for the teaching of doctrines. The great
theologians whose discussions prepared the way for the
council of Nicoea, had, with all their subtle distinctions,
preserved, with their Platonic learning, the consciousness
of the highest religious verities. It was rather the teaching
of John which inspired them than that of Paul: but it was
still the vivifying breath of Christian thought. When that
thought fell upon the barbarism of the middle ages, it
found no method of exposition or instruction other than
the philosophy of Aristotle. We know what this became
in the hands of his interpreters of the Sorbonne and of the
universities of the middle ages. The name Schoolman
tells the whole story of distinctions, divisions and ver
bal discussions. If doctors, such as St. Anselm and St.
Thomas, were able to maintain Christian thought in its high
import, it was because both had a spirit sufficiently high
and sufficiently deep to comprehend whatever in the genius
of Plato and Aristotle is most like that thought. Yet we
may question if the extremely Aristotelian philosophy of
St. Thomas would have been to the liking of Paul, of John,
and of the fathers of the church. We will not speak of
* In the last line of Art. VI. (p. 181), of last number, strike out the word
“not,” and read “ could easily accommodate itself.”
�The Old and the New Christianity.
241
Christ himself, who never let slip an occasion to show his
antipathy to every kind of scholasticism. If he would not
have driven from his church the respectable doctors of the
Sorbonne, as he did the traffickers of the temple, we may
believe that the author of the Sermon on the Mount would
not have set foot in schools of this sort, where the spirit of
his teaching was scarcely better kept than the letter.
There is surely a great difference between the teaching
of the gospels and epistles and scholastic theology ; but per
haps a still greater between the primitive church and the
Catholic church governed by the court of Rome. While
reading the historians of Christianity, and particularly M.
Renan, we naturally picture to ourselves those happy and
charming little Christian societies, with such free manners,
such active faith, such simple practice, in comparisonOth
the strong and minute discipline, the mute and passive obe
dience, which characterize the government of our great
Catholic societies of the middle ages. The truth is that the
rising Christianity had no more an organized church than it
had a fixed set of doctrines. It is subject to the same law
as all things which are of this world, or exist in it: it was
obliged to be formed before developing, and to be developed
before organizing. The blessed anarchy of the first Chris
tian societies may be envied by liberal believers as the ideal
of religious societies in the largest acceptation of the word;
but at that time this religious condition was rather the
effect of a provisional historic necessity, than of a welldetermined theory upon the free action of the religious
conscience. As soon as Christian society had attained some
little degree of development and multiplied the number of
its churches, it experienced the need of a more exact disci
pline and of some kind of central government. When
Christianity became under Constantine the religion of the
empire, the bishops were already exercising an actual
authority over the consciences of the faithful. It is to be
observed that the councils, save that at Jerusalem, which
was little more than a name, began to assemble from this
�242
The Old and the New Christianity.
time, under the more or less imperious patronage of the
Ceesars of Byzantium—a circumstance very perilous to thb
independence of the church. Religious monarchy was a
necessity of the times. If it had not had as a head a pope
at Rome, it would have had one in the emperors at Con
stantinople. We see this clearly later in the examples of
the Eastern and of the Russian church, the one being sub
ject to the Caesars of the Lower Empire, the other to the
czars of Moscow and St. Petersburg. All the emperors of
Constantinople, from Constantine down, set about dogma
tising. He allows himself to condemn Arius, although
later he embraced his doctrines ; and in what terms does he
condemn him? “ Constantine, the conqueror, the great,
the august, to the bishops and people of Judea: Arius
must be branded with infamy.” There is nothing more
curious than his letter to the two great opponents in the
Council of Nicoea. “ I know what your dispute is. You,
patriarch, question your priests in regard to what each
thinks about some test of the law or other trifling question.
You, priest, proclaim what you never ought to have
thoughtjor rather what you should have been silent
upon. The inquiry and response are equally useless:
All that is well enough to pass the time or exercise
the ingenuity, but should never reach the ears of the
common people. Pardon each other then the impru
dence of the question and the unsuitableness of the
reply.” Does not this suggest a Romish priest shutting the
mouth of two complaining parties ? His son, Constantins,
speaks even more freely : “ What part of the universe
are you,” writes he to Liberius,. bishop of Rome, “ you
who alone take the part of an unprincipled wretch (Atha
nasius), and break the peace of the world and of the
empire ?”
The establishment of the discipline and organization of
the church were the work of the councils presided over by
the popes, while the government of Christendom was the
peculiar function of papacy. The adversaries of that insti
�The Old and the New Christianity.
243
tution have seen in it only the advent of a monarchial gov
ernment succeeding a sort of democratic and republican
organization of the primitive church. They have not suffi
ciently comprehended that it was also a necessary and
urgent guarantee of the independence of the Christian
church, which, to triumph more easily and quickly over
paganism, had placed itself under the hand of imperial
despotism. If religious liberty of conscience was to suffer
later from the autocracy of the court of Rome, inspired
more by traditional policy and diplomacy than by the
thoughts and feelings of the true religion of Christ, the lib
erty of the church was then and always that of an establish
ment which, in raising the bishop of Rome above all the
others and giving to him for a see the ancient capital of the
known world, freed the management of spiritual affairs from
the yoke of political powers, whatever they might be, mon
archical, aristocratic or democratic. However, the trans
formation of the Christian church was complete. If any
one wishes to judge what ground has been gone over from
primitive Christianity down to present Catholicism, let him
compare the council of Jerusalem with the council of 1869,
where, they say, is at length to be proclaimed the dogma of
the personal infallibility of the sovereign pontiff in the per
son of Pius IX, and consequently the principle of absolute
monarchy applied to the government of a spiritual society
is to be fully realized: an admirable completion to the edi
fice, of which the founder could hardly have dreamed, nor
indeed his first apostles !
Such, in substance, is the history of Christianity from its
advent down to the middle ages. It is very difficult to see
only the word, the hand and the spirit of God in the devel
opment of an institution where error, darkness, superstition,
and persecution have too large a part to prevent traces of
human infirmity being manifest even in dogma. But, in
whatever manner one explains this history, whether he
only considers human causes according to the philosophic
method, or brings in supernatural causes according to the
�244
The, Old and the New Christianity.
theological method, it is a constant fact that Christianity
has obeyed, in its development on the theatre of time and
space, the law of all human institutions, that it has passed,
in doctrine and government, through all the phases of
things which spring up, grow, become organized and defi
nitely established. After having followed it in the move
ment of expansion which takes it continually farther from
its origin, it remains for us to follow it in the movement of
return, which is constantly bringing it back under the
influence of modern times.
HI.
We are about the middle of the fifteenth century, after
the taking of Constantinople. The Roman church no longer
finds in its peculiar world either heresy or resistance. Doc
trine has been for a long time fixed. The teaching of
doctrine is regulated in its least details in accordance with
the scholastic method. Discipline itself is organized and
regulated in its most minute prescriptions. The Catholic
communion resembles an immense army .which moves or
stops, fights or rests, on the orders of its commanders.
Woe to him who speaks, thinks or prays other than as the
formulary directs. Silence even is suspected among those
of whom the church expects a complete confession or a pro
fession of faith. Nothing is more imposing than this silent,
absolute, infallible, government of consciences, where the
word of command as soon as uttered by the mouth of one
man is reechoed in the most remote parts of the Christian
world, without a single voice being able to protest. And
as if that discipline were not sufficient, the court of Rome
has its indefatigable police of the inquisition, to seek out
and denounce the crimes of heresy and sorcery to pitiless
judges, who condemned to the stake thousands of victims.
Suddenly the star of the renaissance rises upon this world,
and driving away the last traces of the darkness of the mid
dle ages, floods with light the dawn of modern societies.
Before the arts and sciences of antiquity, Gothic art and
�The Old and the New Christianity.
245
scholastic science fall into disrepute. And it 19 not the
learned and lettered world alone which receives, admires,
yea, gazes with unbounded delight upon these marvelous
works of classic accuracy, of material grace, of strong
thought, of exquisite taste, of incomparable language,
whose secret the human mind seemed to have lost; it is
also the religious world, it is especially the court of Rome
and its foremost Italian dignitaries.
We cannot positively say that the renaissance caused the
reform. Protestantism, we must not forgetlwas born of a
simple administrative question, the granting of indulgences :
confining itself to a change of discipline, it kept the doc
trines almost without alteration. The great reform which
it accomplished was, to free the religious conscience from
the tutelage which weighed so heavily upon it, and which
left it no initiative, either of thought or of sentiment,
before the word of God interpreted and formally uttered by
the authority of the church. Now every thing was there,
at least in principle. What matter that the new religion
did not touch the credo, if all doctrine was henceforth
wholly subject to a free interpretation of the Scriptures by
the reason and conscience of believers ? Doubtless, as there
is no church without authority, the reformed church had,
also on its part, a council and creed in the Augsburg con
fession; but the principle of individual initiative had been
so affirmed before the contrary principle of official author
ity, that no effort of Protestant orthodoxy, if this expression
may be applied to the reformation, could arrest its course,
even in the lifetime of the great reformers. The door was
open to liberty in matters of faith. The future was to show
that no necessity of discipline could close it: but for the
moment, if we only consider its doctrinal bearing, the
reform was confined to a very slight simplification of
dogma. The worship of saints, worship of the Virgin,
adoration of relics, in fine, the most serious of all, the
eucharist, were the principal objects of reform in what con
cerned dogma, purely so called. Luther was not only a fer
�246
I
The Old and the New Christianity.
vent Christian, he was a consummate theologian, who
would not hear to any one’s touching the holy ark of doc
trine. He was more convinced than Leo X. and the gay
wits of his court of the justice of eternal punishment, of
the efficacy of grace, of the predestination of the elect and
the damned, of the existence and puissance of the devil, of
the wily power of sorcerers, of the real presence of Jesus
Christ in the host. The boldest thing the reform did in
the way of doctrine, was the substitution of consubstantiation
for transubstantiation in the sacrament of the eucharist,
attempting thus to reconcile the preservation of the mate
rial substance with the presence of the divine person. The
court of Rome did not take fire, as Calvin did, on the ques
tion of heresies, and if it still allowed heretics, like Bruno
and Vanini, to be burned by the tribunals of the inexora
ble inquisition, we cannot think it was done with as much
zeal as Calvin manifested in the trial of Michse’. Servetus. In
religious matters, it no longer showed much wrath or en
thusiasm; its passion was elsewhere.
The leading thought of the reform was quite other than
that ofencroaching upon dogma. The spirit which gave
rise to it was too Christian to touch any thing but the
organization of the church. The religious faith of the
people whom the voice of Luther had won over, demanded
nothing more. The natural sciences were not yet born,
and philosophy was still given over to scholastic disputes,
or engaged in the subtle commentaries of the: learned upon
the books of antiquity. Christian dogma, such as the Old
and New Testament had made it,—Alexandrian theology
and scholastic theology,—had not yet been positively contra
dicted, either by the revelations of the natural and the his
toric sciences, or by the interior revelations of the modern
conscience. Beside, in emancipating the conscience, the
reformation reanimated and strengthened Christian thought,
stifled by scholasticism or enervated by the renaissance.
The faith of the new believers went back to the doctrines of
Paul, which the wholly practical sense of the Roman church
�The Old and the New Christianity.
247
had modified, and even to the Old Testament theology.
Luther and Calvin took up again with a vigor and a harsh
ness which the Catholic church seemed to have forgotten,
the doctrines of necessity, of omnipotent grace, of the stern
justice of a powerful God, mild toward the just, terrible to
his enemies.
But when light had begun to be thrown upon philosophy
by the progress of the material sciences, upon conscience
by the progress of moral science, the spirit of reform in the
Christian world was obliged to attack dogma itself, and it
cut off from it as useless every thing which hindered it
from accommodating itself to modern science and con
science. How could they indeed preserve that barbarous
theology of the Old Testament, which confounds in its''
cruel justice, the Bible says in its vengeance, children with
fathers, the innocent with the guilty ? How keep that psy
chology and those moral principles of Paul which make of
sin a question of species and not of individuals, and which
take away from man all the merit of his works by attribut
ing it to God ? How take literally the miracles and other
facts of Biblical history before the scientific revelation of
the immutable laws of nature? And was it not becoming
very difficult to preserve that mysterious theology of the
Nicsean creed when already all high metaphysical specula
tion was falling into discredit ? Was it possible to this
heavy ship of scholastic Christianity to sail in the new
waters of a sea as strong as the modern world, if a way
was not found of lightening its weight and simplifying its
means of locomotion ? The new Christianity was then
obliged to abandon all the cosmogony and a considerable
part of the theology of the old Bible, the fundamental dog
mas of Paul s teaching, and, at last, the great mysteries of
the divine nature, which it found, if not in opposition, at
least useless to a healthy religious life. Let us render jus
tice to the clear and resolute spirit of the eighteenth cen
tury. It attempted little subtilizing or equivocating with
texts : it loyally made the sacrifice of every part of Chris-
�248
The Old and the New Christianity.
tian dogma which was found in contradiction with experi
ence, history, reason, conscience, preserving scarcely any
thing of it except that which constitutes its truth and
worth. When Kant, Lessing, and later, Schleiermacher,
and all that great school of German theology speak
of Christianity, it is almost always in that sense. Their
Christianity is that which sustains, fortifies, purifies and
consoles the soul, much rather than that which engages the
intellect in the mysterious depths of its metaphysics, or
fetters the will in the bonds of its discipline. In that, this
school has largely opened the way to the Christianity which
later was to push forward the reform movement to the
entire suppression of dogma, by preserving only morality,
and morality, too, reduced to the ideal of the life and the
teaching of Christ. Such seems also to have been the
spirit, if not the explicit teaching of the generous part of
the French clergy who embraced the principles and hopes
of the revolution. It was by attaching themselves to the
moral and purely evangelical side of doctrine, that priests
like Faucher and Gregory wished to reconcile Christianity
with the principle^ of reason, of liberty, of justice, of fra
ternity, which that revolution had inscribed upon its pro
gramme. In this sense, it is just to say that the eighteenth
century remained Christian while ceasing to be Catholic,
and that over that part of society which was won by philoso
phy, religion still preserved a certain sway.
This work of simplification which was already bringing
back dogma to its source, was arrested, at the opening of
the nineteenth century, by a wholly opposite movement,
whose aim, on the contrary, was the complete reinstatement
of Christian thought in modern science and philosophy.
The eclecticism of that epoch exerted itself everywhere, in
England, and in France, as well as in Germany, to show,
by an ingenious method of interpretations and explanations,
that all science and all philosophy were at least in germ in
Christianity; all was, to rightly interpret the texts. So
Genesis was harmonized with the geology of certain Eng-
�The Old and the New Christianity.
249
lish savang, the Kicene creed had a place in the metaphysics
of Schelling and Hegel, and the hard doctrines of Saint
Paul themselves, found their explanation and fortification
in the mystic philosophy of certain contemporary schools.
The learned world was quite astonished to learn that there
was a Christian astronomy, geology and history, just as
there was a theology and a morality with this name. Indeed
all the sciences took a peculiar aspect from the new point of
view in which the eclectics of those times placed themselves.
This method had at first great success, thanks to the genius
of the men and the disposition of the times; but this suc
cess could be only ephemeral, because such a manner of
procedure was contrary to the true spirit of the nineteenth
century, a critical spirit, if any ever were so. Besides, the
method was not new: it has a well known name in the
philosophic and religious history of the human mind. Neoplatism had attempted it for paganism with an ardor, a per
severance, a brilliancy, a positive failure, which we need not
recall. For a century like ours, so severe in its methods, so
well informed in natural and historical facts, this kind of
speculation was not science, it was something which savored
now of mystic dreaming, now of political compromise, or
again of Alexandrian exegesis.
This eclecticism was a pure accident, in spite of all the
appearances of reality ! The law which governs the mod
ern history of Christianity, soon resumed its sway I the
progress of purification and simplification grew more and
more pronounced; criticism breathed upon these scaffoldings
so laboriously and sometimes so artistically constructed.
Sober science would no longer lendlitself to that which it
must regard as a play of wits, if not the illusion of a liberal
faith desiring to be of its century at the same time as of its
church. The spirit of reform which fashions the ChrisWn
societies of to-day no longer loses its time and its genius in
reconciling contradictions or confounding differences. With
a firm and bold hand, the doctors which itlnspires separate,
in Christianity, morality from dogma; that is, in their
VOL. I.—NO. 3.
4
�250
'
The Old and the New Christianity.
understanding, the true from the actual, the essential from
the accidental, the eternal and immutable from the tempo
rary and variable. To the history of the past, they refer
all the details of dogma properly so called, from Paulinian
and Alexandrian theology to scholastic theology, keeping
only what in their eyes constitutes the basis, the essence,
the very spirit of Christianity, the mild and lofty teaching
of Jesus. And yet, as it is difficult not to find in that teach
ing, so pure and perfect, some indications which recall the
narrow genius of the people to whom the Christ belongs,
the doctors of liberal Christianity refer their religion to the
ideal rather than to the evangelical reality, and, without
denying the latter, preserve of the legend only the figure of
a Christ truly divine, in that he has no longer anything in
common with the sufferings of humanity. Suppose that
Christ really was the man of whom the gospels tell us, the
school, or, if you please, the church of which we speak,
does not make of this an essential point of its religion. The
ideal suffices for it, and, not finding a richer and higher one
in the modern conscience, it proposes it to the faith of the
present, to the faith of the future, as the ideal itself of the
human conscience.
Jfo one has better defined this Christianity than Mr. F.
Pecaut, one of its most noble and most serious doctors.
“ It is not,” he says, “ that we attach to this name of Chris
tians a superstitious value or a sort of magic virtue ; but,
whether we will it or not, our moral and religious ideal is
in its essential features the same as the ideal of Jesus, and
we are his posterity. . . . The ineffaceable glory of the
gospel, its immortal attraction, is always its being the good
news, the news of grace, of the spirit of life which assures
us of the love of God, and frees us from the servitude of
remorse and evil. That is a revelation appealed to by the
human soul, and consequently written on its inmost tablets:
the seers attempt to read it in themselves, and from age to
age they are learning among various peoples to decipher the
name of the Father, until Jesus, by pronouncing it loudly,
�The Old and the New Christianity.
251
makes the old earth, weary of long efforts, leap with exceed,
ing j°y« Hence, as from a generous spring, escape in rivu
lets of living water the best sentiments which are henceforth
to render fruitful Christian civilization, humility, confi
dence, unwavering hope, innate dignity, devotion towards
even the wicked. Does any one to-day conceive of a relig
ious idea superior to that ? Who would wish to repudiate
it? who would dare to deprive his brothers of it, and to
deprive himself of it ? It is the very depth of ourselves
so humane, so natural, but so deep and so uncomfortable
for the profane eye to read, that men in their exuberant
delight have believed it supernatural and superhuman.”
This is why the liberal Christian takes his place in the
school of Jesus: not of Jesus the Messiah, the eternal
Word, the second person of the Trinity, but of Jesus, the
Son of man, the gentle and humble-hearted master who
gives repose to the soul, the master whom love of the
Father and tenderness for the least of his brothers raised to
such a moral height that he felt himself the beloved son of
whom the heavenly Father had no secrets in pure, good
and holy things. Such is the true, the eternal Jesus, he
who founded religion upon conscience and opened to
humanity the gates of the celestial city. Is it the spirit of
God which speaks by that mouth, or the spirit of Satan, as
the Roman Church has it? If Christian sentiment is not
there, where then is it ? If this is not the language of the
true children of God, where shall we find it ? As to us,
whom people accuse, it is true, of having a somewhat large
measure in this sort of things, we believe that there are
many ways of being Christian. One may be so according
to the spirit or according to the letter. He may be so with
Jesus, with Paul, with John, with the Alexandrian theo
logians, with the doctors in the Sorbonne, with all tradition,
as the Catholic Ghurch directs. Does it not seem that to
be Christian with Christ alone, receiving inspiration only
from his spirit and his example, is to be it in the best, the most
Christian manner? If any one says that it is only chosen
�252
The Old and the New Christianity.
souls essentially religious for whom such an inspiration can
suffice for living in Christianity, and that, as 1o the rest, all
the formality of dogma and traditional discipline is neces
sary, we do not deny it. Upon this ground, many ways of
looking at the matter may be reconciled. What appears to
us harsh and almost odious, is the intolerance of the friends
of the letter towards the friends of the spirit, so that it is pos
sible to say that in drawing near the hearth of every relig
ious faith, the soul of Christ, in order to receive more and
more warmth, life and purification, we get farther away
from the religion of Christ.
Like doctrine, like church: absolute liberty under the
law, or rather under the spirit of Christ. Where there is
no longer dogma, to speak strictly, there can no longer be
discipline and government. Every believer is his own
priest, as his true Bible is his own conscience enlightened
by the light of the gospel ideal. In fact, it is not a church,
but a society of the believers who instruct, guide and help
each other; it is indeed the communion of brothers of the
free spirit in the most modern acceptation of the phrase.
From whatever source the spirit breathes, it is always wel
come; they receive it and become penetrated with it with
out demanding of those inspired any other title to the confi
dence of all than the excellence of their nature or the supe
riority of their wisdom. As to the Scriptures, for this new
church, every grand or fine book is a bible; it is sufficient
if it answers to what is most pure and holy in the conscience
of each one. It is indeed always the soul of Christ which
makes the religious life of the new Christians; but between
it and them there is no intermediate agent, no traditional
teaching, no authority which imposes its decisions. It is
not enough to say, no more pope; no more councils, they
say, no more synods, no more creeds, even if agreed upon
by all. It is the reign of that divine anarchy of which the
primitive church had been only a very feeble image, and
wThich is the ideal itse f of every truly spiritual communion.
�The Old and the New Christianity.
253
IV.
We see what Christianity becomes by simplification after
simplification, from the reformation down to our time, just
as we saw what it become by complication after complica
tion, from its advent to the reformation. This double spec
tacle gives rise to quite difibrent reflexions, according as one
contemplates it as an orthodox Christian, a liberal Chris
tian, or a historian. Where the orthodox Christian finds
only subject for admiration in the ancient period of the his
tory of that religion, and for regret in the second period,
where the liberal Christian, on the contrary, has only regrets
for the one and hopes for the other, the philosophical histo
rian undertakes to comprehend and explain whatever is
necessary in the double movement, in a sense contrary to
religious thought. With the orthodox Christian, he accepts
the entire dogma, no longer as one single and same revela
tion of which all the parts are equally in conformity to the
ideal itself of Christianity, but as a succession of doctrines
corresponding each to a historical fatality of its existence.
Leaving to the liberal believer the ideal point of view, and
himself, in his quality of historian, holding to the point of
view of actual fact, he finds that Christianity, in respect to
the condition of the society it was to conquer, could do it
only by accommodating itself to the instincts, needs, habits
and necessities of human nature, at any particular moment
of its history. Thus he comprehends how, to become a relig
ion in the positive sense of the word, it was necessary that
Christianity pass from the morality of Jesus to the theology
of Paul; how, to become the religion of the most metaphys
ical and most mystical part of ancient society, it was neces
sary for it to pass from the teaching of Paul to the high the
ology of the gospel of John and of the Nicene Creed. So,
at length, he comprehends that, to become the religion of
the middle ages, it has been obliged to descend from these
speculative heights to the practical necessities of a disci
pline as minute as rigorous. Like all the institutions whose
development history shows, Christianity did not have the
�254
The Old and the New Christianity.
choice of means in extending, establishing and preserving
itself. Whatever were its origin and its peculiar genius, it
had no more freedom of conduct than any other human
institution. It could not escape the law which regulates the
development of everything in time and space; the ideal is
realized only on conditions which do not always permit it
to maintain the purity of its principle or of its origin. Thus
the philosophic historian finds himself in harmony with the
orthodox Christian upon the legitimacy of the dogmas and
institutions with which primitive Christianity enriched
itself or complicated itself, as one may choose to call it.
But he is in harmony with the liberal Christian in quite a
different way. Here it is no more historical necessity that
he has in view, it is the light itself of the idea which makes
him know where he is in the quite opposite religious move
ment which has been in progress since the end of the
middle ages down to our time. The necessity, if this word
may be employed, of the progress which is elevating the
religion of Christ, fallen in the darkness and barbarity of
the middle ages, is no longer an exterior and material law
of reality ; it is an interior and wholly spiritual law of the
idea, which, finding a nature better and better prepared,
whether in individuals or in societies of modern times,
develops itself more and more freely, realizes itself more
and more completely, in proportion as-it feels itself better
sustained by the state of civilization which corresponds to
its expansion. Consequently, without sharing the regrets
of the liberal Christian in all that concerns the past, the
philosophic historian comprehends and judges as a continual
progress, in the literal sense of the word, the work of puri
fication and simplification which is going on in Christian
souls and churches since the renaissance, which restores
liberty to religious faith by the reformation of Luther, and
which is freeing the teaching of Christ from either the subtilties of the Alexandrian creed, or the severity of Paulinian
dogma, to show it to the modern world in all the purity of
its light and in all the power of its worth. If he cannot be
�The Old and the New Christianity.
255
hostile or even indifferent to the history of dogmas and
institutions which have served in the establishment of
Christianity, how much more will he be in sympathy with
the history of the struggles maintained aud efforts attempted
in order to free it from the fett'ers that weigh upon it to-day,
and to bring it back to this high ideal of every truly Chris
tian conscience, which, in certain quarters, is confounded
with the ideal itself of the modern conscience !
What will be the future of liberal Christianity in the pres
ent societies ? If the question were only concerning some
particular reform, attempted by certain men, at some given
time, in view of creating a certain church, all foresight
would be rash. What have become of all the reforms so
ardently preached by the reverend Catholics of our country
who wished to shake off the yoke of Roman discipline or of
scholastic theology ? We know the fruitless efforts
attempted with this intent by Lamennais, Buchez, BordasDumoulin, and Huet. What will become of the movement
of which the apostles of liberal Protestantism have consti
tuted themselves the promoters ? It seems as if everything
concurs for the success of such an enterprise, the devotion
of the men, the favor of circumstances, the essentially popu
lar simplicity of the teaching. Is not this the religion of
those simple in heart and spirit, as Jesus taught it to the
people of Galilee ? In it, appeal is not made to theology,
to metaphysics, to erudition, or to criticism ; it is made only
to conscience, which alone must respond. In perceiving
and loving, all the new Christianity lies; feeling the inner
truths, the heart truths, that is, the beautiful, the just and
the good, and loving them in the person of Christ.
We are not of those whom the passion for pure philos
ophy would render indifferent to such a progress of the
religious life. It is a beautiful idea to make the name of
Christ-the symbol of human conscience, and to surround
the popular teaching of morality with the aureole of such a
tradition. We shall not make so soon a philosophic human
ity. If we could produce such a religious humanity, does
�TC-
256
The Old and the New Christianity.
it not seem as if philosophy might patiently await the day
of its complete triumph, if it is ever to come? What a
dream is that of the liberal Christians ! Christianity appears
to them like the tree which was to cover the world and can
yet do so. This tree, planted at Golgotha for the punish
ment of Jesus, watered with his blood, enveloped with the
divine benediction as with a vivifying atmosphere, left to
natural growth and grace from above, would have first
touched the heavens, and soon embraced the .world in the
universal expansion of its branches. The strong and
learned culture of a Paul, a John, of the Alexandrian fathers
and the scholastic doctors, makes of it the sturdy tree which
history gives us for contemplation, with roots taking deep
hold of the soil, a short and massive trunk, boughs clasped
and interlacing, a rough bark, an-d foliage so thick as to
intercept the rays of light. And as, with such a constitu
tion, the sap could not rise, it was obliged to betake itself
to the ends'of the branches, instead of concentrating itself at
the heart of the tree, to force it to its highest development.
And then, after the brilliant Alexandrian vegetation, after
the solid scholastic organization, either from lack of cir
culation or from a wrong direction of the sap, the tree
grows weak and bends under the weight of the branches
which pull it earthward; it covers the world of the middle
ages with a thick shadow under which everything grows
benumbed or sleeps. What did the reformation have to do
towards righting the tree and making it resume its growth
towards heaven ? To recall the sap to the trunk by lop
ping the dead branches and those too low. It is this work
begun by the first reformers, which liberal Christianity con
tinues, by disengaging the tree more and more from every
thing which prevents it from shooting heavenward. Thus
will it become the tree of life under which the religious
faith of humanity will find again the air, light and fragrance
which strengthen without intoxicating, which calm without
stupifying.
Will the dream become a reality? Only God and his
�The Old and the New Christianity.
257
prophets know; but there is one thing which three centu
ries of progress teach us with certainty; it is that the relig
ious world is on the way to the ideal dreamed of by its
freest children. Because some see it still in large majority
attached to dogma and its most minute details, they con
clude that it has not changed and will'not change, that the
orthodoxy of Rome, of Augsburg or of Geneva, holds it con
strained by its narrow formulas. It is an error. To any
one who looks into the matter closelySt is manifest that the
spirit is gaining light more and more in the Christian con
sciences of our times through the letter which so long
pressed it down. If any one wishes to judge of the im
portance of the religious movement which is going on in
the midst of modern societies, he must not form his opinion
from the bold enterprises which suddeily burst forth and
come to nothing; he must follow the slow and sure evolu
tion taking place in the souls in appearance the most in
bondage to the letter. Everything has kept its position,
everything appears equally firm in Christian dogma as
authority imposes it on its believers; but there is only one
place, even in the Catholiq world, where one does not see
that it has its dead and its living partsk that these latter
alone constitute its worth and can assure its future. Alas
for him, especially in these times, who forgets that the let
ter kills and the spirit gives life! It seems that the true
genius of the new times equally escapes the conservatives
who cling to the past and the men who would revolution
ize the future, to see the illusion of the former and the dis
couragements in store for the latter. Our age has, at the
same time, a liking for tradition and for progress. It
remains faithful to the one by'keeping the letter; it serves
the other by being inspired with the spirit. It is plain that
it is more and more out of conceit with and mistrusts theat
rical strokes and the sudden changes of scene called revolu
tions in the history of human societies. Evolution is what
it would appear is to be the preferred form of modern pro
gress. We do not know what the future reserves for the
�258
The Old and the New Christianity.
religious world. We see indeed liberal Christianity
redouble its efforts and extend its conquests ; we see it in
America, with Channing, Parker and their disciples, draw
crowds and found new churches; we see it in Europe radi
ate in all the great centres of religious life, at Paris, at
Strasburg, at Geneva, the city of Calvin, at London, at
Berlin, at Florence. We should not be surprised, neverthe
less, if this movement did not descend from the high and
free society of the sons of the spirit into the depths of the
religious world, and if the immense majority of Catholic
or Protestant Christians kept the formulas of orthodoxy,
while gaining light from science and becoming penetrated
by the sentiments of modern conscience.
It would be rash in us to pry into the Catholic and
Christian consciences of our times, and pretend to see into
them more clearly than the believers themselves; but it
seems to us that their faith is no longer all of one kind as
in the past. The faith of our fathers in the middle ages,
and even in the first centuries of modern times, embraced
all its articles of dogma in one single affirmation, invincible
and absolute; nothing in it then either wounded the con
science or revolted against reason. To-day there is taking
place, asfit were without its knowledge, a distinction, if not
a separation, in the depth of the religious conscience.
Everything is accepted which the authority of the church
imposes; but people make really two parts of the subject
matter of tradition, one comprehending everything which
no longer answers to the reason, science, or conscience of
ourBime; the other, one whose eternal and universal truth
will never be behind the progress of modern civilization.
Surely no one can call himself Catholic if he does not sin
cerely profess a belief in eternal punishment, in the resur
rection of the body, in original sin, in the mystery of a God
three in one, and even in many other dogmas of less
importance; but how many believers attach to these things
true faith, the faith of the feeling? They believe in them
because it is the law of the church; but the heart of the
�The Old aud the New Christianity.
259
Christian is elsewhere, it is in those ideas of purity, of
justice, of fraternity, of love, which the evangelical teaching
breathes, and which the believer finds in the newest inspi
rations of the modern conscience. This is, if not the only
faith., at least the living one of the religious souls of our
time; the other is only a traditional faith which people
affirm, and will perhaps always affirm, but which they do
not feel alive in their hearts.
Such are those revolutions, which are no more understood
at Rome to-diy than they were in the time of Luther, which
indeed cannot be understood there, because Rome is the
seat of Romanism, rather than of Christianity. The saying
is from the duke of Orleans, and has a yet wider applica
tion than he who let it escape in a moment of discourage
ment intended.
“ Ta regere imperio populos, Romane, memento.” The
verse of the poet is still true. Christian Rome has always
left theology to the doctors of the universities and of the
religious orders, keeping for herself the science of canonical
law and the art of governing. Unfortunately for her,
neither that deep science nor that consummate art are suffi
cient to direct the Christian world in present circumstances.
It is with the religious democracy as with political democ
racy; in order to live they both want more and more
freedom and light, less and less discipline and government.
At the very moment when civilized society aspires to
govern itself, the Romish church reaches the most absolute
formula of personal government. One need not be a pro
phet to predict that such a regime will no more be the law
of the religious than of the political societies of the future.
The spiri-t of liberal Christianity will prevail over the
wholly political genius of Roman Catholicism, not by a
schism, which is not created in a time of so little zeal for
questions of dogma, but by a slow and continued trans
formation of the religious conscience, tending more and
more to conformity with the moral conscience of modern
society. When Protestants like M. de Pressense, when
�I
i
■I
J
I
260
I
The Old and the New Christianity.
Catholics like MM. Dupanloup and Gratry, come to take
for their own church the name even of liberal Chris
tianity, which -is the symbol of the boldest reforms of the
day, we feel that the court of Rome cannot stop the course
of religious thought. In freedom and by freedom was the
great battle of Christianity fought and won in its heroic
age, even in spite of oppression and persecution from with
out. I know no other means of reconquering the world
to-day.” (De Pressense, Hist, des Trois Siecles de l’Eg. Ch.)
Rome is not of this opinion. There are indeed many
degrees in liberal Christianity; the liberty of the Catholics
cannot have such a career as that of Protestants; but Rome,
which understands discipline, comprehends them all in that
universal malady called the spirit of the age, not perceiving
that the true danger which threatens its church to-day, is
the lethargic sleep of a passive and servile faith. It is said
that it is not the freethinkers that cause it the most discom
fort at this time; we readily believe it, and so much the
more as it has never had a taste either for the mystic the
ology or for the scholastic science of these barbarians of the
AVest, for the Germans or the Gauls of any times, which
seem to it to continually wish to go up to the assault of the
Capitol. When Italian finesse does not smile at it, it is
uneasy about it, knowing by a long experience how much
the erudition of the former and the eloqence of the latter
interfere with or trouble her in the manceuvers of her skill
ful diplomacy. They are as children to that great mistress
in the art of governing, but terrible children whose too
violent love for the church of Christ has more than once
agitated and shaken the church of Rome. Such is its mistrust
ot discussion, that, from the advent of modern times, it has
not felt the need of rallying around it the highest lights and
the best forces it found in its own bosom, and that, for its
great combat against the modern spirit, it has counted on
the Inquisition, on the Jesuits, on the favor of princes, on
the adroitness and patience of its diplomacy, on everything,
in short, except the councils. Trusting only to her own
�The Story of a Damned Soul.
261
wisdom, for more than three centuries Rome has governed
and administered her empire without their co-operation,
and now that she has just assembled one, it is to have a
dogma proclaimed which henceforth strikes the institution
with impotence. Then, hearing no longer those disagree
able contradictions which are to have their last echo in the
present assembly, she will be able to live or to sleep in
peace, like the bird which hides its head under its wing at
the approach of the enemy. The fact is, Rome does not
like noisy outbursts, even from the writers and orators
which defend its cause. What it likes, is neither the great
heart of a Lamennais, nor the generous soul of a Lacordaire,
nor the noble and liberal spirit of a Montalembert, nor the
broad and high preaching of a Father Hyacinthe, nor the
fiery polemics of a Gratry, nor the calm dialectics of a
Maret, nor the beautiful and strong eloquence of a Dupanloup, nor, above all, the somewhat worldly wisdom of a
Darboy, nor even the acrimonious temper and satirical spirit
of a Veuillot; it is mute obedience among all its subjects,
without any distinction of character or talent. But, if the
great satisfaction of being mistress of her own house costs
her the dominion of the Catholic world, Rome will have
met the fate of all powers which do not comprehend that
henceforth in liberty alone is the security of all authority.
E. Vacherot.
Article XI.—The Story of'a Damned Soul.
The Examiner and Chronicle, the leading Baptist journal
of the country, calls us to account for the interpretation
put by us upon a passage of Bickersteth’s “Yesterday,
To-day, and Forever,” which we took to refer to Theodore
Parker. Our critic is quite right. The “ Theodore ” of
Mr. Bickersteth’s epic is a Roman youth, the son of a
Christian mother, who, for the love of a pagan girl, goes
over to his father’s paganism, and is soon after killed in
battle, and as particularly and painfully damned, as if the
�262
The Story of a Damned Soul.
existence of God Almighty depended on it. We confess
to having misinterpreted Mr. Bickersteth, and now propose
to make amends by giving him, and our critic above named,
the benefit, first, of our explanation and apology, and second,
of a reproduction of the story of Theodore’s eternal dam
nation.
The intense anxiety of orthodoxy to get Theodore Parker
fast and sure in hell, was so great, even before Mr. Parker’s
death, as to break out in a prayer-meeting devoted to the
purpose of stirring up Jehovah to give instant attention to
the business. The recollection of this, suggested to us that
Mr. Bickersteth, whose whole work shows him entirely
capable of such a thing, had taken occasion to give assurance
that orthodox desires had been attended to. We had read
his horrible poem all the way from the account of creation
to the end, and could neither recall, nor discover upon
examination, any clue to the meaning of the “ Theodore ”
passage. We had missed the story of Theodore by not
reading one of the preliminary books, in which it comes in
as an episode, where Oriel tells how his first experience of
escorting a soul to hell was in the case of a youth by the
name of “ Theodore,” a youth of “ noble birth,” and “ high
and generous bearing,” whom he had “ fondly loved,” and
whom, nevertheless, he “ bore to his own place in yonder
realms of wrath.” We retract, therefore, the charge that
Mr. Bickersteth particularly and personally damned a
mighty enemy of orthodoxy. It was a generous youth, son
of a pagan father, and drawn, by fond human love of a
pagan girl, to depart from the faith his mother had educated
him in, whom the magnanimous singer of hell and damna
tion singled out for particular horrible mention. We
guessed wrong. Mr. Bickersteth did not strike at a great
heresiarch, to warn daring heretics; he struck at the
unconverted son of a pious mother, to warn a Mrs. Stowe,
and whoever thinks God may be pitiful to Christian mothers,
that inexorable hell cannot be so escaped, in any instance
whatever. We particularly beg pardon of the Examiner
�The Story of a Damned Soul.
263
and Chronicle for robbing its client of a portion of his elab
orately fiendish devotion to orthodoxy. It occurred to us,
when we found the poet saying, “Thus passed the centu
ries,” and then mentioning a name as having startled him,
because it was “ so familiar,” that he must refer to one of
his contemporaries, and we had no doubt that the intense
anxiety of the orthodox world to make sure of Theodore
Parker’s defeat on earth and damnation in hell, had found
convenient, disguised expression in Mr. Bickersteth’s vision.
Our secondary inference, that the mother was damned
with the son, is fully justified by the context of the passage.
“ Theodore is represented as stealing a hurried glance
“ upon a form
us,” with the thought, “ could it be his
mother ?” The Examiner and Chronicle says of our mistake
about the passage, “ All this comes of mistaking below us
(below Oriel and the poet-seer) for below him.” But in fact
the poem had described the damnation of the rebel angels
e
o
as going on below Oriel and the seer, so that
“ As their cry of piercing misery
“ From out that yawning gulf went up to heaven,
Standing upon its rugged edge, we gazed,
Intently and long, down after them;”
and immediately upon this, the lost of earth had been sum
moned to take their turn, whereupon Oriel, says the poet,
“ Spake,
“ With tears, of that which passed beneath, our feet”
The very next local allusion is the “ below us,” which tells
where Theodore saw his mother; and if “below us” is not
equivalent to “ beneath our feet,” which referred, two pages
before, to the damned, we do not understand plain language.
However, going back some seven thousand lines, to the
actual story of Theodore, it becomes plain that the poet
intended to show us how the son was damned to everlasting
hell, but the mother to everlasting heaven, and “ no breath
of useless prayer escaped his lips,” or her’s either. Will
�264
The Story of a Damned, Sold.
the Examiner and Chronicle face the honest fact here, and
permit its readers to see that its poet’s lesson, in the dam
nation of Theodore, is blacker, a thousand fold, than the
one we mistakenly pointed out? Meanwhile we invite our
readers, who can stomach as blasphemous heathenism as
superstition ever fathered, to trace with us, in Mr. Bicker
steth’s sulphurous pages, the story of a pious mother’s
son particularly damned, for a sign to maternal love that
for the impenitent dead there is possible no other doom
than “ Gehenna’s burning, sulphurous waves.”
The angel attendant of the seer who tells the vast story
of Mr. Bickersteth’s poem, is called Oriel. He points out
to the seer the road to hell, and is asked whether he has
ever been there.
“ Oriel replied, with calm, unfaltering lip,
And with his words his countenance benign
Grew more and more severely beautiful;
The. beauty of triumphant holiness,
The calm, severity of burning love.”
Is not this exquisitely satanic in conception ? Oriel had
been to hell “ thrice,” and the recollection brings to his
countenance the calm severity of love, “burning to. the
lowest hell,” as the full phrase is. The occasion which
particularly comes to his mind was this :
“ The first
Of disembodied human souls I bore
To his own place in yonder realms of wrath,
Was one I fondly loved, of noble birth,
Of high and generous bearing.”
He was “ born of Christian mother,” the wife of a Roman
consul, who himself kept the old faith of his pagan fathers.
5
“ An aged priest baptized him Theodore,
God's <71/% his mother whispered. And thenceforth
She poured upon him, him her only child,
The priceless treasures of a mother’s heart.”
�The Story of a Damned Soul.
1
265
Oriel was his guardian angel, and relates that the boy’s
home,
9
“ Unlike
The moated fortress of a faithful house,
Was ever open to the spirits malign.”
That is to say, the father not being a saint, devils had con
stant access to the young Theodore! Nevertheless, if the
“ severely beautiful ” Oriel tells the truth, “ not an arrow
reached him.” Innate depravity alone was his ruin, says
the explicitely theological angel. And yet he seems to
ascribe to the father a malign influence;—
11 The mother teaching prayers the father mocked!
And yet her spell was earliest on her child,
And strongest. And the fearless Theodore
Was called by other men, and called himself,
A Christian. Love, emotion, gratitude,
All that was tenderest in a tender heart,
All most heroic in a hero’s soul,
Pleaded on Christ’s behalf.”
Theodore was trained to arms, and joined the army of
Constantine, in the struggle against Maxentius,
“ When it chanced,
In sack of a beleagured city, he saved
A Grecian maiden and her sire from death;
Her name Irene, his Iconocles;
Among the princes he a prince, of all
Fair women she the fairest of her race,
Not only for her symmetry of form,
But for the music and the love which breathed
In every motion and in every word.”
Theodore loved her, but his suit was met with the answer,
from Irene’s father,
“ Never shall my child be his
Who kneels before a malefactor’s cross,”
vol. i.—no. 3.
5
�266
The Story of a Damned Soul.
A determination approved by Irene, who was pagan enough
to abhor the idea of worshipping an undoubted man. The
odore struggled hard,“ now cleaving to his mother’s faith,’’
and “now driven from his anchorage.” “God’s Spirit
strove with him,” and unsuccessfully, says the accurately
Calvanistic Oriel, although he—Oriel —was good enough
to “ ward the powers of darkness off,” while “ the awful
fight was foughten, ’ and give God a fair chance with the
young man. The poet is determined to clearly reveal the
inability of the Heavenly Father (and the human mother)
to save this fine youth, even when Oriel vigilantly and
successfully warded off hellish fraud and violence.” The
bad heart of the youth brought him to this decision:
“ 11 cannot leave that spirit
Angelic in a human form enshrined.
She must be mine forever. Life were death
Without her.’ And straight entering, where she leaned
Upon her father, as white jasmine leans
On a dark pine, slowly, resolutely,
As measuring every word with fate, he said,
‘ Irene, if the choice be endless woe,
For thy sake I renounce my mother’s faith:
I cannot, will not leave thee. I am thine.’ ”
That night the three escaped to the army of Maxentius;
a “soldier’s spousal” was celebrated; and the morning
brought the fatal battle. Mr. Oriel relates, with calm
severity of damning love, that Theodore rose, a desperate,
maddened, hell-inspired blasphemer, “in his eye a wild,
disastrous fire,” and “ the tempest raging in his heart, and
went
Impetuously into the thickest fight,
And prodigies of valor wrought that day,
Felling beneath his fratricidal blade
Whole ranks, his comrades and his brethren, late
Brethren in faith and arms.”
We suspect Mr. Oriel here of being an arrant liar, and
�The Story of a Damned Soul.
267
wonder that the poet-seer did not bid him go “ squat like a
toad ” at the ear of Rev. J. D. Fulton, with this part of his
tale. But we will hear from him Theodore’s end:
£< An unknown arrow, not unfledged with prayer,
Transpierced his eye and brain. Sudden he fell;
One short, sharp cry; one strong, convulsive throe,
And in a moment his unhappy spirit
Was from its quivering tabernacle loosed.”
The first cry of the disembodied soul, says Oriel, was,—
“ Mother, where art thou, mother ? where am I ?”
a cry which Oriel answered by seizing his “ fondly loved ”
charge, with a stern announcement of orders from Almighty
Power to convey him to hell. Theodore was “ submissive,”
without “ lamentations,” and without “ proud reluctances
and vain despite,” as Oriel led him hellward. But as they
advanced on the dreadfully darkening way, and “the hope
less captive gazed a long, last gaze” upon sun and stars,
“ A groan brake from him, and he sobbed aloud—
4 My mother, oh 1 my mother, from thy love
I learned to love those silent orbs of light,
God’s watchers thou didst call them, as they peered,
Evening by evening, on my infant sleep,
And mingled with my every boyish dream:
Are they now shining on thy misery ?
Who, now that I am gone, will wipe thine eyes ?
Who, mother, bind thy bruised and broken heart ?’ ”
Oriel now states to Theodors that his mother, will think
he was slain a Christian and has gone to heaven, whereat
the doomed young man expresses feelings of which Oriel
says,
44 Never will this heart forget
The impress of the look he cast on me.
He had not wept before; but now a tear
Hung on his trembling lids, through which he looked
�268
The Story of a Damned Soul.
Such gratitude as utter hopelessness
May render, .... a look which said
‘ I thank thee as the damned alone can thank;
Lost as I am, hell will not be such hell,
The while my mother thinks of me in heaven.’ ”
At last “ the iron gates of hell ” are reached, after a march
of interminable horror, through a desolate ravine, in the
palpable darkness of which the radiance of Oriel’s form, as
we can readily believe, was but “ a faint and feeble torch.”
The “ adamantine doors ” receive their victim and his
escort; Oriel conducts Theodore to a barren mountain, and
“ God looked upon him,” with his “ dreadful eye,”— not
with its full hell power, but “ half eclipsed,” yet with such
severely loving effect that to the doomed man,
“ The very air he breathed
Seemed to his sense one universal flame
Of wrath, . . . H . . and a low wail
Ere long brake from those miserable lips—
‘ 0 God, and is this hell ? and must this last
Forever ? would I never had been born I
Why was I born ! I did not choose my birth.
0 Thou, who did’st create me, uncreate,
I pray Thee. By Thine own omnipotence
Quench Thou this feeble spark of life in me.
0 God destroy me. Grant this latest boon
Thy wretched, ruined child will ever ask,
And suffer me to be no more at all.’ ”
To this “ aimless, bootless prayer,” the quite contented
Oriel replies,
“ Thou cravest what Omnipotence can do,”
but wont do, because “ Omniscient Love decrees ” damna
tion,
“ And therefore vainly dost thou now invoke
Almighty Power to thwart All-Seeing Love.”
�✓
The Story of a Damned Soul.
269
Even the “free service” of God, “justice interdicts,”
that being “heaven’s perennial joy.” “ Hades knows no
other law ” than “ passive submission ” to damnation,
“And here there is no sentinel but Glod;
His Eye alone is jailer; and His Hand
The only executioner of wrath.”
With this pungent doctrine of Moloch, Oriel proposes to
leave Theodore, while he catches a glimpse, “permitted
him by God,” of Paradise, and is moved thereby to indulge
“ idle phantasies of hope,” which Oriel, mindful of Calvinistic problems, turns back to extinguish, “ in mere pity.”
Convinced thus that there is no hope for himself, Theodore
cries out,
,
'
“ But is there not a hope
For one I briefly, passionately loved ?
*******
Tell her, in mercy tell her where I am,
What suffering—what must suffer evermore :
It may be she will turn and live. And if,
Whene’er my mother’s pilgrimage is passed,
And she, entering the gates of bliss, shall search
Through every field of yonder Paradise,
To find her only son, and search in vain,
If then thou wilt but try and comfort her—■
What way I know not, but thou know’st—and should
Her restless eye intuitively glance
Towards this valley, instantly divert
Its gaze else wither, thou wilt have done all
I ask for, and far more than I deserve.”
To which the insensate, pitiless, damnation-contriving
Oriel replies,
“Thy prayers to thine own bosom must return.”
*******
“ I leave thee in thy just Creator’s hands.”
Fifteen centuries now passed, and Oriel received orders
�The Story of a Damned Soul.
270
from the Almighty to join an embassy sent forth to
“ traverse hell in all its length and breadth,” and announce
the near approach of the judgment day. Of this Oriel
says,
“First to that mountain valley, where I left
Lost Theodore, I bent my course. 0 God !
The solemn change which fifteen centuries
In hell had written on his fearful brow.”
The further description, and the elaborate speeches ex
changed, represent Theodore as entirely converted to high
Calvinism, and quite convinced that hell-fire,—the “ veilless
blaze” of the “Dreadful Eye,” which is to come after
the judgment, will be after all the greatest possible boon,
“repressing with flame the fertility ” of “ the ineradicable
germs of sin,” though never able to extinguish them. And
to this extraordinary exposition of the divine imbecility, or
indisposition, to eradicate sin, the judicious angel gave
Theodore no opportunity to reply, but sped on his way to
advise the hellions of the speedy Second Advent of the
Messiah, making expository remarks, as he went, vindicative
of hell in general, and of particular hell for the generous
youth to whom he had been guardian angel.
To follow the story we must turn now to the ninth book
of the poem, which is called “ The Bridal of the Lamb.”
Here we hear Messiah say,
“ Now is the day of vengeance in my heart,
And now the year of my redeemed is come; ”
and we behold
“ Messiah seated on a snow-white horse
Of fiery brightness, as the Lord of hosts,
Apparelled in a vesture dipped in blood.”
In due time the Last Judgment is at. hand, and the hosts
of darkness gather in one final conspiracy,
�The Story of a Damned Soul.
271
“ When from the frowning heavens again that sound,
Which shook the first fell council of the damned,
More terrible than thunder, vibrated
Through every heart Jehovaffls awful laugh / ”
And now
“ Messiah spake again, His voice
Resounding from the jasper walls of heaven
To hell’s profoundest caves.
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
and' Death and Hell,
With dreadful throes and agonizing groans,
Disgorged their dead, the lost of every age,
In myriads, small and great confusedly.”
These are all brought back to earth to resume their
bodies, which were to be “ made fit to endure the terrors
of the wrath to come.” Then the book of life is read, and
the redeemed deceived to the right hand of the Judge.
The rebel angels are damned in order, ending with the
Arch-fiend, whose head Messiah crushes with “ his burning
heel.”
“ And for a space no sound was heard. But then
It seemed the crystal anpyr^m clave
Beneath them, and the horrid vacuum sucked
The devil and his armies down . . .
To bottomless perdition.”
After this the lost of mankind are summoned, and among
them is specially observed Theodore. Then
“ The Judge arising from his throne,
Bent on the countless multitudes convict
His vision of eternaBwrath, and spake
In tones which more than thousand thunders shook
The crumbling citadel of every heart,—
‘ Depart from Me, ye cursed, into fire,
For the devil and his hosts prepared,
Fire everlasting, fire unquenchable;
Myself have said it: let it be : Amen.’
*
*
*
*
Again the floor
�272
The Story of a Damned Soul.
Of solid crystal where the damned stood
Opened its mouth, immeasurable leagues;
And with a cry whose piercing echoes yet
Beat through the void of shoreless space, the lost
Helplessly, hopelessly, resistlessly,
Adown the inevitable fissure sank,
As sank before the ruined hosts of hell,
Still down, still ever down, from deep to deep,
Into the outer darkness, till at last
The fiery gulf received them, and they plunged
Beneath Gehenna’s burning sulphurous waves
In the abyss of ever-during woe.
"
“ All shook except the Throne of Judgment. * *
The Hand that held the scales of destiny
Swerved not a hair’s breadth: and the Voice which spake
Those utterances quailed not, faltered not.
But when the fiery gulf was shut, and all
Looked with one instinct on the judgment-seat,
To read his countenance who sate thereon,
He was in tears—the Judge was weeping—tears
Of grief and pity inexpressible.
And in full sympathy of grief the springs
Gushed forth within us; and the angels wept:
Till stooping from the throne with His own hand
He wiped the tears from every eye, and said,
1 My Father’s will be done: His will is mine;
And mine is yours: but mercy is his delight,
And judgment is his strange and dreadful work.
Now it is done forever. Come with me
Ye blessed children of my Father, come;
And in the many mansions of His love
Enjoy the beams of His unclouded smil<£f
So saying, as once from Olivet, he rose
Majestically toward the heaven of heavens
In the serenity of perfect peace:
And we arose^with him.
But what of those
Who from the place of final judgment hurled,
Had each his portion in the lake of fire ?
�The Story of a Damned Soul.
273
No Lethe rolled its dark oblivious waves,
As some have feigned, betwixt that world of woe
And ours of bliss. But rather, as of old
Foreshadowed in the prescient oracles,
The smoke of their great torment rose to heaven
In presence of the holy seraphim,
And in the presence of the Lamb of God,
For ever and for ever. At the first
Nothing was heard ascending from the deep
Save wailings and unutterable groans,
Wrung from them by o’ermastering agony;
But as His Eye, who is consuming fire,
Unintermittingly abode on them,—
Silence assumed her adamantine throne.”
The One-Eyed Dread having thus attended to his ene
mies, snivelled a pretence of grief to accommodate a passage
in the New Testament, and got his red-hot look so fixed on
the damned that they burned horribly without useless wail
or groan, there roll away “ages of a measureless eternity,”
and at last the voice of “ hell’s dethroned monarch ” breaks
the silence with an elaborate confession of the dogmas and
arguments of Calvinism, ending with
“ Lost, lost: our doom is irreversible:
Power, justice, mercy, love have sealed us here;
Glory to God who sitteth on the throne,
And to the Lamb for ever and for ever.”
<
The voice was hushed a moment; then a deep
Low murmur, like a hoarse resounding surge,
Rose from the universal lake of fire:
No tongue was mute, no damned spirit but swelled
That multitudinous tide of awful praise,
‘ Glory to God who sitteth on the throne,
And to the Lamb, for ever and for ever.’ ”
H
The reader who has not made himself familiar with the
severities of damning love may imagine that the One-Eyed
�274
z
The Story of a Damned Soul.
Horror called a Lamb took off now his eye of consuming
fire, and'permitted the hellions to cool a trifle. Not he, if
he knew the catechism. On the contrary, he held on the
hotter, as the only sure thing for his glory, and the devil is
made to say pensively and submissively, at the Lamb’s hellhot look,
“ I see far off the glory of thy kingdom
Basking in peace, uninterrupted peace:
But were I free, and were my comrades free,
Sin mightier than myself and them would drag
Our armies to perplex those fields with war.
Only thus fettered can we safely gaze;
Thus only to the prisoners of despair
Can Mercy, which is infinite, vouchsafe
Far glimpses of the beauty of holiness.
Woe, woe, immedicable woe for those
Whose hopeless ruin is their only hope,
And hell their solitary resting-place,”—
/
which makes it plain that if the Fount of Hell, the Lamb’s
Dreadful Eye, should cool ever so little, to all eternity, it
would be very bad for the damned, whose only hope is in
sizzling patierroly under the merciful vengeance of the
Moloch Eye.
There is bug one more point to be made, that of the
advantage to the saints of having the damned always in
view, the happiness a redeemed mother, for example, will
feel from gazing occasionally on her Theodore—her God’s
gift—smoking in the frying-pan of the Lamb’s “ infinite
mercy,” and kept from unconverted pranks of human love
by the “ immedicable woe ” of “ hopeless ruin.” In his
closing pages Mr. Bickersteth labors to make this evident.
He seems to be of opinion that the saints would be too
happy in heaven, or on the redeemed and restored earth,
but for interesting reminiscences of damnation and occa
sional contemplation of the woes of the lost.
�275
The Story of a Damned Soul.
“ Haply such perfectness of earthly bliss,
And such far vistas of celestial light,
Had overcharged their hearts. But not in vain
The awful chronicles of time. And oft
When dazzled with the glory and the glow
That streamed from Zion’s everlasting hills,
Messiah or his ministers would tell
Rapt auditors how Satan fell from bliss,
The story of a ruined Paradise,
The foughten fight, the victory achieved,
But only with the endless banishment
Of damned spirits innumerable and men
From heaven and heavenly favor, which is life.
Nor seldom he, who strengthened human sight,
As with angelic telescope, to read
The wonders of the highest firmament,
Would bid them gaze into the awful Deep
Couching beneath; and there they saw the lost
- ...
For ever bound under his dreadful Eye,
Who is eternal and consuming fire,
There in the outer darkness.
*
*
*
That which men witnessed of the damned in hell,
By unction of the Spirit at God’s command,
Was in our gaze at will, whene’er the smoke
In mighty volumes rising from the Deep,
Blown devious by God’s breath athwart the void,
Dispersed. Nor turned we always from the sight; (
Should not the children share their Father’s thoughts ?
Should not the Wife her husband’s counsels learn?
*
*
*
*
*
*
And in the cloudless joys of heaven and earth
Haply this sight and knowledge were, to us
The needful undertones of sympathy
With Him.”
So ends the tale. The mother of our Roman youth is
with the redeemed; her husband and only child in hell. To
keep her from a surfeit of happiness the Lamb gossips with
her about the fall and damnation of spirits and men;
�276
Prospects and Purposes.
strengthens her vision so that she can distinctly see what
is going on in hell; and so brings her into sympathy with
the effects of his red-hot Dreadful Eye. Who says Amen
to this heathenism ?
The Examiner and Chronicle.
Mr. Beecher's Christian Union.
The Chicago Advance.
The Independent.
The Congregationalist and Recorder.
The Watchman and deflector, etc., etc.
Article XI.—Prospects and Purposes.
We believe we may now say, with confidence, that the
permanence of The Examiner is fully assured. We have
had to make a month’s delay, to consider difficulties and
provide resources, and for this reason, date our third issue
February, instead of January. Our enterprise is a difficult
one, but we lack neither faith nor courage, and we find
willing and strong friends. The Examiner will not die.
It is gaining noble support, and much ampler than we
expected.
Our position in a field already occupied by The Rad
ical and The Index, has a two-fold explanation. We
undertook to interpret religion and kindred themes, under
the Christian name, which The Index rejects, and with the
purpose of earnestly and definitely controverting the pseudo
Christianity of existing sects, much more than The Radical
has chosen to do this. Our views of the error and mischief
of Jesuism, either as orthodox theology or as liberal heroworship, are much more distinct and decisive than those of
contemporary liberalism. Neither The Radical nor The
Index seem to us to have illustrated full emancipation from
the current sentimentalism and unscholarly prepossession,
which have made Jesus more than a common man, and
better, for help and comfort, than the natural dependence of
�Prospects and Purposes.
277
man, the God and Father of all souls. We propose to
have the exact truth of history told about this young Jew
ish aspirant to earthly Messiahship, and the plain truth of
theology taught in regard to the absolute insignificance of
him, or any other man, where the question is of the eternal
life, the destiny and the blessedness, of the creatures of
GOD. It is time to cry Great Pan is dead, and perempto
rily to remand Jesus, the God-man, Lord and Saviour, mas
ter and hero, to his proper humble place, as in himself a
quite common and erring man, and in his providential posi
tion a standard-bearer for similar quite common and erring
men, of faith in God’s presence, without mediator or mes
senger, with every soul of man.
On the other hand we desire to resist, with all the force
of what we deem just thought and sound learning, the
theory of The Index that Christianity is to be separated from,
and that the new movement of faith is to disavow the pre
vious steps of our common humanity. Not only is there
vast power to be kept in the just weight of what has been
best in Christianity, but the connection is one absolutely
essential to the consolation, by religious teaching, of the
suffering millions. We had rather a thousand fold silence
our private opinions, and study and practice the simpler,
more universal, and always most heavenly truths of practi
cal Christianity, as a lay member, a novice or penitent, in
the Catholic church, than to join our friend Abbot in his
stupendous misrepresentation of Christianity. Not that we
shrink from any surgery of truth, lor would hesitate a
moment to give Mr. Abbot a place with us in The Exam
iner, for fair consideration of his views, and full defence of
them, but simply because, when all has been said, his con
clusion is, to us, the most unwarranted and lamentable
which an honest thinker and earnest scholar ever arrived
at. We profoundly honor our friend, whose position we thus
criticise; he has on every ground as much right to his opin
ion as we to ours; we cherish no aversion towards him as
a religious teacher, and will gladly stand anywhere with
�278
Prospects and Purposes.
him, but of what 13 to us the utterly unfit expedient of
seething the kid in his mother’s blood we will unmistaka
bly speak our mind to the end of the chapter. And we
have abundant evidence that in so doing we can render
important service to the emancipation of the public miud
from superstition, and the healthy development of free reli
gion. In general, with many exceptions of course, the
purification of faith results in a free and large comprehen
sion of Christianity, not in rejection of the connection or
the name. With Mr. Abbot’s organ (much more than with
Mr. Abbot himself), it results in a singular stringency ot
speculative doubt and reserve, which flatly forbids us to be
Christian, and hardly permits us to cherish a comfortable
thought of God. Our special hope and desire, on the contrary, is to cultivate a very great, and fervent, and fruitful
thought of God, and to make clear that this, as it is emphasized in “Our Father,” is the ever-enduring truth of Christiani ty.
The lament, or the complaint, of some of our critics, that
The Examiner is the organ of one man, bespeaks a mi-understanding of our editorial plans. To such as take a
friendly interest in our effort to conduct a monthly review
such as The Examiner is, we need say but a word in explanation of our purpose, which is to editorially bring together
the ample testimonies of literature, and make the greatest
and best minds of this and other times help to fill our pages.
To us literature is the true scripture, and it is a neglected
scripture. Lessons far richer and greater than the current
divinity knows, are scattered through the better writings
of mankind, from the time of Socrates to the present day.
To edit and publish these lessons of neglected inspiration,
to gather and set forth to the public of common readers
these contributions of unrecognized prophets, marking
their force and fairly interpreting their significance, is a
legitimate work.
And in this work we can also have the aid of many of
the best living writers, the leaders of thought and faith and
I
I
f
1
I
;
I :
I l
I
I 1
|
|
I
{
I
|
|
I
|
I
I
|
|
�Prospects and Purposes.
279
science in all parts of the world, whose best selected words
we can properly and acceptably reproduce in our pages.
Two distinguished French writers have already instructed
our readers, and Emerson, Parker, Max Miiller, Mr. Abbot,
and others have been heard in the numbers already issued.
We shall make this feature of our plan more distinct as we
go on, and have no doubt that our readers will be satisfied
of the wisdom of our aim. And in addition to this, we
*
shall secure, as our plans develop, the very best aid which
contemporary thought and learning, at home or abroad, can
furnish, in the form of original contributions prepared
expressly for The Examiner, English, French, German,
and other voices, as well as American, speaking through a
publication in the heart of our new world, to the audience
of earnest inquirers which we are gathering.
It is not too much, we trust, to ask our friends to work
earnestly for us now, with the full expectation of permanent
and complete success. To give more time for this, and to
enable us to put our regular publication-day back to the
middle of the month, we shall bring out our next number
for April, and have it ready March 15. This will make ©ur
first year of the publication (12 numbers) end with the
current year.
* There is variety enough, and richness enough, in the current expres
sion of the human race to give us more than we can possibly use. Our
work will be, as near as possible, to gather out of this unrolling scrip
ture of mankind the fact, thought, principle, life, which are the voice
of man and the voice of God in the world to-day; sometimes citing
exact words of contemporary utterances, as in our translated article,
and the numerous extracts scattered through other articles; sometimes
reporting the substance of a new or fresh page of revelation; and
sometimes entering upon a critical examination of the book, the man,
the life which merits attention.
�280
Wanted, a Moralist for Dr. Clarke’s Statesman.
Article XIII.— Wanted, a Moralist for Dr. J. F. Clarke’s
Statesman.
The title under which Dr. J. F. Clarke discoursed of
political matters, in a recent number of Old and New—
“Wanted, a Statesman,”—assumed enough in itself to
warrant us in looking for superior wisdom in the essay,
whether it dealt only with the failure of our politics, or also
went on to lay down a policy of its own. To our great
surprisel we found, under this title, some remarks as
ill-considered as'the worst parts of Dr. Clarke’s theological
treatises, not the sound wisdom of a cautious thinker, nor
even the correct views of a careful observer; but crude
observations of a deplorably careless sentimentalist, such as
we so commonly find in second-rate sermons. Take, for
example, Dr. Clarke’s solution of the Alabama question,
gravely proposed by him in an exposition of what he con
siders the statesmanship wanted by us :—
“ Great Britain either did right or did wrong. Leave it
to herself to decide which. Let Gen. Grant request our
minister to request the British Government to decide that
question, and inform it beforehand that we are ready to
accept its conclusion. If Great Britain, through her govern
ment, says that she did right, we will accept that solution,
and drop the subject; only in that case, we shall, of course,
have the right to do the same. Whenever she has a rebel
lion in her empire, or is engaged in a foreign war, we shall
have a right to do to Great Britain exactly what she did to
us. We shall take just as much pains as she did, and no
more, to keep pirates from going out of our ports, to prey
upon her commerce. If she likes this programme, let her
say so.”
This may be astute statesmanship, to leave to Great
Britain to say whether those who lost by the rebel cruisers
fitted out in British ports have any just claim upon her, and
also to leave to her prejudiced decision to settle the future
law of the matter, but at least we may deny the morality,
in case Great Britain refuses what we are sure is justice, of
�'Wanted, a Moralist for Dr. Clarke’s Statesman.
281
determining to imitate such refusal of justice the first
chance we have. As a sentimentalist, Dr. Clarke might
have said, “ If Great Britain thinks she did right, let us sayno more about it, and when our chance comes, we will
shame her neglect and treachery by scrupulous justice and
fidelity.” He would then lie open only to the charge of
unjustly sacrificing the claims of our citizens, and of yield
ing needlessly a grave point of law, merely for a burst of
sentiment. But when he advises that we yield now, and
make it up in hard hits by and by, he proposes the policy of
the cowardly savage, a statesmanship which would soon
carry the world back to the settlement of all questions by
stealthy blows of the strong hand and the wily craft of
aboriginal passion.
We introduced in our last issue, on p. 184, a barbarism,
anti Christum, etc^intending to indicate by a note that we
used it as a barbarism. Our meaning was, that if the Uni
tarians were to forget their culture and take a position in
the spirit of the expression in question, it would be better
than to dawdle disreputably about Zion waiting for the
Lord to come and claim the contents of the Unitarian
napkin.
VOL. I.—NO. 3.
6
�BOOKS'.
Plutarch's Morals—A Bible of Greek “ Grace and Truth.’'*
—What mean these five goodly octavos, with their more
than twenty-five hundred pages of the writings of a pagan
of the last half of the first Christian century? They are
published under auspices the very best which America
could afford. No house in the country, or indeed anywhere,
would be less likely than Little, Brown & Co., Boston,
whose imprint these volumes bear, to make either a com
mercial or a literary mistake, in a matter so serious as this
evidently is. So, also, the name of Prof. Goodwin argues
not less certainly that so large and difficult a task was not
attempted except for most weighty reasons. And when we
learn that the revision carried through by him has been
beset at every step with unusual perplexities, yet has been
accomplished with the utmost pains, and is evidently a
signal success, we conclude, unhesitatingly, that Plutarch’s
Morals must have merits rarely found in the productions of
any age. To confirm this conclusion, if confirmation were
needed, what witness more competent than Mr. Emerson ?
lie is the acknowledged master of the best school of
American literature, and the man of all men now living
to pass judgment on, and to authenticate to the thoughtful
and working world of to-day, any studies, ancient or
modern, in the important field of ethical science and prac
tical wisdom. If, therefore, he gives unstinted praise, we
need not wait to turn over these twenty-five hundred pages
to be convinced that something rich and rare is set before us.
* Translated from the Greek, by several hands. Corrected and revised by
William W. Goodwin, Ph.D., Professor of Greek Literature in Harvard
University. With an Introduction by Ralph Waldo Emerson. 5 vols., 8vo.,
$15. Little, Brown & Co., Boston.
�Plutarch’s Morals.
2E3
As a matter of fact, however, we had known for some
years that a certain old translation of Plutarch’s Morals,—
an extensive collection of essays by the author of the famous
“Lives,”—was esteemed by Mr. Emerson, both from the
Greek wit and wisdom garnered in it, and for the singular
vigor, freshness, and breadth of its English style, one of
the most precious bibles of mankind. We had had the use
of a copy of this translation — it is a very rare book — and
had made a selection of its richest texts; and from Mr.
Emerson himself we had learned, some time since, of the
plan for its revision and reproducEon, and of the hope
which he cherished that it would introduce to the studious
and earnest believers and workers of our day “some good
paganism.”
The labors of some forty or fifty English university men
produced the version now re-presentedftnd made it, in Mr.
Emerson’s judgment, “a monument of the English language
at a period of singular vigor and freedom of style.” Still, the
old book was “ careless and vicious in parts,” as a transla
tion, and sadly needed the improvement which ProflGoodwin’s accomplished hand has given it. And happily,Ehe
thorough revision which has made the translation faithful
to the Greek original, has proved throughout a vindication
of Plutarch, a restoratibn of clear and accurate statements
where the old version gave something absurd and unintel
ligible.
Plutarch belonged to the generation second after that of
Jesus. He was just coming to manhood when Paul ceased
from apostolic labors. The essays which are called his
“ Morals,” were written at the moment when Christian
teaching was fairly in the world, but before it had made
any appreciable impression upon paganism. If they contain
lessons of rare and gracious wTisdom, these lessons show
what paganism was capable of at the very hour when
Christianity, as popularly interpreted, claims to have found
the light of ethical and religious teaching Blean gone out.
�284
Plutarch's Morals.
The “ Lives” and the “ Morals” of Plutarch, taken together,
form a large body of history and instruction, of chronicle,
character and catechism, retold and retaught, newly narrated
and freshly expounded and enforced, at just the moment
when our popular Christianity pretends that the world of
ancient life and faith was without form and void, and dark
ness brooded over a chaos which waited the creating breath
of Divine interference through Christ. As Mr. Emerson
says, “ Plutarch occupies a unique place in literature, as an
encyclopaedia of Greek and Roman antiquity.” He is a
kind of bible of ancient faith and practice, an evangelist of
the best, in ideas and in examples, which the old pagan
world had to offer. It is worth while, therefore, to know
what his gospel is, and to compareBits truths and errors
with the truths and errors of the system which has so long
put all other systems aside, with the claim that they all
failed of grace and truth, and that it alone had the word of
lifeH
Mr. Emerson says of the “ Morals,” the sermons of
Plutarch, “ I know not where to find a book — to borrow a
phrase of Ben Jonson’s—1 so rammed with life.’ ” Plutarch
in general he pronounces “ a chief example of the illumina
tion of the intellect by the force of morals.” Other
points of the explanation and vindication of the Greek
essayist by the American, appear in the following sentences,
which we cull from the Introduction to the edition of the
“ Morals ” now before us :
“ Whatever is eminent in fact, or in fiction, in opinion,
in character, in institutions, in science — natural, moral, or
metaphysical, or in memorable sayings, drew his attention
and came to his pen with more or less fullness of record.”
—(The reason of Plutarch’s vast popularity is his humanity.
Nothing touches man but he feels it to be his. He has
preserved for us a multitude of precious sentences, in prose
or verse, of authors whose books are lost; and these
embalmed fragments, through his loving selection alone,
have come to be proverbs of later mankind.”—“Now and
then there are hints of superior science. You may cull
�Plutarch’s Morals.
285
from his record of barbarous guesses of shepherds and
travelers statements that are predictions of facts established
in modern science.”—“ His extreme interest in every trait
of character, and his broad humanity, lead him constantly to
Morals, to the study of the Beautiful and Good. Hence
his love of heroes, his rule of life, and his clear convictions
of the high destiny of the soul. La Harpe said ‘ that Plutarch
is the genius the most naturally moral that ever exist
ed.’ ”—“Plutarch is genial, with an endless interest in all
human and divine things.” — “ Plutarch thought ‘ truth
to be the greatest good that man can receive, and the good
liest blessing that God can give.’ ”—“ His faith in the
immortality of the soul is another measure of his deep
humanity. He believes that the doctrine of the divine
Providence, and that of the immortality of the soul, rest on
one and the same basis.”—“lean easily believe that an
anxious soul may find in Plutarch’s chapter called ‘Pleasure
not attainable by Epicurus,’ and his ‘Letter to his Wife
Tiihoxena,’ a more sweet and reassuring argument on the
immortality than in the Phaedo of Plato; for Plutarch
always addresses the question on the human side, and not
on the metaphysical; as Walter Scott took hold of boys
and young men, in England and America, and through
them of their fathers. His grand perceptions of duty lead
him to his stern delight in heroism; a stoic resistance to
low indulgence; to a fight with fortune; a regard for truth ;
his love of Sparta and of heroes like Aristides, Phocion,
and Cato.”—“But this stoic, in his fight with fortune,with
vices, effeminacy and indolence, is gentle as a woman when
other strings are touched. He is the most amiable of men.
He has a tenderness almost to tears, when he writes on
‘Friendship,’ on ‘Benefitsflon ‘The Training of Children,’
and on ‘The Love of Brothers.’ All his judgments are
noble. He thought, with Epicurus, that it is more delight
ful to do than to receive a kindness. . . . His excessive and
fanciful humanity reminds one of Charles Lamb, whiist it
much exceeds him. . . . His delight in magnanimity and
self-sacrifice has made his books, like Homer’s Iliad, a bible
for heroes.”
We cannot here go at length into proof from Plutarch’s
own pages, of the existence in him of a veritable revelation,
worthy to be compared, in many great and noble respects,
with anything ever indited for the instruction of mankind.
�286
Plutarch’s Morals.
In brief, we declare our unhesitating judgment that
Plutarch, pagan chronicler and moralist though he be, is as
well worth earnest and reverent study as that Bible which
has been so long thrust upon us as the only and the infallible
rule of divine truth. In our opinion, the revelation which
is contained in Socrates, Plato, Philo Judaeus, Plutarch, and
the other representatives or inheritors of Greek wisdom, is
much richer than that which we have accepted from the
Hebrews and Hebrew-Christian mind. As the words Christ
and Christianity are Greek, so the best part of our truest
Christianity is from Greek teaching rather than Hebrew,
and far the largest, and deepest, and purest fountain of
divine truth, is in the scriptures which commence with
Socrates and Plato, and which have their fourth gospel in
the “Morals” of Plutarch, as they have their Acts of the
Apostles in his “ Lives.”
’ It may seem a rude judgment in the face of current
Christian opinion, but we cannot help it. We feel no call
to respect the crass ignorance and gross superstition which
still make accredited Christian judgment, in the matter of
divine revelation, a baseless prepossession, no more just
than Hindoo, Chinese, or Mohammedan prepossession. If
the world of Christendom had spent as much pains in the
free study of Greek chronicle and exposition as have been
given to the law and gospel derived from Jewish sources,
we have no doubt that the average enlightenment and ele
vation of mankind would be very much greater than at
present. The simpler and more superstitious books have
commanded attention, and the world meanwhile has lost
fifteen hundred years, and only now begins to walk with
the best masters of paganism. It did not surprise us when
Mr. Emerson said to us, speaking of Plutarch, “ We want
some good paganism.” The study of divinity will take a step
as important as any ‘ revival of learning ’ that ever was,
when Greek Socrates shall displace Hebrew Samuel, Plato
Paul, and Plutarch John and Matthew’, aud study shall seek
�Plutarch's Morals.
287
for great thoughts, humane principles,, and manly examples
rather than waste itself on the®uperstition that one young
Jew and certain Jewish books shut up both God and God’s
truth in themselves, and that the first and last labor of
investigation is to vindicate this pretension. We will un
hesitatingly compare Plutarch alone with the whole Bible,
not to show that he avoids error, but to prove that he more
fully and more profoundly grasps essential truth, and that
on the grand points of ethical and theological teaching he
is infinitely wiser than the popular Christian interpretation
of so-called holy writ. We shall make it our duty to bring
forward proof of this from time to time, as our space and
plans will permit. In conclusion now we merely cite a few
specimens taken from the first pages of Vol. I. of the
“ Morals.”
0S'<3hr,a'tes, ^t^as be’perceived "anyfierceness of spifiT
h
*s
to rise within him towards any of his friends, setting him
self like a promontory to break the waves, would speak with
A lower voice, bear a smiling PowntenancS,, and look with a more
*
yentie'eye $ andtehusl by bending thexother way and moving
contrary to the passion, he kept himself from falling or
being worst®d^S|
“Observing that many have begun their change to virtue
more from being pardoned than being punished, I became per
suaded of this: that reason was fitter to govern with than
anger,” JI
“Good temper doth remedy some things, put an orna
ment upon others, ^udgweete^^thermiU
“ If every one would al way s rep eat th e question of Plato
to himself, But am not I perhaps sum aone
and
turn his reason from abroad to loofei into himself, and put
restraint upon his reprehension of others, he would not make
so much use of his hatred of evil in reproving other men, seeing
himsaH:
in need fgrgat. indulgonc^^jg
“ J^rnTve affl vnlwest, 1
Jimpedoelelp.as a
divine thing, ‘ To fast from evil.’ ” — From Concerning the
Cure of
�288
The Invitation Heeded.
“Atheism, which is a false persuasion that there are no
blessed and incorruptible beings, . . is very lamentable and
sad. For to be blind or to see amiss in matters of this con
sequence cannot but be a fatal unhappiness to the mind, it
being then deplved of the fairest and brightest of its many
eyes, the knowledge of God.”
“ Atheism hath no hand at all in causing superstition ;
bull superstition not only gave atheism its first birth, but
serves it ever since by giving it its best apology for existing,
whgh, although it be neither a good nor a fair one, is yet
the most specious and colorable.”
“There is certainly no infirmiB belonging to us that
contains such a multipllity of errors and fond"passions, or
that consists of such incongruous and incoherent opinions,
as this of superstition dotl3f It behooves us, therefore
to
*
do our utmost to escape it; but withal, we must see we do it
safely and prudmtly, and not rashly and inconsiderately, as
people run from the incursions of robbers or from fire, and
fall into bewildered and untrodden paths, full of pits and
precipices. For so some, while they would avoid supersti
tion,Rea® over the golden mean of true piety into the harsh
and coarse extreme of atheism.”—From Of Superstition or
Indiscreet Devotion.
The Invitation Heeded—Reasons for a Return to Catholic
Unity.—By James Kent Stone.
*
The activity of the Catholic Publication Society has been
for some time one of the signs of theKimes. It represents
an earnest school of American Catholics, whose gifts and
graceJcannot be denied. We have a shelf of the books
which have come from this school within a few years, which
we highly prize as one of the genuine fruits of contempo
rary religious activity, although much which these volumes
contain must be winowed out as mere chaff of tradition. In
our judgment the new school of Catholicism is much more
humane, sensible and religious in its literature, both books
and tracts, than the Protestant orthodoxy ^represented by
* The Catholic Publication Society, New York, 1870.
�The Invitation Heeded.
289
the Tract Societies and Publication Houses which flood the
country with cheap superstition; superstition, too, which is
absurd and cruel.
This school finds a new recruit, and a valuable one, in
the author of The Invitation Heeded. Dr. Stone appears to
great advantage in his deeply sincere, earnest and able argu
ment and appeal, which he does not confidently urge with
out having profoundly felt. We can lend a hearty sympa
thy to the deep, spiritual tones of such a man’s plea, and
challenge for him the respectful attention of his religious
contemporaries, although the opinion within the limits of
which he now attempts religion has no more practical value,
weight, or interest to us than any other hallucination of
misguided sentiment] Dr. Stone treats first of the Church
considered in certain historical aspects, such as the attitude
of the world towards it, its perpetuity, its guardianship of
morals, the failure of its great foe Protestanism, its relation
to civilization, and its asserted complicity with persecution.
In the second part of his work he deals with the Church as
a Divine Creation, under the heads of incarnation and in
spiration, infallibility, scripture, antiquity, and the signs of
the true church. The third, and concluding part, considers
the Church as an organization, or the relations of the Pri
macy to Christianity; to prophecy, to antiquity, to unity, to
authority, and to infallibility. Into the merits of the argu
ment we cannot here enter, but we can assure our readers
that they can see in these pages just how pious and earnest
men are obeying certain sentiments taught them by Chris
tianity, by going over to Romanism. And we think no
man engaged with religion can sympathetically follow Dr.
Stone’s plea through to the end without being wiser and
better for noting the aspects of experience which it discloses.
Pew readers accustomed to the assumptions of faith which
are dictated by sound reason will have ary difficulty in see
ing where Dr. Stone’s illusion is, or how it is that his logic
has constrained him to join himself to the largest historical
�290
Mommsen’s Rome.
result of the primitive Christian movement. If we did not
believe in the universality of inspiration and incarnation,
and had to assume that the creature can return to the Crea
tor only through creature mediation by Christ and the
church, we should make haste to follow Dr. Stone. As it is,
we bid him good speed into the Roman fold, but propose,
ourselves, to stay outside and take the chance of their being
God enough for all creation. We have a shrewdy guess that
the supply of Divine grace is not materially lessened, much
less exhausted, by what the Primacy has shut up in Roman
limits.
Mommsen’s History of Rome, the American edition of
which, published by Charles Scribner & Co., New York, is
now completed by the appearance of the fourth volume,
merits recognition by both critics and readers, as without
exception the finest existing account of the course of events
from the origin of Rome, and the earliest political life of
Italy, to the time when Caesar put an end to the Roman
Republic!in the year 46 B. C. The scholar finds in the fruits
of Mommsen’s labors much more than learned study in this
field has ever before achieved; fuller discovery of facts,
more just appreciation of causes, more faithful and more
complete reproduction of real features of Roman life, and
a method and style of the highest and noblest art. But
none the less does the mere reader, who wishes to be carried
along by a trustworthy and attractive recital, find in Momm
sen a guide whom it is a profound pleasure to follow. The
secret of this two-fold success of the work is in the author’s
union of learning and masterly intelligence with simplicity,
earnestness and vigor.
It is one of the most satisfactory peculiarities of study, as
the best scholars undertake it, that it demands real facts and
actual truths, and counts no cost great which adds to veri- .
tableBcnMledge. We are able now to come at a great deal
of historical truth, where heretofore we have had to put up
with traditions W’hich were in large part misrepresentations
�Froude’s England.
291
of fact, even when they were not pure inventions of igno
rance, or fictions of imagination. We rejoice in this new
fidelity of study to truth, both for its results in such resto
ration of the picture of humanity as we have an illustration
of in Mommsen’s Rome, and for what must come from the
inevitable application of it to the history of religion, which
has been with Christians a mass of misrepresentation in the
case of all other religions than their ownland for their own
a tissue of fiction and false tradition, persisted in with a
bravery of unveracity fcr which the whole history of man
kind besides affords no parallel. Dr.Mommsen tells the
story of conquering Rome down to a period very near the
era of Christianity. He is expected to go on with the nar
rative through the period of the empire, and mil thus give
us important aid in comprehending the world into which
Christian teaching penetrated. At present, however, the
work is complete. The English translation was made from
the fourth German edition, and the reprint is in Scribner’s
excellent library style, four handsome volumesBwith com
plete index, and sold at the very low price of $2 a volume.
Scribner’s edition is decidedly preferable to the English.
Froude’s History of England has extended to twelve vol
umes, covering the events from the Fall of Wolsey to the
Defeat of the Spanish Armada, and is now brought to a
close, because the author deems that he has already tres
passed too much upon the patience of his readers, and
because, although he has not reached the end of the reign
of Elizabeth, where he at first proposed to stop, he has gone
far enough to accomplish his main purpose, which was “to
describe the transition from the Catholic England with
which the century opened, the England of a dominant
Church and monasteries and pilgrimages, into the England
of progressive intelligence.”
It is not our purpose to attempt even a brief criticism of
the work which Mr. Froude thus brings to a close. Its
�292
Eroude’s England.
fascination as one of the grand stories of the world, told
with singular eloquence, need not be celebrated here. But
one remark in particular we wish to make, in justification
of the unstinted praise which we deem it but right to
bestow upon Mr. Froude’s work. It is not yet time to write
the final history of an epoch so closely connected with our
own as that in which “ the England of progressive intelli
gence” had its birth. Dr. Mommsen can write of Rome,
and Mr. Lea can write of early and mediaeval Christian
pretension, with the confidence of judicial decision, because
the one and the other have been sufficiently investigated to
be thoroughly known, and readily comprehended and
judged. The turns and problems of Roman historv are
simple, as soon as they are seen in the light of actual facts,
and even Christianity, as it took outward form in an organ
ized church, only needed to be fairly seen as it was to be
conclusively judged as the most woful defeat of the Chris
tian spirit, and most heinous outrage upon human rights.
If Christians generally do not admit this, it is only because
their prejudice loves ignorance rather than knowledge,
and deliberately excludes the light, that in complete dark
ness it may continue a pretension which every candid
scholar in Christendom knows to have no warrant whatever,
nor even the shadow of an honest excuse. But no such
judicial certainty is possible in the case which comes before
us in Mr. Froude’s volumes. We are hearing the pleas of
great advocates, and must continue so to do for a long time
to come. Mr. Froude is an advocate worthy of the field
into which he has entered, in thoroughness of learned
study, in penetration and vigor of thought, in profound and
glowing sympathies, and in earnest eloquence. The course
of his great story commands our deepest interest at every
step, and if we cannot feel on all points that historv utters
through him her conclusive word, we nevertheless are con
scious that no such plea in her court has been made before,
touching this matter of the transition from Catholic England
to the England of progressive intelligence, and that very
�The Library of Wonders.
293
much which Mr. Froude so eloquently urges will appear in
the final verdict of the tribunal of coming time. The story
is a long one, but we can hardly wish that there were less.
In fact we hope that Mr. Froude may yet carry out his
original purpose, and go on to the end of Elizabeth’s reign.
The twelve volumes which now complete the work are
brought out in three styles by its American publishers,
Charles Scribner & Co.; a large paper edition at $5 a
volume, a library edition at $3 a volume, and a capital
popular edition at $1.25 a volume.
The Illustrated Library of Wonders, a translation of which
is in course of publication by Charles Scribner & Co., was
immediately successful on its first appearance in Paris, and
seems hardly less popular in America. Eighteen volumes
of Scribner’s edition are already out, and eleven more are
to appear shortly. One of the last published volumes,
however, Lighthouses and Lightships, is chiefly an English
work, and the entire series has been edited by English
hands. These volumes, in their proper place, as stories of
science told for the entertainment and instruction of un
learned and uncritical readers, fully deserve the welcome
they have received, and one much wider still which we
cannot doubt they will‘obtain. They are just the sort of
books which are needed in the popular library and on the
household book-shelf, attractive with their numerous illus
trations, entertaining and readable in matter and style, and
full of information, suggestion, and intellectual stimulus.
The titles of the volumes already published are, Thunder
and Lightning; Wonders of Optics; Wonders of Heat;
Intelligence of Animals; Great Hunts; Egypt 3,300 Years
Ago; Wonders of Pompeii; The Sun; The Sublime in
Nature; Wonders of Glassmaking; Wonders of Italian
Art; Wonders of the Human Body; Wonders of Architec
ture; The Bottom of the Ocean; Winders of Acoustics;
Lighthouses and Lightships; Wonderful Balloon Ascents;
and Wonders of Bodily Strength and Skill. Price per
vol., in scarlet cloth, gilt backs, and printed on very nice
paper, $1.50.
�264
The Geology and Physical Geography of Brazil.
The Geology and Physical Geography of Brazil, by Ch.
Fred. Hartt, which Fields, Osgood & Co. have just published,
forms an elegant octavo of above 600 pages, enriched with
73 illustrations and a large and valuable map, and completed
by an excellent index (price $5). In form, therefore, it is
worthy of the place which its author and publishers propose
for it, as one volume of the “ Scientific Results of a Journey
in Brazil, by Louis Agassiz and his travelling companions.”
It seems to us still more worthy of its ,place among the
fruits of the “Thayer Expedition” to Brazil, in the scien
tific excellence, and in the great interest, of its matter. It
was at first the intention of Prof. Hartt to make the work
embr|pe merely the results of his explorations as geologist
of the expedition under Prof. Agassiz, together with those
of a second journey made by himself, independently; but,
happily for the public, the studies incidental to the prepa
ration of the matter for the press, led to a considerable
expansion of this plan, and we now have a general work
which incorporates with the results of recent investigation
all that is most valuable in previous works on the geology
and Physi°al geography of Brazil. We note with special
satisfactions also, the strong terms in which Prof. Hartt
announces his indebtedness to the people of Brazil, and his
“ sincerest wish in acknowledgment of so much kindness
to be to some humble degree instrumental in removing
false Jmpressions so current about Brazil, and to make the
tesourcegof the empire better known in America.”
It would be of no avail to attempt, in a brief notice, to
give a just idea of the store of facts about Brazil which
this rich volume contains. Prof. Hartt takes us from prov
ince to province, over the great field of his explorations,
along the extensive coasts, up rivers and through forests,
over plains and mountains, until he has shown us the whole
face of the land, has pointed out to us its striking features
and its most remarkable objects of interest, when we feel
almost as if we had ourselves probed the soils, hammered
the rocks, inspected the corals, brought to light the treasures
■
�Margaret, a Tale of the Real, Etc.
295
of caves, threaded the forests, and otherwise gathered the
elements of a complete sketch of that great region which
Brazil is. Not only will students of science receive this
volume with particular satisfaction, but whoever is practi
cally interested in the resources of South America, and its
opportunities for enterprise, will find in it a trustworthy
guide to an extensive knowledge of important facts, while
to all who acknc wledge the duty of acquainting themselves
with the great regions of. the earth as. the seats of human
life, it will render a great and grateful service.
Margaret, A Tale of the Real and the Ideal, Blight and Bloom, by
Sylvester Judd, is a New England classic, a true picture out of the
quaint, sweet, homely life which a gentle parson such as Sylvester
Judd was loved to move in and portray. Time but adds to its value.
If it were not a picture which the press can multiply, it would speedily
become a work of price, as one of the choicest remaining illustrations
of manners and men of the genuine New England which is passing
rapidly away. Happily a new edition can reproduce for a new gene
(
*
ration of readers every line of Judd’s masterpiece, as undoubtedly
future editions will transmit the wise and beautiful tale to future gen
erations interested to study, and able to take delight in, the by-gone
New England. Mr. Judd was one of the earlier apostles of sweetness
and light, a very true and pure soul emancipated by graces of charac
ter and clearness of intelligence from the old dark creed of the Puri
tans. He became-a saintly teacher of charity, justice, and faith, as he
found these impersonated in him to whom he looked, without worship,
but with reverence, as his guide, friend, and Master, and the helpful
and friendly Master of all the sons® of men. One aim of hi® tale was
to bring back to his readers the simple, natural humanity of the ideal
Christ, which was to him the actual leader of life, and so to give to
whoever could accept it a gentle,Hiving guide and Reacher in place of
the half awful, half absurd Jesus of Puritan theology. In this aspect
the book is twenty-fold more available now than it was when Mr. Judd
first gave it to the world, twenty years ago, because the popular con^i
ception of the Christ has come round very largely to the view which is
so admirably illustrated in Margaret# But Mr. Judd was more an
artist than a theologian, and made a capital tale of real life rathe© <
*
than a religions treatise. He will be increasingly honored and loved
�296
Immortality.
by all readers who know how precious a thing is a true, simple'
impressive picture of wholesome realities, as they were seen by him,
and were portrayed with photographic accuracy. The present edition
is in a very neat volume from the pre'-s of Roberts Brothers, Boston.
Price $1.50. We shall take a future occasion for criticising Mr.
Judd’s view of the ideal, “ self-wrought,” perfection of Jesus, which
we deem as far from radical truth lying before it as it is in advance of
the Puritan idea which it had displaced. Meanwhile we can promise
our readers a rich repast in Mr. Judd’s beautiful pages, and trust
many of them will place Margaret among their choicest books.
Immortality. Four Sermons preached before the University of Cam
bridge. Being the Hulsean Lectures for 1868. By J. J. Perowne, B. D.
Published by A. D. F. Randolph, New York. These lectures, which
only profess to be “ a fragmentary contribution to the literature of
a great subject,” may be profitably consulted as an able recent
evangelical attempt to prove that life and immortality are revealed
through the Christ of orthodoxy alone. The first discusses the theories
of materialism, of pantheism, and of spiritism. The second treats of
Egyptian, Greek, and Oriental faith, and failure of faith, in immor
tality. In the third we are shown the hope of the Jew, which is
found on a cursory examination to be “ no advance whatever upon the
pagan system,” yet is finally thought to have been “ brighter and
truer than that of the wisest of the heathen,” because so clearly
implied in the doctrine of a near relation of the soul to God. In the
concluding chapter, the hope of the Christian is set forth as resting
on two facts, the resurrection of Christ, and the inner life of the Spirit.
The general fairness, sincerity and thoughtfulness of the work are
worthy of praise. It opens a great subject, the critical examination
of which, as handled by Mr. Perowne, we shall return to at a suitable
future time.
If our readers are acquainted with the little books entitled Arne,
and The Happy Boy, they will eagerly accept a third from the same
source, a little volume of stories of Norwegian and Danish origin, with
the title The Flying Mail, Old Olaf, and Railroad and Churchyard,
published in very tasteful style by Sever and Francis, Boston. Arne,
and The Happy Boy, which the same publishers introduced to us in
an English translation, were delightful specimens of the current
fiction of Norway, stories by Bjornstjerne Bjornson, a simple, pure,
and touching painter of human life and passion in the land of the
northmen. They were a real addition to our treasures, at once works
of real art, and transcripts of pure nature, from a field in which nature,
human and other, possesses an unique interest. In the little volume
before us the third of the stories is by Bjornsen. The first is by
Goldschmidt, a Danish writer famous in his own country, and the
second by Mrs. Thoresen, a countrywoman of Bjornson. They all
have the same fine flavor of simple nature, and make together a
charming little book.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
The Examiner: a monthly review of religious and humane questions, and of literature. Vol. 1, February,1871, no. 3
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: [Winnetka, IL.]
Collation: [201]-296 p. ; 25 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Contents include: Unitarian leaders -- Theodore Parker's character and ideas.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
[s.n.]
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1870
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
G5449
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
[Unknown]
Subject
The topic of the resource
Periodicals
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /><br /><span>This work (The Examiner: a monthly review of religious and humane questions, and of literature. Vol. 1, February,1871, no. 3</span><span>), identified by </span><span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk">Humanist Library and Archives</a></span><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Religion
Unitarianism
-
https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/5f85f677cf19fe78a4511e4746611143.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=runGzARXfZ4l0TK%7E3ueAX7CeMCxXDS9x1R5qUBIfjre2IHMJIOUmxPrT84uS8YdlURRuWXeAF41Lt32KDXi9e6AH-0STd9CmEWLOlclXK1nz1lQY9fjZ%7EhkhIL1ZWCZaB3lOYdG%7EMMkdBHpev8d9pjds3htlox8ys57uhbelo9-t3b4qgXhVueSBbL6J0Uj%7EkGtZleZicbdu%7EqDjjkbwfvq%7EpBXFtoTSAQD7cT6CAY6ybY9fIcuhkf9hBpH%7EVFgygNnr6SbHgZknkS%7EO6pTu1XjBx5ZvsrS2V77F2Qx9S2KOgL2GNY0QO6JI2OmP7v9P7hknXFq0NePx2oJDEE%7EoYw__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
916735ffb77918a141ae3c23c321fba5
PDF Text
Text
THE CROSS OF OSIRIS,
OR
THE CROSS OF LIFE.
By EUSTACE HINTON JONES,
Joint Author (with Rev. Sir Geo. W. Cox, Bart., M.A.), of
* Popular Romances of the Middle Ages,’ and
‘ Tales of the Teutonic Lands.’
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCO^TT,
11 THE TERRACE, FARQUHAR ROAD, UPPER NORWOOD,
1878.
Price Sixpence.
S.E.
�LONDON:
PRINTED BY C. W. REYNELL, LITTLE PULTENEY STREET,
HAYMARKET.
�TO THE READER.
To seek a higher and nobler idea of God, the
Supreme Source of Rife, than the various religious
systems of the world present under the debased form
of Personality, is not necessarily attempting to under
mine the foundations of Religion, but only attempting
to discover and demonstrate them—as the geologist
goes down to the old red sandstone for a basis.
Religion has nothing to fear from the removal of the
mosses and many-coloured lichens with which ages
have covered the old rock.
The comparative philo
logist is never suspected of animosity against any
particular language because he endeavours to trace
all languages to a common root.
And it is no
irreligious work to strip off the framework and
trappings, and bare the base on which all the
religious
systems
foundation.
of
the
world find common
��T
THE
CROSS OF
LIFE.
-------—
This Cross, the Cross of Osiris, or the Cross of
Life, is represented on ancient Egyptian monu
ments generally in the hands of Deity, or borne by
priests ; but is always employed as the Divine symbol
of Life—of life as the result of perpetual regene
ration. As such it occurs frequently in the hiero
glyphic writing on all four sides of Cleopatra’s Needle.
And we know for certain that the symbol is intended
as that of Life; for, on the Rosetta stone, it is employed
to translate the title aiwoflios, given to Ptolemy
Epiphanius. But this figure of the pole and the
ring in combination is peculiar to no country. It is
found everywhere, alike among Egyptians, Assyrians,
Jews, Greeks, Latins, Gauls, Germans, Hindoos—
sometimes in the form of the plain stauros joined
with an oval ring, and sometimes in the form of
a ring inclosing a cross — but always the same
symbol of cross and ring.
It is the very oldest
�8
The Cross of Life.
of symbols, and has ever been regarded in every land
as the emblem of Everlasting Life, and the principle
of its perpetuation. It forms the root symbol of the
entire religious philosophy of the old world ; and in
it Hindoo, Egyptian, and Hebrew alike read the
mystery of creation, and the ultimate Secret of
Eternal Life. And it is noticeable that this emblem,
of primeval religion is unwittingly employed to this
day in the construction of our Christian churches
—the intersections of the cross on the ground
plan being determined by the ovoid lines of the
vesica piscis. Thus the cruciform structure of every
cathedral stands on the oval ring.
On examining the composition of this Cross of
Osiris it will be seen to consist of the stauros or pole,,
and the ring or ovum, in combination—the Ifng a
and Yom—or, in other words, the symbols of the two
male and female conditions necessary for the produc
tion of all known vitality. The staff and the ring have
always been held respectively as emblems of the womb
and its impregnator; and, when combined, as the symbol
of reproduction.
*
The twy-form unity of the Cross
of Osiris consequently suggests a two-fold principle
of generation whereby Life is perpetually renewed
and reproduced ; and as such was adopted as the
natural emblem of the Divine and Eternal Life-giver,
who was consequently regarded as a Twy-form
Principle. The modern idea that the divine source
is a single male regenerator and life-giver is a corrup
tion from primeval belief which does not stand alone.
*“ We recognise” (says Rev. Sir George W. Cox, Bart., M.A.,,
in Aryan Mythology, Vol. II., p. 115) “the male symbol in the
trident of Poseidon or Proteus, and in the fylfot or hammer
of Thor, which assumes the form of across pat^e in the various
legends which turn on the rings of Preya, Holda, Venus, or
Aphrodite. In each of these stories the ring is distinctly
connected with the goddess who represents the female power in.
nature.”
�The Cross of Life,
9
The self-sufficiency of the female principle alone has
even been heathenly asserted in ascribing to Venus the
cross, as well as the ring, in the astronomical sign $,
which still stands for the star of that name. But
this sign is essentially twy-form—male and female
—and has no meaning when taken to stand for
either the male or the female principle separately.
All ancient belief, however, held true to the
analogy of Nature; for it was seen that Nature
afforded no solitary example of the production of
life from a single parent. So they of old time
doubted not but that the Life-giver must be twy-form
—male and female—like all his products. And indeed
the most exhaustive investigations which science has
made up to the present time have failed to demon
strate a single instance of the spontaneous generation
of matter, or the possible production of any form of
life whatever, except as the result of the impregnation
of one distinct principle by another of opposite sex.
Matter is certainly lifeless until impregnated by some
unfathomable principle of force recognised equally
by science and religion, though variously described
—by religion as Spirit or God; by science as
an unknown quantity a?. Whatever be the true
nature of this ®, whether called force or spirit,
whose action we distinguish in such forms as heat
and electricity, we know at least it is not life—any
more than oil is flame. It is not Life, any more than
matter is Life; but an inceptive (male) principle
which, by combination with re-ceptive (feminine)
matter, produces the unending phenomena called
Life. For Life is a compound phenomenon, neither
self-creative nor self-maintenant, but as it were a
flame, the product of two mutually expending
principles, the result of the constant action of in
visible spirit (or force x) on visible matter. Matter
we know is not life ; and the correlative principle, or
force®, which impregnates it, must necessarily be, not
B
�IO
The Cross of Life.
Life, but a far higher Principle than any form of merer
life, h owever intelligent, with which we are acquain
ted. Life is not God; but is the unending product
of the mutual love of the double first cause, which is
God. Life is the Incarnate Divine, and has justly been
■worshipped as such. But God is not Life, but Love.
Hence every system of religion has retained the idea
that the Christ, the Krishna, is the Son; and that
the Son is Life, but God is Love; and love by its
nature is twy-form. Life is clearly not self-existent,
but a manifestation dependent on the continued
union of two parent principles widely differing from
and vastly superior to it. Life is spirit and matter
in combustion; the flame from the oil and the wick ;
the spark indicating the current that passes between
the yearning poles of approaching magnets; the
effervescence that arises from the mingling of the
acid with the alkali. Life is neither matter nor spirit,,
but the offspring of the pair; it ever consumes, yet
is ever renewed, because the loves of the parents are:
constant; it is eternal because they are. Life is thus-the vital incarnation of the Twy-form Principle, and
as such naturally came to be personified in the elder
systems of religion as the Son, the visible manifesta
tion of Deity, and the Third Person in the Trinity.
The earliest object of organised worship by learned
Hindoos and Egyptians was a God in two persons,
male and female, such as they found typified through
out all nature—as, for instance, in the fertilising sun
fructifying his mate, the earth—a God consisting of
two diverse Principles, whose uninterrupted union
made Life as eternal as themselves ; and so Life, under
many different names and forms, became also an
object of worship, but always as the manifestation of
Deity, as the divine Son of the loves of the Twain, not
Deity itself. All visible matter has instinctively been
regarded as a feminine and receptive principle, and
called “Mother” Nature, and “Mother” Earth ; while
�The Cross of Life.
11
the invisible Force by which it is ever fertilised and
regenerated, has just as instinctively been considered
masculine and inceptive, and invariably addressed as
our “Father.” And, indeed, the old-world thinkers
could account in no other way for the perpetually
regenerated vitality of the universe than by sup
posing the existence of an everlasting two-fold prin
ciple of generation, bi-sexual as all visible creation.
Had we no other reason for concluding the ultimate
Source of life to be both male and female, the abso
lute universality of that arrangement as a condition
of life should suffice to prove it. For life, in what
ever degree it may be found existing, is invariably
the product of two diverse parents. There is no
exception whatever to this law.
*
If we probe the
very origin of sensation, by examining the nervous
system, as minutely as Sir Charles Bell and Muller
have done, we find that the anterior root of each
spinal nerve is motor, while the posterior is sen
sitive; and that it takes a masculine and a femi
nine principle acting on each other to produce
the simplest form of sensation. Similarly, electri
city is produced by the friction of two diverse ele
ments. In fact, all nature asserts the necessity of
the union of two opposite elements, the motor and
the sensitive, male and female, as the condition of
generating and maintaining life and sensation.
* Instances are, no doubt, to be found of apparent self
reproduction without impregnation, among the annelids, the
entozoa, hydrozoa, molluscoids, and aphides. But in these cases
we have propagation without generation, as plants may be
propagated by cuttings, but are only generated from twy-sexed
impregnated seed. Hence Professor Owen’s designation of
this property of self-splitting, possessed alike by some animals
and some vegetables, as “parthenogenesis” (parthenos a virgin,
and genesis the act of production), is clearly unjustifiable.
No “genesis” is involved in the operation, and the whole
notion of the possibility of spontaneous generation has been
routed from its last strongholds.
�12
The Cross of Life.
Electricity, and all the great physical forces, includ
ing nerve-power and all the various characteristics
of the phenomena of Life, are but special modifica
tions of one common energy or force, produced by
the active and incessant communion of the same two
Almighty principles. Eternal union makes the twain
One, though they are Two ; and their unfailing pro
duct, life, introduces a Third principle. Thus, the
mystery of the Trinity naturally explains itself as
implying the Two, who by love are One, and whose
oneness is ever manifested in their eternal offspring,
life—the Third person—in the Trinity who are all One’
Now it is observable that the doctrine of a male and
female Deity is the very fundamental principle of all
the sacred books of all the elder religious systems; the
common foundation of religion and mythology alike.
We have it in Genesis, where we read, “and God
said, let US make man in our own image
So God created man in his own image, in the image
of God created he him : male and female created he
them.” Here the “Us” unmistakably asserts the
twy-formity of Deity, while the distinct statement
that “male and female ” are “ His Image” defines
the sexual nature of that twy-formity. The doctrine
of a Trinity of male persons is a modern corruption
never dreamed of in the Old Testament, and not
even inculcated in the New, which does not speak of
the Holy Ghost as a personalty, but as an influence or
spirit; just as one may refer to “a spirit of good
feeling” pervading a certain meeting, or to “a spirit
of eloquence ” having fallen on a certain speaker.
The belief in a Trinity composed of a twy-form
parent Cause and its product Life, was the instinctive
idea simultaneously fastened on by all humanity long
before religion became a profession, a system of
morals, or an engine employed in national govern
ment. And the presumption in favour of the original
instinctive idea of a race, as against all subsequent
�The Cross of Life,
13
overlaying with local systems of ethics and national
administration, is overwhelming. The old Vedic
hymns praised Aditi the Unbounded, as being at once
mother, father, and son. And the old Hellenic myth
tells of Ouranos, the heavens, brooding down on
Gaia, the earth, and of Gaia returning the love of
Ouranos by the ceaseless production of Life. It was
long before such an aberration took place from the
original belief as to permit the elimination of the
female element from the Deity, or even to suggest
the idea of male procession, as the Greeks did in
making Pallas spring full-grown from the brain of
Zeus. But the aberration has proceeded until even
our own creed actually recognises a reproductive triad
composed of three males !
In the genesis of the Trinity given by our creed,
the believer asserts in one and the same breath, that
Christ was the “Son of the Father,” and also that
he was “ conceived by the Holy Ghost.” The believer
further professes that the Holy Ghost was not only
Christ’s Father but his Son; for the Holy Ghost
“proceeded from the Father and the Son,” wherefore
the Holy Ghost was manifestly his own Son’s son.
All which difficulty arises from regarding the Holy
Ghost as “ a person ” instead of “ an infine-noe,” and
thereby hopelessly endeavouring to complete the
Trinity without the logical female element of the oldworld belief. The Romanists have eagerly preserved
the female idea in connection with Deity, but so
illogically that, in their doctrine of the immaculate
conception, they are even driven a step further.
For, if St. Anna, the mother of Mary, was conceived
by the Holy Ghost, as well as her daughter, the believer
must see that the Holy Ghost was not only the father
of his own father (Jesus), but the father of his father’s
mother (Mary), as well as of her Son. How, all
this may be Creed, but cannot be any part of Reli
gion ; because it is sheer and impossible nonsense.
�14
The Cross of Life.
The old creed of the Trinity, as embodied in the
Cross of Osiris, imposes no suoh demands on the
imagination, but plainly records an elementary belief
which science every day justifies; a belief which is
the forgotten root of every known system of religion,
viz., that Vitality, in whatsoever degree of intelli
gence it may exist, is not a Cause, but an Effect, the
product of Two Eternal Causes whose Loves are Life.
Thus, this Cross of Life declares the Trinity by dis
playing the Two great eternal Principles whose union
involves the eternal Third. And so, under the guise
of male and female, the Cross of Osiris figures Life’s
twy-form Cause as Love; asserts the world-lesson
that life can only come from love; that as human
life is produced by human love, so Everlasting Life is
produced by Everlasting Love; and, therefore, that
Love is God; or, as St. John puts it, that “ God is
Love.”
Here, then, we find the oldest creed wide enough
to embrace all modern systems of religion, on a basis
which science can approve. And it is something to
know that there exists a base broad enough for all;
and that religion, like language, is thus traceable to a
common root. At the same time a return to primi
tive uniformity in the details of religious creed would
be no more possible, perhaps no more desirable, than a
return to the primitive uniformity of spoken language.
The peculiar value of this Cross lies in its being
a crystallisation of natural teaching—a piece of
Nature’s own inspiration, first conveyed to mankind
by instinct (truer than reason), and which has since
proved the root from which all the various systems
of faith, theology, and moral philosophy, have grown
up ; systems which, artificial as they are, nevertheless
form a necessary part of the artificiality of civilisa
tion, and will be recognised as indispensable even by
the wise who seek to see through them to their com
mon root. There can be no doubt that all the
�The Cross of Life.
15
various systems of faith and worship, founded on the
common basis of early belief, have, in course of ages,
incorporated many purely natural myths of equal
beauty and truth. But the fact of these myths of
Nature’s own revelation being universally true of
Nature, only makes them the more true of human
nature; while one may strip religion of its mere
framework of an incarnation, mediation, crucifixion,
•and resurrection, only to find it reveal its grandest
beauty in naked form.
The secrets of Life, Death, and Resurrection must
be gathered from facts, not assumptions. And we
find one unassailable fact about Life, which was
fastened on by all the unprejudiced world at the first,
and which has been confirmed by all scientific inves
tigation ever since. That fact is, that Life is the pro
duct, not of one principle, but of two, a male and a
female. No such thing as spontaneous generation is
discoverable by the closest examination into Nature’s
remotest corners. Life must have a mother as well
as a father. And Life is invariably the incarnation of
the loves of two. This is why a twy-form emblem of
Life has ever been regarded as the divine symbol of a
Trinity who are One.
Taking the primary idea displayed in the Cross,
viz., that of Life as the production of Two Principles
ever in active union, it is evident that the Egyptians
at least saw very far into the Secret of Life ; the
secret, not merely of its creation and maintenance,
not merely of the extent of its duration, but of the,
nature and condition of that duration. The world’s
■experience has demonstrated the everlastingness of
the Two Principles, and the everlasting activity of
their union, and consequently that their product Life,
being co-existent with that activity, is everlasting
likewise. Yet, everlasting though Life be, it is not
.self-existent. It is a perpetual consumption, a flame
that has ever to be nourished by the twy-form parent
�16
The Cross of Life.
Deity—by the Burning Bush which burns always,
yet nevermore consumes.
The perpetual consumption of life, and its constant
renewal every moment, show in what an important
way the nature of the Life (theologically the Son),
differs from the nature of its two parent principles.
In duration, all three principles of the Trinity are
equally eternal. But while the nature of the two
male and female principles is absolutely unchanging,
insomuch that, could personality be ascribed to them,
they would ever remain the same two persons, the
nature of the product is change. Life is change ; an
eternal momently resurrection from eternal momently
death. Incessant change is the condition of Life,
but not of its twy-creative Principle. It is the Burn
ing Plame that changes and consumes, not the Flame
giving Bush. Hence, while this Cross proclaims the
everlasting life of the two constituents of humanity
—matter and spirit—it refutes the doctrine of
immortal personality. There is no individual resur
rection of the flame specs, whose life is due to the
constant death which consumes them. The eternity
of Life renders individual immortality impossible.
For Life, in its essence, is consumption ; a self-con
suming of the Divine Twy-Parent Flame, which con
quers death and achieves immortality only by that
constant change which momently sacrifices indivi
duality in order to reposit its constituent elements
in the twy-parent breasts for regeneration into
new flame. Thus, the only things in the universe
which can possibly be supposed to retain unchange
ability, are not Life, but its Two Causes: the
inspirers and producers of all that beneficent sys
tem of expending energy which we call Life. Here,
then, we get the abrupt distinction between Life and
the Divine Life-producers. The compound effect is
not, and cannot be, of the same nature as either of
its two Causes ; Life partakes of the eternity of both
�The Cross of Life.
17
its causes, but at a cost of perpetual consumption
which excludes immortal individuality. The same
analogue pervades all Nature. Steam, for instance, the
produce of fire and water, manifests the character
istics of both its parent principles, but the particles
of vapour have only momentary individuality before
hastening back for absorption by their respective
sources—the fire-nature to the fire, and the water
nature to the water—and so providing for continued
regeneration. For, be it remembered, we cannot
consume heat or consume water; in using them we
only consume the momentary individuality which
they present to us; the water and the fire which we
use are the same (except in their individuality) which
all mankind have used before us. The practice of
burning dining-room fires does not diminish the
amount of heat in the universe.
In all forms of animated matter, however intelli
gent, except Man, it is not disputed that while Life
is reproduced everlastingly, the personal individuality
of life never is. And experience affords no ground
for making an exception to this universal law in the
case of humanity—an exception which would involve
the only waste known in the whole economy of Nature,
viz., the dormancy of a large portion of the principles
of vitality locked up in a state of eternal sterility,
all for the sake of preserving to mankind the doubt
ful blessing of an individual immortality which no
one affects to believe is shared with any other form of
animate or inanimate matter. The eternal Life of
every atom, both of spirit and matter, as indicated in
the Cross of Osiris, is an absolute assertion of uni
versal resurrection—a fundamental doctrine which
all Nature daily proclaims in its wasteless renewal of
life. Nothing can die but it goes home to God, to be
given forth again in Life as a newly revivified atom.
The Jews still maintain this glorious old article of
belief, and at a death-bed they still say the prayer
�18
The Cross of Life.
■“ Yig-dol,” which they so offer that its last words,
The Eternal is One,” may coincide as nearly as
possible with the moment of departure of that portion
•of His breath which He has lent, to return into His
Essence. But the idea of personal resurrection is bot
tomless as the Bottomless Pit which has been founded
n pon it. It is an idea utterly excluded by the nature of
Life itself. All the old theological systems of metem
psychosis, so far from teaching personal resurrection,
do but symbolise the constant changes of individuality
which every atom, after brief manifestation in Life’s
flame, undergoes on its way to seek resolution in the
vivifying bosom of its Twy-parent. We have the
prophecy of these changes even during the momen
tary individuality of human life. For we know that
every particle of a man’s body is renewed once in
seven years, and that the very semblance that remains
is not the same man as it was seven years before ; but
that both body and spirit are in a state of incessant
flaming consumption and renewal, and only depend
for their personality on the time that a certain atom
of spirit will maintain its relations with a certain
atom of matter without disintegration.
Personal individuality dies even while we live ; but
Life cannot, even after we die—for the eternal exist
ence of the Two Principles mutually evolving Life
makes that of necessity everlasting. But the con
sumption of the individual is the primary condition
of the Eternity of Life. St. Paul saw this when he
•said: “ Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not
quickened except it die.” Thus the individual grain of
wheat dies. But not the life of the wheat—that goes
into the seed. New grain arises from it, and “ Grod
giveth it a body as it hath pleased him ” (the old doc
trine of reposition as the condition of regeneration),
but the new grain, though it has the same Life, is not the
same grain; only “ like unto” it, after its kind ; as the
new rain-drops which the sea evermore gives back to
�The Cross of Life.
19
the sky are “ like unto ” those that have rained them
selves down for regeneration upon its generous breast;
they are the same life, but not the same individuality.
Yet the rain-drops sparkle no less brightly, and the
wheat-grains bear themselves no less proudly for
having sacrificed individuality to the refreshing joy
of Eternal Life. The desire for personal immortality
is the mere outcome of the personal ambition, of men
—the leaping up of a flame that would fain reach the
sky, but can only picture itself thereon. Eternal Life
is infinitely nobler than an impossible personal immor
tality, which, could it even be accorded without the
abolition of Life itself, would necessarily prove the
greatest curse which could be bestowed on mankind.
Good men and bad men would alike reject it, could
they but realise it. And it is just this root idea that
makes the Scriptures of all races counsel the sinking
of self in the ideal they present of the Divine Source.
The end of all religious teaching is the sacrifice of
personal Self, and the entire identification and absorp
tion of the individual Will, the ego, with the Divine
—all which is merely an enlargement of the preach
ing of the Cross of Life.
Christ himself, the type of all Divine and human
self-sacrifice, repudiated the idea of personal resur
rection, when, in answer to the Sadducees, he replied
to the question they propounded as to whose wife a
certain woman should hereafter be who in life had
seven husbands. The Sadducees attacked two beliefs
as to Eternal Life : first, as to the fact of any resurrec
tion at all; and, next, as to the doctrine of a personal
resurrection. The Saviour’s answer was that of the
Cross of Osiris. As to the fact of resurrection, he
answered, “ God is not a God of the dead, but of the
Living.” That is to say, the eternal existence of a
constant Life-giver is absolute proof of the eternal
indestructibility of the Life which he evolves. As to
the preservation of personal individuality, the reply
�20
The Cross of Life.
was: ei Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor
the power of God ; for in the resurrection they neither
marry nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels
of God.
That is to say, there is no perpetuity of
sex, because each component part of the individual
returns to be reposited in its appropriate portion of
the Twy-form Deity, which evolved, and still main
tains, the Life which had been momentarily exhibited
in personal form. Now this statement of the disin
tegration of sex is undoubtedly an assertion of the
disintegration of individuality, because sex is the pri
mary condition of individuality.
Hence we find that Scripture, Reason, and Science
agree in supporting the testimony of this forgotten
old Cross, and unite in the creed that, while Life is
necessarily Everlasting, the needful factor which makes
it so is the fleeting character of all personality.
Is this cruel doctrine ? Nay ; but the gentlest gos
pel of tender Divine benevolence. How much crueller
would be the notion of personal immortality ? Once
accept it as true that our dear dead preserve their
individuality after death’s disintegration, and we are
driven perforce to the conclusion, either that they are
faithless, or else that Deity is cruel.
We all know, of bitter surety, that our dead never
answer our tears, our heart-yearnings, our prayers for
assurance in any form whatever of their continued
existence and sympathy. Yet do we believe them
faithless? We know we do not. And it is just
because we know they are not faithless that charla
tanism has ever found willing dopes, led by the most
transparent professions, to look for a reproduction of
“ A touch of the vanished hand
And the sound of the voice that is still.”
Yet those who know what human love is—and who
does not ?—know surely that there is nothing in this
world or the next—no power in heaven or hell—that
could keep two truly loving beings from commu
�The Cross of Life.
21
nicating with one another so long as conscious
personality lasted.
There have been men and
women in the world—there are still—who have
braved obstacles to which death is a trifle, in order
to convey a mere word of comfort and continued
trust to one another. In the case of death we know
that the silence does not proceed from indifference on
our side of the gulf. Our own hearts tell us that it
does not proceed from indifference on theirs. All
Nature, as symbolised by this old Cross, unites in pro
testing that the very worst form of blasphemy against
the Divine Love is to suppose that Deity shuts our
dear dead in an unseen other-world cage, against
whose eternal bars He leaves them evermore to beat
the wings of conscious personal intelligence, crying
always to make us hear, but all in vain, because He
forbids. We cannot bo blaspheme at once our dead
friends and our dear God. We know they are only
silent because their mortal personality is absorbed in
the eternal Extasy of the Divine, and it suffices to be
assured of their everlasting Life by seeing the Divine
renewal of all Life from day to day. We can also
depend that, if our own mere personal love be tender,
the Love which produces all Life (of which personal
love is but a mortal part) must be infinitely tenderer
still—far deeper and nobler than all the personality
which it momentarily illuminates.
But the notion of personality continuing after
death is practically refuted by us in all the ordinary
actions of life. For, whenever a bereaved person
takes his own life in the firm belief that he will
thereby personally rejoin one whom he has loved
and lost, the world’s verdict is justly one of tem
porary insanity. They recognise that the man was
suffering from delusion and hallucination. But,
were it really believed that he would gain his object,
the idea of delusion or hallucination could not be
entertained. It is, however, instinctively felt that
�22
The Cross of Life.
the man was deluding himself as to the first condi
tion of continuous Life. The same feeling is exempli
fied another way. Second marriages would be the
cruellest and cowardliest form of bigamy, and would
be regarded as such by all the world, were it truly
believed that a dead partner remained personally con
scious of the circumstances attending the re-marriage
of his or her mate. Indeed, all the duties and rela
tions of daily life would be unendurable did we
believe we were consciously watched by dumb dead,
whose eternal personality was cursed with the doom
of eternal inability to communicate with us.
The fact of our possessing personal consciousness is
insufficient as a ground for belief in our own personal
immortality. A man may say, “ I know I am a
conscious thinker; that is the only thing I really do
know; everything else is inference ; and I am so
satisfied of my conscious thought as to believe myself
an eternal entity, and therefore a cause and not an
effect.” But our knowledge of our own personal
consciousness is very limited. The time we have to
study it is but short. We can only assert our con
sciousness from moment to moment, and it is so little
under our own control that it is frequently inter
rupted by sleep and other causes. But all we do
know of it distinctly contradicts the idea of its im
mortality. The assertion, “ I think, and therefore I
am,” is but the assertion of momentary personality.
But we cannot say, “ I think, and therefore I always
was, and therefore I always shall be.” For, so far
as we know, a hundred years ago, “ I,” this per
sonal individuality, did not think, and therefore luas
not. And, so far as we know, a hundred years hence,
“ I,” this personal individuality, will not think, and
therefore will not be. We know that our “conscious
thought ” has grown out of un-consciousness—for
where was our boasted conscious thought at the time
of our birth, or say some hundred years before it ?
�The Cross of Life.
25
We have no consciousness whatever of this individual
personality previous to birth, and have therefore no
reason to anticipate it after death. Experience
teaches us that conscious thought is a growth as
gradual as bodily growth, and subject to similar enfeeblement and decay. Our powers of conscious
thinking not only grow and develope with years, but
fade with them, and depend for their brightness on
the precarious tenure of bodily health. Sickness
undermines them, the more so the nearer the sickness
is unto death. And if we notice this gradual extin
guishment up to the last point, why assert that no
sooner is the lamp turned out than it is fully alight ?
There is no form of animated matter which we see
around us in Nature but sacrifices personality to
renewed life ; and it is unreasonable to seek a soli
tary exception in the case of mankind. We share
conscious thought with many of the inferior animals
—possibly in a superior degree—but, possessed in
whatever degree, self-consciousness cannot constitute
a “ cause,” instead of an “ effect.” Nothing can be
cause and effect too. Man must be one or the other,
but cannot be both. God must be one or the other,
but cannot be both. All personal consciousness
teaches us that we human beings are only effects,
and very momentary effects. It further teaches us
that there can be only One Cause ; that we are con
sciously not that Cause, but yet are conscious that
there is a Cause. That Cause must needs be so far
above personality, and above comprehension by per
sonality, as to be “ past finding out; ” and we can
but dimly worship Him, through pictures and para
bles, and are as sure to make a God in our own image
as it is sure that He made us in His.
Consciousness and thought are but parts of the phe
nomena of Life in its higher manifestations ; and the
gradation all down the scale of Creation is so complete
that it is difficult to see, if we accept the immortal
�24
The Cross of Life,
individuality of man, how we can reject the immortal
individuality of the grain of wheat. The Life endures
everlastingly ; but its momentary individual charac
teristics perish. Doubtless there are forms of Life
far higher and grander than mere consciousness and
thought—forms to which the life that now animates
us may attain as it passes through the unwasting
process of eternal disintegration and renewal. And
the prospect of this is surely better than the con
ceited desire of souls to be fossilised in any form of
momentary personality. That would mean a clean
stoppage of the eternal process of Regeneration,
which in Nature stands never still like the fabled
sun upon Gibeon, or the moon in the Valley of
Ajalon.
Nor have we any right to complain, this being so,
that Nature is malignant and merciless, or say that
human life is a fraud. It cannot be so if one ade
quately feels the grandeur of the idea of the Absolute
Indestructibility of Life, its glorious renewal, and the
certainty that individual life can never lose anything
but its individuality—which is the last thing that men,
taught to thirst for higher life, would ever wish to
retain. All the truly refined parts of life needs must
last for ever, to be the perpetual germ of higher and
higher individualities. And what is there about
momentary individuality to make people, with Eternal
Life in them, so anxious to prolong that individuality
beyond its natural term ? The assurance of Life
Everlasting suffices for the happiness of all Nature,
and fills the Universe with unending praise.
If we were never to advance beyond present per
sonality, and had only to look forward to a kind of
spiritual mummification, in which individual pecu
liarities were preserved to all eternity, man would be
of all living organisms the most unfortunate. The
roses *nd the daisies would have a better life; they at
t
east, ia their ever-renewed bloom, are gifted with for
�The Cross of Life.
25
getfulness of all, save their Maker’s face. Personality is
not good enough, and should not be desirable enough,
to make one wish for its perpetuity. The best of
men that ever lived could not last out an eternal indi
viduality. But eternal life is mercifully incompatible
with eternal individuality ; for life is growth, and
growth is change ; and change involves decay and
renovation. And further, the eternity of the indi
vidual would require a fortiori the eternity of species
—whereas we know species not to be eternal.
But why should we be so conceited ? Personality
is the very lowest characteristic of created Life. The
huge wheeling planets and circling stars, that roam
the sky in rampant life, boast no personality ; and
the best proof of the fundamental truth of all sys
tems of religion lies in the fact that they all alike
teach us to despise personality, to sink self, and to
absorb the individual will in the Divine aspiration—
1‘ Thy will be done.”
We die like the flowers, and have everlasting life
on the same terms as they; for the vital principle of
flowers never fails, but is wastelessly perpetuated
throughout all generations.
Life is only the Twy-form Divine becoming conscious
of itself. This dual cause of life can have no independent
personality. Life is manifestly a result, not a cause;
the product of two ever combined Life-producing
Forces which have not life, but live in their incessant
productions. The lightning is the manifestation of
two forces, neither of which is lightning or like
lightning; an invisible positive force of electricity
meets an invisible negative force, and the result of
their embrace is that they expend the dazzling forkSo God, as we call the Almighty Twy-force, manifests
himself in the flesh; and we, and all animated life,
are his spirit in combustion. In him we live and
move, and have our being. But God himself, the Twyform, is above and beyond all our conceptions of person-
�2.6
The Cross of Life.
ality. Wherefore we need not be so eager to retain
immortal personality for ourselves, when God himself
has none. It should suffice us to know that life cannot
die, but is evermore renewed, God giving it a body as it
pleasethhim. And Nature assures us for certain that this
double and impersonal force is the embodiment of love.
All observation and experience show that the entire
creation and maintenance of life is the product of
love—the loves of the twain. Their Love is our Life.
And Life'is, not God, but the turning into conscious
ness of the two root principles of Divine Force.
Mythology has always personalised the sun ; and
religion has as invariably personalised the life-principle.
And the universal tendency to personalise things is
not objectionable, provided the root principle personal
ised be not hopelessly obscured. But mythology and
religion seldom stray quite away from their objects. The
instinctive feeling of the human race keeps all parables
approximately true to their origin. But to attribute
personality to the Divine Source, in any literal sense,
is as mistaken as for individuals to claim an eternal
personality for themselves, in spite of the unanimous
evidence of Nature to the contrary. It is impossible
to have experience of i/mpersonal forces of Nature
—like the wind, the storm, and the huge restless sea—
without feeling their superiority to personality, and
the impotence of personality to cope with them. They
are tremendously greater .Powers than any kind of
personality of which we can conceive. Yet we know
that these are far inferior to the grand Impersonal
Life-powers that wheel the planets in their awful or
bits. And even these Powers themselves must be
infinitely inferior to the Supreme Producing Force of
which they, like us, are only the manifestations. For
the Lord is not in the whirlwind, and not in the
earthquake, and not in the fire—these are but the off
casts of the great Creative Force. It is certain that
we must soar far higher than the notion of a personal
�The Cross of Life.
27
Deity to obtain an adequate idea of the Supreme
Producing Forces whose unending Love is the Life
which we and all things live for ever in constantly
changing personalities. Force, wherever we see it,
is a higher and more godlike thing than any morsel
of personal life. No person can produce Force ; all
the personality in the world has never yet generated
a single particle of Force. We can use the ready
made forces of Nature, but we cannot make any for
ourselves. It is clear, then, that personality cannot
produce Force; and it follows inevitably that the
Divine Producer of all Natural Forces cannot be a
personality, but must be an Impersonal Force as infi
nitely higher than all the huge impersonal forces of
Nature, as those impersonal forces of Nature are
infinitely higher than we and our miserably insignifi
cant “personality.”
If this conclusion as to the grand Impersonality of
Deity be as inevitable as it appears, it effectually dis
poses of the paltry argument which says a personal
resurrection is necessary in order to repair individual
rights and wrongs by a future distribution of rewards
and punishments. For, if it be accepted that Deity is a
Twy-force, not a person, it is obvious that the force is
exerted, like the subordinate forces—e.g., the wind and
the sea—beneficently for the greatest good of the
greatest number, but necessarily without consideration
for the individual. It occurs to none to complain of
the individual injustice of the wind or sea, or indeed,
of the inevitable individual injustice of all our
own-made wisest and kindest laws. Besides, any
system of rewards and punishments is a monstrously
imperfect expedient for the adjustment of good and
evil deeds. Neither punishment nor reward canwntfo
a single wrong. The golden rewards of Heaven and
the fiery pains of Hell would be alike powerless to
obliterate any one committed deed, or its unending
influence on life as a whole. Yet the root of the
�28
The Cross of Life.
Heaven and Hell parable is sound. And herein. It
is certain that life may Regenerate as well as regene
rate. We see this in species, as well as in the indi
vidual. And no man can wantonly disobey Natural
Law without suffering for it, not only in his momentary
personality, but in the injury done to the Eternal Life
through which every particle of his indestructible
matter and spirit has to pass. The individual life of
all species must either improve or degrade; but
though individuals may so injure themselves that the
eternal Life particle by which they are inspired may
even have to go back as far as its organic form for
regeneration, yet the world’s old belief that Good
will ultimately prevail over Evil is justified by the
gradual improvement of life and intelligence. To
suppose that the Twy-form Life-giver—the Infinite
Mother and Father, Aditi, to use the child-language of
the Vedic hymns—punishes, or is vindictive, or per
mits unmerited suffering, in order to be worshipped
for soothing the remembrance of injustice with the
golden largess of Heaven, is blasphemy against all
Nature, if the doctrine of Heaven and Hell is literally
understood instead of tracing it to its root. The
placid T wy-form Principle which inspires life and gene
ration is absolutely Impassionate Law andForce, and is
so manifested in universal Life. The stone falls not
to crush us ; but they that fall upon the stone must
be broken. We human creatures adjust things in a
rough kind of way by a system of punishments; and
by disregarding these artificial laws, imposed by
civilisation for mutual protection, a man suffers in
his personality.
But if he disregards the impas
sionate laws of Nature, he is self-punished in the de
terioration of his immortal life, and the necessity for
its assuming a lower form. This is the germ from
which all the personalised schemes of eternal punish
ment and immortal reward have developed them
selves.
�The Cross of Life.
29
The remarkable tendency of all known species to
sport and aberrate from the parent stock, and in due
time to form new species, is a natural law, and appears
to be a condition, of the Regeneration of Life. It is
so recognised in the animal and vegetable kingdoms.
But, in the case of man, the tendency to err
from the normal standard is artificially described as
“ sin ” or crime. This is socially provided against by
the penal laws of communities. But the Divine sys
tem of adjusting what we ignorantly term Evil—which
is probably no more evil than the friction attending
all motion—is not penal, but regenerative. Evil is
at least used, like the decayed dough in the flour, to
leaven the mass. Indeed no kind of life which we
may superficially regard as spoiled or degraded, is
ever wasted. It is invariably regenerated and uti
lised to its utmost capabilities by the divine Life
generators, who ordain the survival of the fittest,
while decreeing the necessity of emulation and suffer
ing as the condition of improved life.
It is common to arrogate to man an exclusive mono
poly in the possession of what is called Free Will; and
therefrom to argue that man has an exclusive mono
poly in future punishments and rewards. Of course
man’s “ Free Will ” is not absolutely free, its exercise
being restricted by the laws and social restraints
imposed by communities for self-protection, and also
by the restraints of the ordained Law of Life, which
cannot be disobeyed with impunity. But man has no
monopoly in free will. He shares its possession with
the animals, and with all other kinds of animated
life. Every living thing has the power to sport and
aberrate, and to take its choice, subject to the inevit
able consequences of disregarding the Law of Life—
which law encourages the best forms of individual
life, but discourages deteriorating forms. A dog
has the same free will as a man. If a dog is whistled
to by his owner and called to come to him, that dog
�30
The Cross of Life.
has the same power as a man to choose one of two
courses, and decide yes or no, whether he will come
to his master with a wag of his tail and lick his
hand, or whether he will bolt off with his tail between
his legs. The dog’s decision is so far free that he
has a choice ; but it is a choice restricted by the
knowledge of consequences ; he knows he must
either obey or suffer. Man’s free will is held and
exercised on the same terms as the dog’s ; and is
just as much restricted by law, human and divine.
There are fortunately many artificial laws for the
protection of social life, which if a man offends he
suffers in his personality. But there is the Divine
law of life, which none can offend without injury to
the immortal life in him, the life which outlasts his per
sonality. All law is of course impersonal; and nobody
believes otherwise, although we personalise human
law into a blind goddess, bearing a pair of scales.
The Divine law and cause of life must be equally im
personal ; and it is only because Divine law has been
parabolised, to meet the vulgar comprehension, into
an all-powerful Personal God, who permits evil in
order to punish it vindictively, and rewards virtue
with the bribe of a golden heaven, that the grand old
root of an Impersonal Law and Cause of Life has
become obscured. All things living know that dis
obedience to the Divine Law and Cause of Life means
maiming and degeneration. But the degeneration is
not vindictive—it is vindicative. It is the vindica
tion of the squanderously beneficent Law of Life,
which decrees the survival of the fittest, and the
decay of failures into forms more elementary for
the purpose of future regeneration.
PRINTED BY C. W. REYNELL, LITTLE PULTENEY STREET, HAYMARKET.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
The cross of Osiris, or the cross of life
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Jones, Eustace Hinton
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: Upper Norwood, London
Collation: 30 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Printed by C.W. Reynell.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Thomas Scott
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1878
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
CT77
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The cross of Osiris, or the cross of life), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Subject
The topic of the resource
Immortality
Conway Tracts
God-Attributes
Immortality
Religion
-
https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/2f6d118af64c262561efd842ea81d11a.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=e1Tm0B1WefxCEPr-qqYyiT7xhduHRfVR8DBpT6CO5-WMx4xD-eXlVeVReP9DMf1Kitm4ccWnr8B6qAxOaxDT9r69pnlgMiKe6sB-1eMLUqtqEbPVlGqIvtMqKtYZs723ZAfmw5yqB8b7xMF08o3TgY8jO2Op2v6eB1ZVZKOml0ShXhoOYoWKGcm7itAZzFW1KvDSxqihkwedNjLP44iEDITFXFNrmGossCIf9iNNzX6wz7AxlZlJVtoJNxFEWwX7wOISihAa8qU-bOTTMiTTR8C7MawabWAmI81qiZh0j3ntfN6ODpdKCZTdrpilTnlr86YP-pfe%7Eh4ZNGOST4JUVA__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
e0db98836a6abc81c5d29040af4cf9ec
PDF Text
Text
RELIGION VIEWED AS DEVOUT OBEDIENCE
TO THE LAWS OF THE UNIVERSE.
F one had the required power, leisure, and knowledge
for the purpose, no work could be undertaken, at
present, as it seems to me, more seasonable or more use
ful than to write a book on Religion viewed as consisting,
simply, of devout obedience to the laws of the universe,
and, in so far, as being obedience to the God of the
universe.
I do not pretend that this definition of religion is
absolutely perfect. But whatever its defects may be, it
has, at least, one advantage. It lifts the subject out of
the region of all dogmatic controversy. It runs back
to ultimate principles, and is the only definition I can
think of that is likely ever to bring rational and nnprejudiced men everywhere into religious agreement.
It rises above the narrow and superstitious tests of
churches, and aims not, as sectarianism has done, at
breaking up society, but at building it up. It takes
account of men, not as believers in this metaphysical
theology or the other, but simply as constituent parts
of Humanity, and refuses, at all hazards, to acknowledge
them under any more limiting classification.
All that can be attempted in this short paper is to
group together a few ideas on the subject, and to offer
them only as rough and fragmentary materials for a
chapter in the suggested volume, which, I hope, may
some day be undertaken by an abler pen than mine.
Perhaps the most noticeable fact to the reader of
history is that Humanity has been looked upon by the
I
�4
Religion Viewed as Devout Obedience
wise and good in all past ages as out of gear in relation
to itself and to the whole physical and moral order of
things; and philosophers, prophets, patriots, politicians,
and philanthropists have, up till now, been thinking
and toiling in their respective centuries, and in their
several ways, to set it right. But this is found to be a
longer and more difficult business than most of us, in
our juvenile dreams, had supposed.
Moreover, the
good work has been too often complicated and retarded
by the remedial schemes proposed being extremely
partial. In some cases these schemes have had the
misfortune to be based on an incorrect diagnosis of the
disease, and consequently have not touched more than
a very limited part of the surface to be covered by the
remedy. In other cases they have been marred by the
silly conceits of the world’s benefactors and their
disciples—the representatives of each cure praising
their own as the only right one, and running down
that propounded by their neighbours.
There can be little doubt that the ancient seers and
reformers of the East battled with each other over their
rival efforts to raise the people of their times, and
weakened their most zealous attempts by jealousies and
struggles for mere theoretic and party victory. The
sectarian divisions of philosophers and theologians in
India and China date back, it is impossible to say how
far, and continue in bitterness up to this moment.
The Jews were so vain of their systems of healing error
and evil that they handed over even their own Samari
tan kinsfolk to reprobation for the crime of following
their religious convictions in preference to the creed
and rubric prescribed at Jerusalem; and if we knew
all, it is very probable that this arrangement of holy
cursing was punctually observed on both sides.
The Greek schools of philosophy were so busy in
attacking each other’s ideas—the Stoics finding fault
with the Epicureans and the Platonists with the
Sophists—that these profound sects had neither time
�To the Laws of the Universe.
5
nor strength left to test their different experiments in
the raising of the helot population around them.
Nor does Christianity form an exception to this rule.
It, too, had its enemies in the orthodox Scribes and
Pharisees, as previous great schemes and efforts had
their opponents; and so wrapt up were those Jewish
dignitaries in their traditions and ritual that they
could see no salvation outside their own pale, and
would rather that the author of Christianity should
perish ignominiously than that his more realistic
teachings should supersede their rabbinical subtleties
and ceremonial insipidities. The unhappy persecutions
of the followers of Jesus by each other, too, since those
times are familiar to all; so that the saying has passed
into a proverb, that the greatest barrier to the extension
of Christianity has been Christians.
But, at all events, it is painfully evident that, after
all the systems for removing human evils which have
been contrived or set on foot, Republics, Churches,
Utopias, Arcadias, “ New Moral Worlds/’ St Simonism,
Fourrierism, and the like, after all the battles of religions
and philosophies that have been fought—the state of
the world is still, without doubt, a great deal worse
than it ought to be.
The tastes and habits of the masses of the people
may not be so openly barbarous as in ages gone by,
but still society is ill at ease with itself. Whether wre
look in the walks of commerce, the sphere of politics,
the family, or the social circle, we find that the mass of
the people continue under the sway of mad passion or
foolish prejudice. We are over-ridden by priestcraft,
social enmities, and class inequalities; capital and
labour bidding each other defiance; pauperism draining
the resources of the honest and the thrifty by its hungry
and oppressive demands, and crushing the higher
possibilities of the pauper’s nature; crime, sparing
neither age nor sex in the havoc it is continually
making with human life and property; hard and fast
�6
Religion Viewed as Devout Obedience
lines, ridiculously capricious, drawn between class and
class; vice, sitting without a blush in high places, and
making its contagion to be felt, more or less, through
out all grades of society; ignorance, holding its carnival
in the lanes and alleys of our great towns.
What is to be done with these moral and physical
pestilences'? No past religious, philanthropic or politi
cal system, has thus far been anything like a success
in dealing with them; and the proof of this is as
ironical as it is real. The countries which get the
greatest credit for possessing pure religion are the homes
of the darkest deeds, and after we have accomplished
our fondest wishes in the adjustment of the relations
between Church and State, and the reform of our Par
liament, and the recognition of woman’s rights, and the
settlement of social and international differences by
arbitration, and the universal extension of education,
I fear the millennium will yet be a good way off. Are
we quite sure that we have distinctly understood the
ailment of the patient? If not, we need not be sur
prised that we should not have hit upon the adapted
remedy.
One thing is certain, that old theories of
“ sin ” and “ the devil ” have failed to account for
the disorder, and equally superannuated theories of
“grace” and “supernatural regeneration” have failed
to remove it, to say nothing of the doubtful benefit
to the character in the case of those who profess to
believe and follow such notions.
Forbid that I should disparage any earnest experiments
to improve the world which history records. There is
much in past leading systems of religion, philosophy,
and ethics that shews them to have begun in a sincere
attempt to advance the world’s good, though their
gradual enfeeblement and decay proves that they were
only intended to bring partial and temporary relief, and
to be mere foreshadowings of the true and complete
Temedy.
Indeed, it could not be otherwise with
methods planned before the idea of conformity to
�To the Laws of the Universe.
7
natural law came to be discovered and comprehended
as the one effectual and permanent cure for the world’s
errors and sufferings.
If I have expressed, then, in the last sentence, the
only fixed and absolute condition of the deliverance of
Humanity from the manifold burdens under which it
groans, I show no disrespect to that form of religion
which traditional Christians tell us is to cover the earth
and change it into a moral and physical paradise. I am
not aware that I cast any slight upon Christianity, as
commonly understood, if I venture to say that, in the
nature of things, it is impossible that it can ever achieve
such an universal triumph. Whatever in it is naturally
permanent will prevail, but nothing else. The best systems
ever founded before the principle of scientific induction
came to be known and applied in the investigation of
law in the universe and in human history, must neces
sarily be limited in the time and area of their influence.
If they rest on any authority short of the cultured and
unsophisticated reason of Humanity, and on any authority
short of universal law—whether that authority be ch urch,
book, or man—their power can only be temporary. They
contain within themselves the elements of eventual de
cay as systems, though whatever modicum of truth may
be in them will be taken up by the system which at
length is destined to advance beyond and displace them.
I do not hesitate to assert that the popular habit in
Europe and America of regarding Christianity as the
final and absolute revelation of God’s moral nature
and will to man and as the sole medium of regenerating
society, has no historical basis to rest upon, and is, in
fact, a species of idolatry. The orthodox theory of
Christianity, by centering the thought and veneration of
mankind in a man, a book and a theology all belonging
to a period between one and two thousand years ago
(though several of the evangelical tenets are much more
recent,) tends to check that free and onward develop
ment of our perceptions which was clearly the design of
God in the arrangements of our being and of the
�8
Religion Viewed as Devout Obedience
*
universe.
The traditional founder of that religion,
moreover, judging from what trustworthy statements
the New Testament contains about him,—would be the
last man to give countenance to so pernicious an idea,
tending, as it does, to arrest the progress of the
human mind in its pursuit of the new forms of truth
that daily invite our study. At the outset of his career
as a teacher and before the foolish worship of J ewish
peasants brought any shadow of ego-ism upon his con
stitutionally self-forgetful nature, he seems to have
breathed a truly universal spirit,—the spirit of a
brother of all Humanity. No doubt, at first, his simple
aim was to lay the foundation of man’s future good in
piety and charity sufficiently broad and deep to carry
the world-w'de moral structure he proposed to raise upon
it. It must be admitted that the mzZ as distinguished
from the mythical Jesus towers above all the ancient
* The eminent statistician, Professor Leone Levi, a short
time ago delivered an address at Birmingham on the issues of
the Bible, which brings out the monstrous views of the
character of God held by the orthodox in a light not intended
by the speaker. He said, ‘ ‘ the Mission of the British and
Foreign Bible Society was simply this—to see that every
individual in the world had a copy of the Bible in his own
vernacular. Consider what this meant : in this wide, wide
world of ours, scattered over its continents and its islands
there were 1100 million human beings. How many Bibleshad
been issued for them ? Taking the issues of this and of all
other societies, including Bibles, Testaments and portions of
Scripture, there was 112,000,000, or including issues from
private sources, 120,000,000. Taking one-fourth of the people
and apportioning the Bible (among them) there would be one in
40............ Taking the number of Bibles which had been dis
tributed as being now in existence, the number would be
8,000,000 and if it was over 10,000,000 the proportion of Bibles
to people would be one in four. In France the proportion was
probably one in 20 ; in Italy one in 30; in China one in 600,
and in India one in 2000.” But even granting that the supply
of Bibles circulated had been at all equal to the number of
adults in the world capable to read them the professor goes on
to inform us that “a great hindrance to the diffusion of the
Bible was the comparatively small number of readers. “ Tak-
�To the Laws of the Universe.
9
seers known to us in the clearness of his perceptions of
the grand secrets of men’s moral growth; viz. looking
upon God as a Father and upon mankind as a brother
hood, knowing no orthodoxy but loyalty to conscience,
and disapproving no infidel ity\m.\> infidelity to conscience,
living up to your lights and conceding credit for sincerity
to all who reverently differ from you. Such a beautiful
blending of unselfish truth-seeking and charity is quite
enough, without any effete theory of supernaturalism, to
account for the spread of Christianity in spite of the
superstition, bigotry, anderrorwithwhichhuman passions
have, from the first, alloyed it. But looking at the whole
question of religion in the light of modern research, it
must forcibly strike us that the religion associated with
the name of Jesus—very wise and good though many of
its principles are—-could not, by any means, ever serve
the purpose of an authoritative and exhaustive exposition
of religion for all Humanity and for all time. The line of
ing the number of recruits as a guide, he found that in Prussia
4 in every 100 could neither read nor write, in Belgium 14, in
Great Britain 21, in France 23, in Italy 70, and in Austria
71.” The gist of these remarks is that to meet the religious
wants of 1,100,000,000 human beings there have only been
sent forth 120,000,000 portions of the Bible or 8,000,000
entire copies of it. So that, at most, only a little over
100,000,000 have it in their power to possess individually a
copy of even a portion of the Bible while there are still little
short of 1,000,000,000 or nearly ten-elevenths of the inhabit
ants of the world left without even the smallest portion of the
book. Yet, according to the popular faith, that volume is the
sole revelation of truth and duty to the world, and he who dies
ignorant of Jesus as the atoning sacrifice for “original ” and
“actual” sin must be eternally roasted or annihilated. That
is to say, for not doing what it is totally impossible for them
to do, ten-elevenths of the inhabitants of the world are doomed
to the most frightful destruction. The case is aggravated
when we take into account the unhappy fact that many who
happen to possess the Bible are denied ability to read it, in
general from no fault of their own, but only from the destitu
tion or the neglect of their parents. Almost any deity in the
pantheon of ancient paganism is a fitter object of worship than
a god so grossly immoral as the God of Evangelicism.
B
�io
Religion Viewed as Devout Obedience
religious thought marked out in the New Testament, as
far as it is true, forms but an arc in the circle of universal
moral truth. Jesus probably spoke and lived the high
est and most comprehensive moral truth possible to his
times and the one most needed by the world at that
stage of its culture. He enunciated the eternal and
unchangeable principles of morality and religion with
unsurpassed fervour and wisdom. But voices were to
speak whose time had not come yet. Humanity was
not then prepared to understand them. Laws of the
universe were yet to be revealed, but their revelation to
the prophets and teachers of the future was to be brought
about by slow and gradual preparation. Not even the
highest and truest seer of those dimmer times was premitted to anticipate, in detail, the further unfolding of
the mysteries of God and of the universe which would
be needed, and made when needed, at a distant day.
The moral experiments that have been tried in the
past, therefore,—not excepting organized Christianity,
have been too local, too partial, too much mixed up
with party interests, and too unscientific to meet the
whole length and breadth of the world’s' present and
future wants. It is according to analogy that the woes
of men and the cure alike, should not come to be known
and realized all at once. The training of the world and
of the child are substantially similar. In both instances
the process is necessarily very gradual.
The individual cannot at first travel in thought
beyond the parental hearth. His parents, in general,
are to him all the providence he knows and all that as
a child he can be expected to know.
His sense of
obedience is directed, in the first instance, only by the
parental approval or displeasure. At length he gets to
know his relation to those beyond the dwelling, and
connected with him by family ties. His next social
experience probably concerns the religious body to
which his parents belong. He comes to think, as most
do, who yield for a while to the teaching of traditional
�0
To the Laws of the Universe.
11
beliefs—that the only effectual method of setting the
world right is the theological method. But if he have
anything like a progressive mind, he will rise, in time,
above and beyond these primal relationships and ideas.
He will take in by and by, his position and duties as a
citizen, and afterwards his connection with the whole
family of Humanity. As he advances from twilight to
day-light he will become firmly established,-—as his
ancestors had not so favourable an opportunity of being
before him, in the immoveable conviction that the
revelation of God and the well-being of man physically,
morally, intellectually and religiously, turn on knowing
and keeping of the laws of the universe. But this last
experience, if it come at all,—comes only in its fulness,
in riper years.
So it is with the race : there is first the tribe ; and
in barbarous times people used to think all other tribes
the natural enemies of their own. They carried the
same prejudice into their religion. Everybody else’s
religion was held to be dangerous and heretical, and
scheming politicians and unscientific traditional systems
have united in strengthening this social and religious
exclusiveness more or less up to the present time.
These primitive circumstances however are the first
“ tutors and governors ” of Humanity. But “when the
fulness of the time has come ” all narrow dogmas and
enslaving creeds and alleged infallible authorities and
sectarian boundaries will perish. It will then be found
that religion, in its broad and absolute form, is but re
motely connected with theologies and churches, and that,
in its greatest purity, truth, and power, it can be culti
vated outside these institutions. And this Emancipation
of the human mind will not consist, as many timid per
sons fear it may, in Humanity merely passing from super
stitions to negations. Humanity will rather be emanci
pated by passing out of useless speculations about what
cannot be proved into positive faith in those great veri
ties and phenomena of the universe which have the
�12
Religion Viewed as Devout Obedience
clearest and closest bearing upon our every-day life. The
transition will be from the experience of the vague and
the partial to that of the plain and the universal. Just
as the worship of things gave way among the Hebrews
to the higher development of Jehovah ivorship, and as
Mosaism was succeeded by Christianity, which latter
form of religion professes to be less occupied with details
and more with principles than the faith which imme
diately preceded it: so, existing systems and sects which
at present claim to have their roots in the religion of
Jesus, must, sooner or later, succumb to a religion
grounded solely upon a devout recognition of the known
laws of the universe, taken as a whole. The operation
of these laws will be deemed by the disciples of this
highest, truest, most absolute, and most practical faith,
the one, all-sufficient and ever-expanding revelation of
truth and duty,—equally accessible and adapted to
men of all countries and times.
Compliance with
these laws will then be viewed as the one sure antidote
to human evil of every kind.
When this religion becomes universal,—as it certainly
will do,—the world will be able to dispense with
ecclesiastical and theological props, with the authority
of tradition, with theories of supernatural interference
and with formulated doctrines, expedient,—perhaps in
some measure necessary, as these things may have been
up to a certain point in the training of Humanity. The
new development of Religion will recognise all feelings,
thoughts, acts, and experiences tending in any way to
our individual elevation and culture, and to the general
good of mankind.
The race will have done with slavish devotion to any
one set of commandments, be they ten or ten thousand,
and to any one written book,—however interesting and
inspiring to us, religiously, that book may be. For only
thus can we rise from letter to spirit, from printed ideas
in one volume—ministering to one part of our nature—
to all thought-prompting and heart-stirring books, which
�To the Laws of the Universe.
13
gleam upon us like the light hues shining through parti
coloured window panes—all fitted to delight, refine and
develop, in due proportion, our whole nature.—We shall
cease to show deference too exclusively to one teacher,
richly endowed though he may be with prophetic gifts.
We shall ever accept his teaching thankfully, as far as
it goes; but our nature is inany-sided, and every part
claims alike to be trained. So in the future to which I
refer, men will everywhere lay themselves open to the
influences of all true teachers who can contribute, in
any wise, to the unfolding of their whole nature in its
nobler individualism, and who can strengthen their rela
tions to the world in charity, harmony and peace. An
universal religion now dawning, but not, as yet, generally
received—not new, but already in its essence, underly
ing all the splintered forms which the religions of the
nations have assumed, will rise upon the ruins of all
existing and conflicting faiths, whether they be based
on tradition or sentiment. Orthodox churches must
die, for they are erected on this latter sandy foundation.
Even churches of more liberal tendencies, unless resolved
to place themselves in accord with the prophets who
stand on the heights of true scientific thought, and
who are “ ringing in the Christ that is to be,” unless,
moreover, they are ready to follow the true spirit of
the age which beckons us forward, they cannot last.
Every religious institution that is accustomed to view
religion chiefly from dogmatic stand-points, and to rest
in the perpetuation of theological shibboleths and anti
quated forms and phrases is already an anachronism.
The church of the future will insist on truth being
looked at, not in relation to barren controversies ecclesi
astical or dogmatic, but simply in relation to God,
Humanity and natural law. It will teach that “the
root of the matter ” can only be reached by the devout
knowledge and application of the laws of the universe,
as far as they can be known and applied. It will urge
upon individuals and communities to consider how far
�14
Religion Viewed as Devout Obedience
they have fallen short of those laws and to help each
other on in the path of intelligent and rational obedience
to them, as the “one sure and certain hope” for the race.
Up till lately.most religious sects have suspected
science as the natural foe of religion. The church ok
humanity to be founded solely on the reverent acknow
ledgment of universal law, will welcome the discoveries
of science in every department as its chief means of know
ing what the will of God is, and how that will is to be
obeyed. The priestly distinction between secular and
sacred, with all the childish folly which that distinction
has wrought, will then cease. Everything whatsoever
which aids in making up a rich and full mind and
character—whether it pertain to health, pleasure, art,
literature, morals, philosophy or devotion, will then be
held to be equally religious. Worship will not then
consist simply or mainly in frequenting churches, and
in offering up prayers and praise,—exercises which how
ever, I admit, are honestly valued by a certain class now,
as helps to a good life. But the pure and loving heart,
the cultured mind, the tender conscience, the enlightened
and happy family, the unselfish friendly circle, will then
everywhere be acknowledged as the true consecrated
altar, and that devotion will be respected as the very
highest expression of religion; which consists of a
brave, kind, and noble life. Our fellowship will then
be based, not so much on connection with some theolo
gical sect as on natural humanitarian sympathy and
enterprise. The ministers of the coming church will
not be men trained chiefly in theories of theology and
church government and in whom, as at present, the lead
ing qualification for their work is the predominance of
the devotional element. Religion will then be felt to
include every development of law affecting individual
and social interests, and so the teachings of that church,
will have a. correspondingly wide range. Each assembly
of kindred minds will have a plurality of ministers,
though they will need no sacerdotal or professional
�To the Laws of the Universe.
L
T5
badge to distinguish them, and these ministers will
number among them all the strongest spirits of the
■ - community who have high truths to tell of whatso
ever kind, and are able to teach them. These minis
ters will include cultivated and earnest men and
women of all occupations and of no occupation. Their
themes will embrace the laws of health, the laws of
mind, the laws of conduct, the laws of sociology, the
laws that govern every department of material and
spiritual life, and they will be listened to with equal
interest upon all these subjects. In that happy day
“ the mountain of the Lord’s House ” shall indeed “ be
established on the top of the mountains and all nations
shall flow into it.”
Now let us see how this notion of religion as the
recognition of and compliance with law will work in
.
effecting the. improvement which the partial systems of
philosophy, philanthropy, and theology have, as yet,
failed adequately to accomplish.
Man’s being an'd character are made up of two
*
. factors:—first, the natural constitution inherited from
those who gave him birth; and, secondly, the educating
conditions in which he has been trained and in which
he lives. Now, there is no religion at present, that I
am acquainted with, which lays it down definitely as
an offence against Law or against God, for two persons
to be united by conjugal ties whose offspring are certain
to be tainted with hereditary blemishes, physical or
• B
moral, through that union. It is seldopi that this is
made a religious question 'at all. Few magistrates or
clergymen would be prepared to take the legal conse
quences of refusing to be a party to the union of such
a pair, rather than be instrumental in introducing
bodily suffering, mental defect, or moral obliquity into
the world. I have met with but few members of popular
religious bodies who seriously look at violation of law in
this respect as having anything to do with religion. But
if the world is to be radically reformed we must begin
�16
Religion Viewed as Devout Obedience
here, and get rid of that morbid squeamishness which
evades so solemn and urgent a consideration. Mr
Herbert Spencer powerfully reminds us in one of his
remarkable essays that, in the rearing of animals for
the race, the hunt, or the market, the necessity of
regard to the law of their breeding is felt to be vitally
important. But when the propagation of human beings,
with “sound minds in sound bodies,” is at issue, this
matter is usually left to the control of chance or caprice,
the impulse of passion, or the motive of social aggran
disement. To make the most sacred earthly alliance
subservient to the mere demands of the lower nature, or
to the ridiculous demands of the deity of fashion, is to
desecrate an institution which was expressly ordained
to be the mightiest lever in the elevation of the race,
and to evince, moreover, a state of mind grossly irre
ligious. But the natural penalties which persistently
and without exception track this most “respectable”
sort of folly, ignorance, and transgression, prove unmistakeably that “higher law” has been outraged by
such acts.
Mr Huxley’s well-known essay on “ The Physical
Basis of Life” has in it, I think, the elements of the
psychology of the future; and the tendency of the
greatest philosophic minds, at present, is in the direc
tion of believing that the cast of one’s thoughts, tastes,
and habits depends even more, if possible, upon our
born physical organisation than upon the moulding
agencies by which our daily life afterwards may be
surrounded. In fact, education is but a leading out of
what powers may be in the brain, and not so much the
altering of its original structure; and I believe the day
will come when married combinations, physically and
morally unequal, will be pronounced to be wrong as
emphatically on religious grounds as they now are on
scientific grounds, because, then science will be reve
renced as one of the mainsprings of religious emotion
and action. As the knowledge of the secrets of nature
�To the Law of the Universe.
*7
gets more spread abroad, an. increasingly deterrent
influence will be exerted upon all who may seek to
enter the family relation from sensual or sordid
motives.
If, in short, the scientific conditions of
begetting a progeny, vigorous in mind and body, be
not thoughtfully recognised as the basis of our opera
tions in the general improvement of mankind, the best
choice of schools, books, companionships, and principles
for children afterwards, will be almost labour lost.
“How is it possible,” some may object, “to secure
spontaneity and depth in the loves of the sexes by such
an arrangement?” My reply is not difficult.
Does
not the reason, at present, usually come somewhat into
play, to determine, first, when and where love is to be
encouraged, in what are deemed “ prudent marriages?”
Men and women already, for the most part, let con
siderations of suitability go before and direct matri
monial selections, in respect of station and culture, at
least, in the middle and upper classes ; and when
scientific intelligence on this subject is more widely
diffused, the reason will command and shape the out
going of the affections so as to secure right physical
and moral conditions in the domestic partners sought for.
There is a fine touch in the gospel parable of the
sower, which I do not happen to have seen noticed
anywhere, bearing on the vital importance of natural
susceptibilities.
The writer distinctly lays it down
there that Jesus trusted more to the innately can
did, self-forgetful, truth-loving disposition than to
any outward and applied scheme of regeneration
in producing that disposition. In that parable he
accounts for the inoperativeness of his teaching in
certain classes of persons, and in every such case traces
the cause of spiritual insensibility to the particular
constitutional tendencies of the recipient, and, at the
same time, shows the happy affinity that there is
between the universal moral truth he strove to teach
and “ the good and honest heart,” the truly gentlemanly
�18
Religion Viewed as Devout Obedience
*
nature.
Like all other great and good qualities in
Humanity, this one, if it exist at all, must be born
with us. It may be feebly simulated, but can never
be acquired by any evangelical or other -process. In
this respect it is just on a footing with intellectual
qualities. The man of bright parts cannot help being
clever; the man of obtuse faculties can never rise above
dulness. No more can he of high moral qualities, if
justice be done to his training, be other than righthearted. To bring into being, then, a generation that
shall rise above their ancestors in all the higher attri
butes of manhood and womanhood, we must become
more religious — wider in our conceptions of what
religion is in its relation to natural law, and more
devoutly alive to the necessity of loyalty to natural
law in relation to parentage as an indispensable con
dition of human improvement.
But when we have achieved this essential prelimi
nary to the world’s advancement, there is still a great
deal to be done before we get civilised communities—•
to say nothing of barbarians—to lay to heart religiously
their duty as to the education and training of their
children. Before popular organized religion be good’
for much, it must cease the mystical business of arraying
itself in ceremonial vestments and lifting up a whining
voice, and dealing in super-mundane phraseology and
ghostly manipulations, and giving itself to vague un
realities ; it must have done with its weird way of
holding itself aloof from the practical world, as if its
sorcery-mongering were a higher sort of exercise than
* It is not uninteresting to observe that the phrase, KaXy Kat
aya.Oy, which occurs in the parable (Luke viii. 15), to describe
the approved state of heart, is the very one used by Plato,
with only a difference of gender, to describe a gentleman, and
the writer of the parable probably intended to convey the
idea that only the disposition which was naturally ingenuous
could ever have the courage, honesty, and readiness to receive
truth for its own sake, independently of the name and position
of the teacher and of the consequences to the recipient.
�T) the Laws of the Universe.
i9
“ waiting upon the oracles of nature,” and serving God
by solemnly keeping nature’s laws. Most earnest men,
who put a right value upon the scientific method, of
viewing the universe and of doing duty, are fast getting
to look upon much that goes on in churches and chapels
as a fanatical perversion of true religion. . Before
popular organized religion be good for much, it must
not confine its attention so exclusively to teaching the
young, Sunday after Sunday, what happened to the old
Hebrews, and the alleged incidents in the life of Jesus
or of Paul, and the contents of some gospel or epistle,
proper as these things are to be known in their place,
though forming a very small part of the infinite circle
of truth; it must take the form of bringing up the rising
race, in every respect, in harmony with the eternal laws
of their being and development. The first thing reli
giously demanded of us is, that the child have secured to
him, as far as possible, thorough vigour of brain and
muscle and proportionateness of form, as the groundwork
of all future culture. He should next be trained to the
habit of accurately observing the ordinary objects that
meet his eye in the nursery and in his daily walks. He
should be brought in contact with refining influences in
the scenery, the sounds, the pictures, and the persons
around -him • and when the Government and the nation
become religiously impressed with a sense of duty in
the education and development of the children of the
State—which they.are far from being, at present-—the
lot of no citizen will be incompatible with those con
ditions. Not only should the imagination be early
filled with visions of varied beauty, but the memory—
‘which is so largely drawn upon for the data of reasoning
in after life—should be systematically stored with wellsifted facts, and where fictions are admitted they should
be distinctly labelled as such, whether they be found
in the Bible or any other book. When he has learned
the leading realities of the universe and the outlines of
human history, he should be trained to the right use of
�-20
Religion Viewed as Devout Obedience
his reason, and taught to put on one side what cannot
be proved by evidence, whether it relate to science or
morals, and to cleave through good and through evil
report only to what has forced itself upon him as matter
of conviction. While made to feel that he must con
form to reason and law in using his senses and his
appetites, and to be severely exact in all details per
taining to the exercise of the intellect, he will have
to be taught to remember that both physical and intel
lectual powers are intended to he subject to the control
of the moral. The discipline of the conscience is seldom
conducted with that specific discrimination to which it
is entitled. When we consider the subtle influences by
which it is prone to be warped—some of these arising
from the excessive and dominant activity of certain other
parts of the nature, and others arising from outward
circumstances unfavourable to clear moral ideas and
the self-denying performance of duty; when we con
sider that the prevailing tone of society is against
our feeling with scrupulous delicacy on moral questions,
and that there is no sphere of work or pleasure free from
temptations to our tampering with the moral faculty,
surely the education of it, on philosophical principles,
ought to receive more anxious attention than it usually
does. Otherwise, the law of proportion, which is the
test of correct human development, will be disturbed
and the design of existence frustrated.
The culture of the child’s emotions should next en
gage thought and effort that they may always be con
trolled by sober, well-considered conclusions of the
judgment, and that they may be kept from running to
the equally dangerous extremes of stoicism and
fanaticism.
Strict regard to the law of our mental structure and
progress also requires that we give just and proper
scope to the exercise of the child’s social affections, never
allowing him to shrink from the sight of pain, squalor,
or poverty in others, but making contact with such
�To the Laws of the Universe.
21
experience the occasion of stimulating and guiding
those sympathic human feelings that cannot be held
back from their appropriate objects without marring
the symmetry of our nature. A lively connection
should also be established in our little ones between
the decisions of the judgment and the will, the ap
pointed vehicle for carrying out the behests of all the
other powers. In brief, if, in the process of training,
we fail to treat the child’s nature as a sacred whole ; if
we fail to remember that we cannot slight or mis
manage one faculty without more or less weakening
and lowering all, we violate the laws inscribed upon
our constitution, and act irreligiously.
Are these views of religion prominently set forth in
the teachings of the pulpit ? Do they mainly influence
church-going populations 1 So far from this being the
case, I fear that any painstaking effort to adapt the
training of youth to the repression of innate weaknesses,
and to the bringing out of the nobler parts, of the
organization in a strong and well-balanced life is rarely
felt by the orthodox to have much to do with religion.
There is a sad lack of system and principle in the choice
of the things taught, and in the proportion in which
they are generally taught. Parental ambition is often
satisfied, even in evangelical circles, with acquirements
in children that simply serve the purposes of expediency
or display; and no wonder, for the orthodox faith
implies—if it does not positively teach—that the great
business of life is to have the soul insured against risk
of eternal torture or annihilation through faith in “ the
sufferings of God the Son,” and this end gained, the
symmetrical discipline of the whole nature is deemed a
thing of secondary moment. Once the soul is “ saved
religion comes to be very much a matter of decently
waiting till death remove us beyond the reach of suffer
ing. Hence, often the remarkable exhibitions in reli
gionists of this class, of narrowness, meanness, pride,
and covetousness, side by side with an enthusiastic en-
�22
Religion Viewed as Devout Obedience
joyment of unctuous evangelical services. Where they
can gratify their love of “ pomps and vanities,” this
passion does not, as a rule, grow less for all their stick
ling about 11 salvation through the cross,” and “ living
by faith.”
There is no more melancholy spectacle than the
ignorance of an average middle-class English girl of
nineteen or twenty, in many a so-called religious
family, after her education is supposed to be over.
The vacuity of her mind, as regards the knowledge
and management of her physical, intellectual, and
moral being is appalling. As far as any thoughtful
preparation for domestic or other responsibilities is con
cerned, the subject rarely suggests itself to her. As
for boys, in the same station, they are not unfrequently
fitted out only with the particular education that
bears on the professional or commercial career chosen
for them, and are sometimes allowed to stumble into
positions in life for which they prove quite unsuited.
If the parents have risen in wealth and social standing,
it sometimes happens that they look down upon the
honest toil by which they have been raised, and their
children follow in their wake of contempt for their own
origin; so the parents resolve, (carried away by the
witchery of feudal illusions, and irrespective of fitness
in their sons,) that one of the lads shall enter the pro
fession of law, and another the profession of war, and
another the profession of the church, and thus many
hopeful minds getting misplaced, are blighted in the
spring-time of their days, and fall a wretched sacrifice
to parental ambition. And this profane disregard of
reason and divine law is carried on to the detriment of
humanity by many who believe themselves to be the
“ regenerate ” favourites of heaven.
*
* I am optimist enough, to believe that every moral absurdity
in mankind carries with it its own remedy, and the presage of
its own ultimate removal. The marvellous far-reaching and
Wealth-producing influence of commerce is still a comparative
�To the Laws of the Universe.^
23
But if these things be done in the green tree of wellto-do society, how shall we estimate the sad and uncon
scious outrage upon physical, intellectual, and moral
law which takes effect in the dry tree of poverty, where
the struggle for a bare existence is so hard, that many
great powers are suffered to rot in neglect, and minds
naturally inclined to good are mixed up in the same
polluting society with minds naturally inclined to evil,
in undistinguishable confusion.
But the religion of the future will be brought to bear
throughout the State in discovering, under enlightened
governmental supervision, the distinctive natural
tendencies of the children of the state, that they may
all be educated, and especially that their education may
be rightly directed in the unfolding of their nobler in
dividuality, and that they may be led in that path in
which their abilities will be most beneficial to the
world. The economic law will be reverently acknow
ledged, that every human faculty has its corresponding
sphere amid the activities of the universe, and that it
clashes with the designs of being for any community
to permit the powers of any of its members to be mis
directed or to run to waste.
When this law of social economy—the principle of the
utilization of all human powers, great and small—comes
to be respected by nations as an integral part of religion,
it will be embodied in the statutes of every realm ; the
right situation will be found for every citizen, and all
will be qualified by training to do the work for which
novelty in the western world. The rise of commerce and
manufactures has inflicted a blow that will eventually prove
fatal to feudal rank and has already reduced to a minimum
the influence of pedigree and title. Aristocratic birth will
now-a-days do little for a man who is without brains and in
dustry. So the advance of general education among the
people will, in time, make “British Philistinism,”—our rougher
money-ocracy,—ashamed of their “ fantastic tricks ” in aping
a style of things which is untrue to their associations and their
nature.
�24
Religion Viewed as Devout Obedience
they are naturally fitted in the very best way. Every
man will be compelled to contribute his quota of
labour to the common weal and will be adequately sup
ported and honoured in whatever position he may be
called to fill. Of course a sense of public duty will
guarantee to all the poor and the sick whom misfortune
prevents from adequately providing for their own
wants, a liberal supply of what they may need.
Then, but not till then, will science, art, literature,
and religion truly flourish, for the division and faith
ful consecration of labour will ensure unceasing and
intelligent industry everywhere. Idleness will be put
to shame by law, and by the force of public opinion
expressed through law, and with the disappearance of
idleness, want will be comparatively rare. Sensuality,
intemperance, and crime will no longer be dealt with
by the unphilosophical and barbarous arrangements of
the prison and the gibbet. We are largely indebted
for the long continuance of these absurd forms of pun
ishment among the Bible-reading communities of the
west, to the stern Oriental Criminal Codes which
characterize the Old and, in part, the New Testament.
The enthralling doctrine that the Bible was sent as an
infallible and a miraculous authority, has greatly
tended to perpetuate this foolish and useless penal
severity and keep us from looking into the subject
rationally. But signs are not wanting, that reason
will soon assert her rightful authority in the adjustment
of these questions. All natures disposed to vice or
crime will by and by be treated medically. Any man
or woman in that good time coming, who lives at
variance with the laws of nature and of intelligent
society—who, for instance, feels an impulse to take
the life or the property of another, will be looked
upon as in some way the subject of cerebral derange
ment or defective education, and dealt with as one
insane or ignorant, and requiring to be placed under
the control of doctors and teachers.
�To the Laws of the Universe.
15
In the -world-embracing religion, to the advent of
which we look forward, the application of law to mental
and moral affinities will also be better known and more
fully acted on. The accident of birth, fortune, or social
status, will no longer determine, as nowit does, the range
within which friendships may be formed. When a high
education becomes universal and braces and refines all
the powers of the mind in every section of society, the
dignity of all honourable and useful labour will be duly
respected. The degree of a man’s intellectual and
moral force may then—though not now—be safely
judged by the work to which he is chosen ; for the
right man will always, under the universal reign of
law, fill the right place ; but the intelligence of all will
be so broad, their feelings so pure, their hearts so
generous, and their characters so correct, as to make
them companionable to each other, let their outward
circumstances be what they may. The wise will walk
with the wise, and the good with the good, irrespec
tive of the accidents of birth and wealth.
The laws of mind and of morals too, will then coin
cide with the laws of the state, and proved vices of the
mind such as selfishness, dishonesty, envy, ingratitude
*
and conceit will be dealt with by the enlightened
authorities of that day with full public consent, as pre
judicial to the whole nature of the individual and, in
so far, as dangerous to the interests of the entire body
politic.
Religion will also take the form of conformity to
political justice, and every measure brought before
Parliament will be decided upon its merits; not as now
according to the effect it will have, if passed, upon the
fate of a political party. It is needless to say that, at
* The reader will remember the fact recorded by Xenophon,
that the ancient Persians had so advanced an idea of morals
that they punished ingratitude as a crime.
�q.6
Religion Viewed as Devout Obedience
present, this self-evident principle of justice has not as
yet found a place in “ the rules of the house ” or in the
jurisprudence of the country. Our legislators, for the
most part, do not even pretend that abstract justice and
eternal right are practicable in statesmanship, and the
man who would be so bold as to enforce these principles
upon “ honourable members ” would be at once put
down as a fool or a bore. We are very scrupulous
about keeping up an Established Church “ as a solemn
public acknowledgment of God by the nation.” But
we have high authority for believing that it is one
thing to have the popular religion which cries “ Lord,
Lord ” in hymns and prayers, and quite another to
observe that higher religion which consists in “ doing
justly, loving mercy, and walking humbly.”*
The
time is coming, however, when official and diplomatic
expediencies will no longer usurp the throne of con
science and right. The “ golden rule ” will be held to
be as necessary, as a test of religion in reference to
politics, as the law of gravitation is necessary as a fact
in astronomy.
Prejudice, passion and class-interests
will then be felt to be so flagrantly opposed to the laws
of reason and of social progress that these qualities will
effectually disqualify any candidate for the responsi
bilities and honours of parliamentary life.
What are all the painful eruptions on the surface of our
society but beneficent signs and faithful warnings that
social laws whose observance is necessary for our social
health, have been broken ? The workhouse, the prison,
the lunatic asylum, the criminal nisi prius and divorce
courts, the daily “ inhumanity of man to man,” ay and
to woman, too, the strife going on between employers
and employed, in all these troubles God is standing like
* “A man may cry ‘ church ’ ‘ church ’ at every word
With no more piety than other people
A daw’s not reckoned a religious bird,
Because he keeps caw-cawing from the steeple.”
Hood.
�To the Laws of the Universe.
27
the fabled angel with the uplifted sword in the path of
the disobedient prophet, to stop us in the career of ignor
ance and wrong-doing, and to urge us in the path of
obedience to natural law. Just as discoveries in the laws
of physical healing have sometimes been suggested to
great minds by the sudden and untimely death of
thousands from a virulent plague, and as our forefathers
sanctioned the burning of witches before their eyes came
to be opened, (through the very enormity of the folly
they were thus superstitiously committing,) to the de
lusion of demoniacal possessions and the appreciation
of the uniformity of universal law, so it is through
the experience of present religious, social and political
anarchy that we are destined to come to a clear
understanding of the eternal laws designed to govern
religious, domestic, social and political life. When
these laws are intelligently apprehended by the whole
people, our religion will simply be measured by the ex
tent to which they are earnestly complied with. The
family will then be a scene of unbroken joy and peace,
the master will feel it to be to his interest to be just and
liberal to his workmen ; the workmen, not, as at pre
sent, in many cases, the creatures of impulse and
caprice, will find an intense satisfaction in devoting
their best energies to the work for which their faculties
specially fit them, the rich and the strong will cheer
fully render aid and sympathy to the deserving who
are poor and weak, and not as now to bestowing their
attentions mostly upon those who least require their
help.
There is a touching legend related of Jesus, when
he is said to have risen from the dead and met two
of his disciples on the way to Emmaus. It is written
that their eyes were holden so that they did not know
him. In like manner the moral vision of the world is
“ holden ” that it does not usually discern wisdom in
the first instance, unless it strives and cries and lifts up
its voice in the streets, is accompanied by prestige and
�28
Religion Viewed as Devout Obedience
“ arrayed in fine linen and fares sumptuously.” If a
prince or a millionaire happen to have the merest grain
of sense or kindliness, though it be mingled with child
ish frivolity, the toadies of the earth would fain exalt
him to the dignity of a philosopher or a saint. But if
a humble John the Baptist, a witness fortruth, freedom
and justice, living on rough fare and clad in homely
attire, seek a hearing, he is ruthlessly pooh-poohed as
a crazy intruder.
It will be clearly seen, one day,
that the gifts of insight into the higher laws of thought
and life and heroic resistance to oppression and wrong
are vastly more precious than mines of wealth. Noise,
audacity, diplomacy, show, and monopoly, will then have
died out, and enlightened goodness and truth, forgotten
amid ages of neglect, will be called to the leadership of
the world. Mankind will then be civilized; and to that
term I for one attach a very definite meaning. Civilization
means something more than railways and telegraphs,
conveniences and luxuries. It is the art of putting a
right estimate upon things, and the countries which have
not acquired that art have no right to be called civilized.
The African is not civilized while he parts with lapfuls
of ivory, and gold, and rivers of palm oil for glass beads
and iron pots. The Englishman is not civilized while
he places more value on a large income, a costly estab
lishment and a popular faith, than upon scientific
spiritual insight, the honest investigation and profession
of truth, and an unselfish life. Our country is only
civilized and religious in proportion as its citizens come
to know and reverence law in its universality and
uniformity.
It is the habit of paid teachers of Christianity to
credit that form of organized religion with all the
higher civilization of the world.
We only know
Christianity, so called, as it is embodied in creeds
and churches, and it is simply a fact that so far from
this boast having any foundation, popular churches
and creeds, have invariably denounced, as pernicious or
�T) the Laws of the Universe.
29
profane in one age, discoveries in science and criticism,
which the inexorable logic of events has compelled them
to approve in the next.
Science and criticism have
always, in the first instance, had to encounter clerical
opposition. The most superficial study of history irre
sistibly leads to the conclusion that at least during
the last three centuries, however, science and criticism
looked down upon, though they have been by priests and
their disciples as only “carnal” or “secular” have
greatly modified theological and ecclesiastical principles,
while the influence of churches upon science and criti
cism has only been to alienate more and more the intel
lect and learning of the world from orthodoxy and its
creeds as gigantic unrealities and persistent hindrances
to human progress.
Is it not the case that the human mind has become
strong and clear, and that even the cause of morality
has thriven just in proportion as the law’s of nature
have been found out, studied and followed in relation
to the government of the world 1 Had we only been
allowed the fare which orthodox churches would have
provided for us, had the ecclesiastical spirit proved
stronger than the scientific and sceptical one, our minds
would simply have been embittered by angry theological
controversies and warped by the bondage of papal dog
mas or protestant bibliolatries. But science has sped
its fearless course towards light and truth in spite of the
thunders of the Vatican and the anathemas of Geneva,
and its beneficent mission will continue till it has swept
from the world the last vestige of superstition, bigotry,
ignorance and suffering.
TURNBULL AND SPEARS, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH.
��
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Religion viewed as devout obedience to the laws of the universe
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Macfie, Matthew
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: Ramsgate
Collation: 29 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Tentative date of publication from KVK. Printed by Turnbull and Spears, Edinburgh.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Thomas Scott
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
[1872?]
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
G5492
Subject
The topic of the resource
Religion
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Religion viewed as devout obedience to the laws of the universe), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Conway Tracts
Religion
-
https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/8f5fa044cf927e1f0f9a100d0b6e2ac7.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=Uc%7E4ojv%7Ec6QJJHCPii-ulAhlmL3Ba7i6Bju8z3x0XFIM2XqT0QPBQIaCFwcrzpA6miP9ZkYr01KSAbuaOvQEroX7PYm8Uyhrkfm-lYRfPHbOZj2CCyaTIyyOOHv8px3xemAkF6FOERzw7BinguaxP9EJdXaktwoLdEy8D4Rp%7EyOPljPyhh%7El7TGzsOngfk0n8hqWGi7qtAIt7t36Ybftoy2%7EYh3OkwnH3p48TiOIqBqYrib9ZfMVJ-bQEsgt1vM%7EI7uHJRG3q%7E1qvq0NLNRgoZnzr-rM0VvDMt7%7Ecr04rILkBJfs6aldK1Z7E1G9IomOzDzF53avlVEFS5T4v-v-2w__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
e8497e74d27e10e6ec16629316a503eb
PDF Text
Text
THE
PAST AND THE FUTURE,
BY
ISAAC S. VARIAN.
JANUARY, 1868.
*
DUBLIN :
R. D. WEBB & SON, PRINTERS, GT. BRUNSWICK ST.
1869.
�The following short address was delivered before a small body
of persons of kindred religious thought. It was not intended
for publication ; but as the writer has since been called to join
the loved ones to whom he so feelingly refers, and as even a
slight memento of him will be very precious to many who held
him in especial esteem and veneration, as a man of unwonted
purity and nobleness of mind, it has been thought well to print
a few copies for private circulation.
Other members of the same circle have been called from this
earth within the past year, or have had to lament the loss of
those dear to them. May not these pages help to strengthen
and encourage such on the earthly path that yet lies before
them ?
A. W.
Dublin, January, 1869.
�THE PAST AND THE FUTURE,
January, 1868.
“ One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh.
---------- > ♦ ♦ ♦ <----------
Since we last met together, another year has closed upon
us—another year has opened. Once again has our earth in
its ceaseless never-ending whirl, completed its great circle—
swift as the lightning—deep and calm and solemn as a
midnight hell:—another year has formed the connecting
link between two eternities—The Past and The Future.
What a wdrld of solemn meaning there is in the words.
But a while ago and the past was ours—ours to use and to
enjoy; it is gone from us, never, never to return. All those
loves and affections; those kindnesses given and received ;
those high resolves; those manifestations of pure and ex
alted soul, of tender loving nature ; all are but memories—
sweet and beautiful—yet but memories. As time draws
over them his dark and shadowy pall, are they indeed
quite gone from us for ever—nothing done that we might re
touch, nothing said that we might unsay, nothing omitted
that we might now supply? Alas, yes ! The present
moment only is ours; the past is irrevocable. Yet it lives
for ever in memory; it writes its history upon our souls
with an “ iron pen and lead as upon a rock for ever.” Let
us therefore be careful that we use it aright, let our acts
�4
not alone be good, but our very best, our wisest, our most
saintly. Let us throw into them all our thought, all our
energy, all our devotion, for when once done they must
remain ever as they are. No after-thought can alter them,
however thoughtlessly or recklessly they may have been
performed; under whatever impulse of passion, however
instigated, they can never be blotted out. Rarely is the
opportunity granted us even to make amends when we
have done wrong, and even then we do it with sorrow and
humiliation. And let us remember that although irreme
diable they are not therefore inactive. Not alone in
memory do they live ; yea are they not all as seed put into
the ground which will grow. Every act brings another,
aye ten others, we know not how many, after it.
By our acts our minds are formed, and our position, and
that of those around us fixed ; and we must act—life is a
succession of acts—well or ill, -wisely or unwisely, usefully
or injuriously. Life means action. Life is before us to
act in—in time or in eternity. It is no choice of ours.
We are here. We cannot annihilate ourselves, as surely
as we cannot create ourselves. Nay we could not if we
would annihilate one particle of the matter of which even
our bodies are composed; how much less can we destroy
our souls. It is no choice of ours that we are here, and
that we must act; our acts are the seed of future action, of
future joy or future sorrow.
And they are eternal.
Therefore we must get knowledge, so as to act with greater
wisdom. It is a sacred duty, for we cannot be too wise.
Therefore let us cultivate holy and blessed thoughts ; let
us cleanse our minds of everything that is impure and that
is unlovely.
We cannot be too good. Alas, at our very best, with
our greatest care, with our greatest energy, how full of
sorrow and Ttgret are our lives. What a consciousness of
�errors and short comings. How frail, how feeble are we.
We fail in will, and we fail in knowledge, and no prayer
suits us so well as that of the desponding publican—“ God
he merciful to us sinners.” Almost docs the crushed soul
cry out “ The work is too great for me, I cannot under
take it. I cannot act wisely and well. Take back, oh !
Creator, thy great but too perilous gift.” But it cannot be.
We cannot falter or turn back in the great journey—no,
nor even halt on the way. With fear and trembling it
may be, or with a firm and reliant step ; in cloud, and dark
ness, and trouble it may be, or in sunshine and prosperity.
Through well-known beaten paths it may be, dr in devious
and uncertain ways where there is nothing but the inner
light to guide us,—still must we ever onward. Well may
the faint and weary heart fail within us, as we tread that
path on which there must be no faltering, no false step, no
going aside to the right or to the left ; for assuredly if we
do, trouble and tribulation, suffering and sorrow, will
inevitably follow—for such is the decree that has gone
forth from Eternity, that has resounded through the ages.
It is undeviating. It is unavoidable. The wisest, the
most loving, the holiest are not exempted from it. Ye
must always act wisely and well. There is no exception
either in time, place, or person.
This is a great subject, including all of religion, morals,
and philosophy. Let us think well over it. There are
laws of being in all its phases; laws of our material bodies,
of health and disease ; laws of our moral nature ; of our
fellow beings—the society in which we move; and laws of
our spiritual nature—our duties to our souls—of our rela
tions to the Great Author of our being. And the breach
of any one of those laws, any misunderstanding and con
sequent misapplication of them, any want of knowledge of
them whereby they may be set aside or disregarded, is
�followed by the inevitable sentence “ Retribution.” No plea
of ignorance, inadvertence, forgetfulness, will avail us.
Nay, no appeal to higher duty will supersede in the small
est iota the divine laws of nature. Fatigue follows overexertion, in however holy a cause it may be undergone;
disease follows infection, however benevolent or loving the
motive which drew us to the bedside of sickness. In every
instance the punishment is inexorably demanded. Suffer
ing, physical or mental—sorrow, pain, or loss of some sort—
follows every breach, however occasioned, of those varied
and all-pervading laws. How necessary is all our care and
all our thoughtful anxiety.
If, indeed, we must tread this path—this path that is
marked out for us—do this work that is set before us, and
do it always perfectly, always wisely and well, surely^very
nerve should be strung, every power and faculty heightened,
every means and opportunity of gaining knowledge resorted
to, so that we should be prepared in body and mind, ready
for every emergency, like men of God, “ perfect and entire,
wanting nothing.” Alas, how far from such a condition do
we find ourselves ; how feeble and frail; how fickle ; how
ignorant, and short-sighted; how often forgetful or reckless
of our highest dpties !
And for us there is no substitute, no mediator, no atone
ment in the orthodox and usually accepted sense. We are face
to face with God; there is no go-between. We live sur
rounded by His laws, always within His influence. Thankful
are we that God, as we believe Him, is not a hard task
master, expecting perfect service from imperfect creatures.
True obedience is required to all His laws, and their breach is
ever followed by the appointed punishment. Yet is it ever
inflicted as by the ever-loving Father, to warn us of our
danger, or to guide us into life. Anger or vengeance belong
not to Him. His justice requires not satisfaction. It is for
�ourselves alone, and for our soul's good, that His laws
exist; and this His awful law of Retribution, is but one
amongst His many mercies. If wise and good actions were
to bring no happy pleasurable results, or unwise or simple
ones no painful, then indeed would we lose our chief
guide and warning. Better for us to bear the inevitable
penalty, and be lead back again to the path of life.
I will not pursue this subject further—it is too wide
and many-sided—only so far as to indicate the nature of
the Divine dealings. Thus, the rewards and punishments
that flow from obedience or disobedience to the divine laws
participate in the nature of those laws themselves. The
physical have relation to health of body—and the effect of
neglect of them, or defiance from whatever cause, is bodily
pain, weakness, infirmity, death. The moral laws, having
relation to our dealings with our fellow beings, have their
punishment in mental and moral debasement, social exclu
sion and self condemnation ; and the spiritual laws, having
relation to our own soul, and its connection with the great
soul of the universe, have also their glorious rewards and
most terrible penalties.
Of those penalties how shall I speak ? Is there
any bodily anguish so severe as the consciousness of
having lost—aye, though inadvertently—the tender affec
tion or even the confidence of a loved or valued friend—
—of a brother or sister, father or mother, or dear, dear,
relative. How will the recollection of the act haunt
our thoughts by day, and our dreams by night; until
we seek by unwearied assiduity and thoughtfulness to
win back again the affection and esteem of our friend. So
also in our relation to our God, if we feel that we have
polluted our soul, that we have lowered it from its high
position, and that we dare not come into the presence of
our Maker, that at best we can but stand trembling in the
�8
outer court of the temple, and smite upon our breasts,
saying “ God be merciful to me a sinner/’ there is no
anguish equal to our anguish, and we are ready to exclaim
with him of old “ my punishment is greater than I can bear.”
Yet how beautiful and excellent is the retributive law,
which brings us in sorrow and anguish to the footstool of the
throne, and, opening our bleeding heart to our Heavenly
Father, makes us resolve upon renewed and holier life.
So also of the rewards of the spiritual life, of the intense
delight which follows a loving, true, and devoted action.
Who can tell the joy that is concentrated in the expiring
moments of the martyr for truth, for love, or for liberty ;
nay, we none of us can express it, but we all instinctively
feel that we would not exchange its joy or its triumph for
all the glory or the glitter of an earthly conqueror.
Thus have I endeavoured to explain the nature of our
destiny, and the complication and variety of the laws we
are compelled to understand and obey. But it is important
we should view them also in their relation to each other.
No doubt each is obligatory. Retribution follows their
breach or non-observance with equal certainty ; but yet are
they placed one above another. We must, as far as it is in
our power, build up a healthy body, and guard its health
with scrupulous care, but at the slightest whisperings of the
soul, must we put all its warnings aside. We must at the
call of duty overtask its powers, expose it to hardship, stint
its food ; at the call of love, expose it to contagion, weari
ness, anxiety; aye in the cause of truth, humanity, and
progress, peril to the uttermost even its very existence; and
we feel that we can point to acts, which if judged of the
material laws solely, were undoubtedly foolish—examples
of extravagant enthusiasm and infatuation—but judged of
by the spiritual laws, become our highest wisdom. Thus
can we join in the true spirit of the popular song
�9
“ John Brown’s body is mouldering in the clay,
But his soul keeps marching on.”
So say we of all the martyrs who have died for truth and
humanity—sowing the earth -wide with lessons of truth and
heroism ; of love and virtue. They died not in vain
for their own or for their race’s benefit. A little more
knowledge, perhaps a little more insight into human
affairs, would have saved their lives for a time. Others,
perhaps with more wisdom or greater knowledge, may have
doubted or disbelieved the righteousness of their cause or
the justice of their measures. What matters it to them ?
It was their highest light—their loftiest duty. They have
gone through with it “ and their souls keep marching on,”
a countless and innumerable army.
Let us gather up the great subject. Here have we thrust
upon us this glorious and blessed patrimony of life, with its
countless duties, laws and responsibilities; its struggles, its
trials, and its dangers, but oh ! with its gracious blessings,
its loving providences, and its most glorious anticipations.
Who will halt or falter on the way ? Who will not “ be
strong and of a good courage?” The path is clearly marked
and well defined, full of snares and pitfalls for the unwary
and ignorant, and of delusions for the heedless. All the
laws of our being must be attended to, and while “ the
mint and cummin ” of the bodily life are duly regarded
Justice, Mercy, Truth, (the soul’s high watchwords) must
be the touchstones of every thought and action. Then
shall we move gloriously forward in the path of duty with
certain and sure footsteps, with the everlasting arms sup
porting us, and the voice of the Eternal Father ever sound
ing in our ears.
Ours is no Simplon pass of eternal snows, lighted by
dim twilight, with a grim devil ever at our elbow, seeking
how he may entangle our slippery feet—obscuring still
�io
more the paths before us, or hurling us headlong into the
abyss below; while in the dim misty light, many voices
sound in our ears, each one shrieking in his peculiar
key, “No! this is the way;” “This is the true way;”
“This is the infallible light; all others leadeth to destruc
tion, ” and each holds up his little lurid light, and now
and again shouts “We alone shall climb the holy hill; we
alone shall see the celestial city.” No ! our step is ever on
the solid earth, and the sunshine cf, Heaven rests upon it.
We feel the Holiest ever at our side; often do we struggle
on in sad forgetfulness, yet do we know He is ever
there, helping our weaknesses, healing our backslidings,
and ever making our clip run over with blessings, heedless
of our unthankfulness, of our ingratitude, often even of our
grumblings and discontent. No ! our faith is firm, leading,
it is true, from we know not where, commencing from before
our consciousness—but ever lying in pleasant places, ever
resounding with cheering voices and beaming with cheer
ful faces; sometimes overcast with cloud and storm, and
anon aglow with light and love.
Many a trial and hard fought struggle have we gone
through. Each heart knows its own bitterness; yet is
hopeful life strong within us, and we trust we have
gathered strength from sufferings. We would fain bind up
our loins for our eternal journey; and while we add
another mark to the record of our lives, prepare ourselves
with joyful alacrity for whatever the future has in store for
us.
During the last revolution, two beautiful spirits have
passed from us—passed within the veil into the Holy of
Holies ; and while we try and peer beneath the curtain into
the resplendent glories beyond—where they have gone to
meet the noble army of martyrs, the glorious company of
the just made perfect, to join the seraphim who love most,
�11
and cherubim who know most—fain would we see the meet
ing with the other loved ones, who one after another long
before had left our own circle—some in mature years, some
amid abundant cares and useful life, and some in bounding
youth and toddling infancy—fain would we witness the
raptured embrace, the endearing, loving remembrance.
Nay, it is not given us to see. We cannot enter within
that veil with our mortal bodies, yet can we with the soul’s
eyes sometimes see them round about the eternal throne,
ever circling joyfully, not without song, not without holy
work in everlasting jubilee. But surely, wre hear some scorner whisper in our ears, “ How know you that we live
again 1 What you call revelation is but old wives’ tales—
give us facts—facts—all else is worthless.” Ah ! friend,
one great stupendous fact has been pealing in our ears since
childhood, has been about our path and about our bed, has
beset us behind and before, from infancy up to manhood—
through it we live, and move, and have our being. Oh! it
has been very bountiful to us. It has given us thought
and affection, and hope, and memory. It has, science tells
us, moulded this beautiful world myriads of years ago, far
longer than thought can reach ; has taken it atom by atom,
and minute crystal by crystal, until through ceaseless
never-ending change this beauteous world has been produ
ced, every operation carefully, thoughtfully prepared for—
never missing of its purpose, never failing—nothing forget
ting, nothing misplaced, nothing wasted or lost, an undevi
ating movement onward—onward through all ages—from
glory to glory. Do we not see it even in our own short
lives ?
Shall we, then, separate our loved ones from the same
kindly Providence which we feel within us and in every
atom around us, animate and inanimate 1 Their bodies may
moulder in the ground. They were beautiful, but they
�12
were of the earth, and have returned to their beautiful
mother. But their souls cannot die. Their love, their
truth, their hope, their faith, their devotion—these live for
ever. They are entities. They have life. Their souls keep
marching "bn ; and when one by one we too are called to
tread the darksome valley, we shall, as we hope, tread fear
lessly, aye joyously. We shall feel “ our Father’s right
hand in the darkness, and be lifted up and strengthened
we shall hear His soft kind voice sounding in our ears
“ It is I, be not afraid
and with trusting fearless hand,
shall we lift that mystic awful veil, and stand with Him
within the Holy of Holies.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
The past and the future
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Varian, Isaac S.
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: Dublin
Collation: 12 p. ; 19 cm.
Notes: Introductory paragraph signed 'A.W.' From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
R.D. Webb & Son
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1869
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
G5175
Subject
The topic of the resource
God
Religion
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /><br /><span>This work (The past and the future), identified by </span><span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk">Humanist Library and Archives</a></span><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Conway Tracts
God
Religion
-
https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/bf981093f0ff863d371ada2ec5acb527.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=vTE8k-IvAcBgFsg9%7EdvPw0CWMVEiG0M%7EaTbLvWBZ-WhVa0egz%7Eozi%7EfBdS6OohUwp5gZMdRSFMQxABK8NnOueeNVLjiu1HJwE4daeyRYRyuBPwTr-fsUzbJGayrGrVS03NSiauwQoo--OHjmYnWdWlYNaQ8XrRBWH-A1RP0ME16a%7E5B6yY9kSTROBFw8WC6oOkg8n5iVPLM5puXNAh-W%7E-rroSGVNIyAJKZr0zK1WgCIL-uLZWklzeag6J6r9OcpihRjYX5p-0rDNjLNedJTNfMBKr2R3aRgrFnrBJAd8zJYevhypSQ3ol5YY70kc6x-na79ZbEMKWb4vNizOswogA__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
27483b8a5b27ea5989f15a0903fe2396
PDF Text
Text
3
- A UHKMFIONjOF ORTHODOXY THUS REPLIES
RELIGION.
Sir,
A Correspondent on the above subject in your paper of last
week, styling himself “ Layman,” should have been
and styled
himself a “ Socinian” (a nickname foi’ an Atheist).
He has acted like all cowards act,—first misrepresent the opinions of
their opponents and then abuse them. Being a Layman (so called), I
venture to answer your Correspondent “ according to his folly,” and
challenge him to a public discussion, at any time and place, and defy him
to disprove the following propositions :—
That the Bible, fairly interpreted, teaches the following to be the
revealed will of God, and experience proves its truth :
1. That there are three persons, yet but one God.
2. That there is a future state of happiness, and misery, eternal in its
nature, and increasing as to its effects, let that happiness or misery arise
from what cause it may.
3. That Satan (or the Devil) first deceived our first parents, and from
that time to the present reigns in the hearts of all who have not repented
and believed on Christ.
4. That all mankind are born in sin, possessed of a fallen nature,
which leads them to love sin and hate God. This hatred is manifested
by all without distinction, high and low—your Correspondent not excepted.
5. That infants are not admitted into Paradise because of their
innocence by nature but by grace—“Christ died for them,” therefore,
baptized or unbaptized, if they die in infancy, in whatever clime, “ they
sleep in Jesus.”
6. That an atonement for sin was necessary. That Christ was, by
his Divine nature joined to the human, a fit sacrifice ; and His death and
resurrection confirms His power—and having atoned for the sins of the
whole world, He ascended upon high, and ever liveth to intercede for us.
The instruments God used to accomplish His purposes have nothing to do
with the atonement made. The Jews were as much the murderers of our
Saviour as though God’s design had been overturned, “ but our God turned
it into a blessing’' Christ could have died for us in some other way had
the Jews received Him, for “without shedding of blood is no remission.”
7. That repentance towards God, and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ,
from Adam to now, have ever been followed with a consciousness of sins
forgiven, a heart renewed in righteousness and true holiness, and a hope
of eternal rest and power, through the in-dwelling Spirit of God, to live
unspotted from the world, doing good in their day and generation—proving
by their life and conversation that they “ seek a city which hath
foundations whose builder and maker is Godand when death comes
triumph over it, and die in hopes of a blissful immortality.
That there are many who teach otherwise we admit, but who are
they ? Papists, who deny the Scriptures to be the rule of our lives;
Puseyites, who are “ bastards of the Pope of Romeand Protestants
�4
(shame on the laws which compel us) are compelled to keep them—they
are spiritual thieves and murderers of the souls of men—common; high-'
waymen and murderers are angels when compared to them; Unitarians or
Socinians, who misquote and mistranslate Scripture, devil like, in order to
establish their unholy creed, viz., “ to live a devil and die a saint;” Anti,
nomians, who hope to be saved through a process they call “ election,” a
scheme concocted in the infernal regions, and sent into the world to
deceive mankind.
But all true Protestants of whatever name, and their name is Legion
—Methodists over 2,000,000, with chapel accommodation for 12,000,000;
Independents, 1,000,000, with chapel accommodation for 4,000,000; not to
mention Baptists, Evangelical Churchmen, and others, who, with the
immortal Chillingworth, cry out, “ The Bible and the Bible alone is the
religion of Protestants.”
Yours, &c.,
Oct. 9, 1865.
B. STICKLAND.
C.’s
REJOINDER.
Sir,
Your Correspondent, Mr. B. Stickland, fearfully denounces
all those who do not happen to entertain the same religious opinions as
himself.
My letter which you were kind enough to insert in your
impression of the 7th, has sorely grieved him. It is well he has not the
power of the inquisitors of old, or I might have suffered for my “heresy”
some fine morning at Smithfield or on Tower Hill. He evidently questions
my sincerity, for, says he, had I “ been honest ” I should have styled my
self a “ Socinian, a nickname for Atheist,” but I am “ like all cowards,”
I “ misrepresent and then abuse;” yet he “ will answer me according to
my folly,” and “ challenge me to public discussion,” when he will “ defy
me to disprove” his views. Bravo, Mr. Stickland! He evidently does
not want your readers to think him “ a coward,” yet how mightily
Pharasaical. He produces some half dozen of what he calls “propositions,’’
and adds, that those who “ teach otherwise ” are “ Papists who deny the
Scriptures, Puseyites who are bastards of the Pope, spiritual thieves, and
murderers of the souls of men !” “ Common highwaymen and murderers
are angels compared to them ; Unitarians and Sociniaus, who misquote
and mistranslate Scripture, devil-like, in order to establish their unholy
creed,” viz., “ to live a devil and die a saint.” “ Antinomians, who hope
to be saved by election, a scheme concocted in the infernal regions,” &c..
&c., &c. I
One would certainly conclude by this that Mr. S. is on terms of great
intimacy with his satanic majesty, as he appears to be quite au fait with
him, and his “ infernal regions.” I decidedly admit his superior knowledge
in this respect.
“But,” adds Mr. S. “all true Protestants,” such as he is, of course,
“ think otherwise,” &c., &c.
Now, in the name of common sense, what reason is there in all his
denunciations. Has our great teacher, Christ, who Mr. S. professes to
serve, ever given him the shadow of such a creed as is contained in his
seven propositions? Compare Mr. Stickland’s letter and creed with
Christ’s Sermon on the Mount, and mark the contrast ! Oh, Mr. S.,
“ first cast the beam out of thine own eye,” &c.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
A champion of orthodoxy thus replies. Religion.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Stickland, B.
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: [s.n.]
Collation: 3-4 p. ; 22 cm.
Notes: A letter to the Hackney and Kingsland Gazette in response to a letter by W.E. Conner. Conner's rejoinder is also printed. Reprinted from the Hackney and Kingsland Gazette, October 9 or 10, 1865. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
[s.n.]
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
[1865]
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
G5258
Subject
The topic of the resource
Theology
Religion
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (A champion of orthodoxy thus replies. Religion.), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Conway Tracts
Orthodoxy
Religion
-
https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/4fedf4bfc557118c1cd49de85a1152a4.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=gTofWlBcq1jazvMv6U02O9OwVxFGpKWjJ-UrY36kYQjvg0UbzMvcwJCMUvLAgWCjnon62EONvpFzlLPms9JR1iHEdEdey88TTc2e6CdSWwS3RAIIlRMyUw-gWz3wGScKF%7EDrZdei0x4xxy9not%7EDw05ALmNtV1Ib--4uka1SSQ%7ENTwQTbGwiTsCNs7EEdKsrIuQSVBx4nPXqaqJ%7EFht8eWfm0vy0MwiK59vHjEUkUau3kjgNLquYO0oCqmwwlJm0QPDJdJOnJoOlvHsfD-IXUvdahqdkXJdEKPQx0c%7Ey7NDrXMKJzIkmTYk9Xfp3u6xjT14g-r950hyRCf8kdF6c3g__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
76a7c1f6b0aa954e044dd71f6613ef1d
PDF Text
Text
RELIGION:
ITS PLACE IN HUMAN CULTURE.
A LECTURE,
Delivered in the Freemasons’ Hall, Edinburgh,
On Sunday, May 18, 1873.
BY
JOHN MACLEOD.
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCOTT,
NO. 11 THE TERRACE, FARQUHAR ROAD, UPPER NORWOOD,
LONDON, S.E.
1873.
Price. Sixpence.
��RELIGION :
ITS
PLACE
A
IN
HUMAN
CULTURE.
LECTURE,
BY
JOHN
MACLEOD.
��RELIGION:
ITS PLACE IN HUMAN CULTURE..
T is now well-nigh two years since first I stood on
this platform, and although I did not feel then so
hopeful of the immediate success of our undertaking,
yet I felt convinced that our movement contained in
itself all the elements on which true and permanent
success depends. I knew it was not an arbitrary
movement propped up by artificial aids, and appealing
for support to low and vulgar motives, but a free and
spontaneous outcome of the intellectual vigour of our
time—the masculine birth, as it were, of the nine
teenth century. It says very much for the intelligence
and manliness of Edinburgh citizens, that some years
ago there could be found among them several men and
not a few women who broke away from the enervating
influence of orthodox Christianity; scorned that soft
sentiment which languishes and sickens at its ancient
altars, and in spite of the obloquy which invariably
awaits the revelation of great truths, asserted the
divine right of their manhood and womanhood—the
freedom of the human soul. Although only a few
years have elapsed since you left that worse than
Egyptian bondage, yet the influence which your con
duct, and that of your noble-minded leader, Mr Cranbrook, has had on society is incalculable. Ten years
ago, few men would believe that society could so
rapidly advance in intelligence as it has' done; that
the tone of our daily press could rise from faint and
scarcely audible mutterings against spiritual tyranny
to a tone of rolling thunder, loud, heavy, and crushing,
against everything that is hypocritical and false; and
fewer still could believe that nearly every clergyman
who has any pretension to a highly-cultivated intellect
and refined taste in every Christian sect or denomina
I
�4
Religion :
tion would, in eighteen hundred and seventy-three, be
following in the lead of Bishop Colenso. I cannot say
that I admire the conduct of a man who signs a
document such as the Confession of Faith, or the
Thirty-nine Articles, and pledges himself by a solemn
oath to maintain every proposition therein contained
against all criticism, if, on finding that some of those
propositions do not harmonise with his better judg
ment and more enlightened reason, he seeks to force
his own meaning into them, and then to inter
pret them, not according to the obvious meaning
of the text, but in accordance with the subjectivity
of his own mind, and the false poetic gloss with which
he can invest them. I say I cannot admire the
conduct of these men; it lacks in manhood and
fearless honesty. Christian dogmas have been dead
these many years, and they cannot now be gal
vanised into life; it is against the analogy of
nature, of science, of history. Christian dogmas are
interesting to us only as the fossilized remains of
ancient life; of life which may or may not have been
bright and useful, but which was certainly inferior to
our own in comprehensiveness and breadth of human
sympathy. I know several men in the churches who
believe no more than I do in the literal interpretation
of their own creeds, or indeed in the Biblical authority
which is supposed to establish these creeds; and yet
these men are contented to remain within their respec
tive churches as the paid representatives of orthodox
Christianity, satisfying their conscience with the old
but miserable subterfuge, which was once the glory of
the Jewish philosophers of Alexandria, and of the
early Christian fathers — namely this, that every
passage and even word in Holy Writ contained two
meanings, a primary and a secondary one; in other
words, a literal and a mystical meaning. It has been
said that a coach and six can be driven through any
Act of Parliament; but ecclesiastical acts are still
more elastic, in the opinion of not a few, for they can
�Its Place in Human Culture.
5
be expanded into dimensions which look anything but
orthodox; and immediately on the pressure being
withdrawn, they contract within limits which, from
their narrowness and convenience of manipulation,
might satisfy the most expert advocate for “particular
redemption,” or “ eternal reprobation.”
We say, then, that when a man ceases to believe,
not only in the distinctive dogmas of his Church, but
even in the so-called “ external evidences ” of Chris
tianity itself—prophecies, miracles, &c., that man does
violence to his own nature, to his entire moral and intel
lectual powers, if he still remains a professed believer
in orthodox Christianity, and a paid advocate of it.
Let such a man scorn to sell his birthright for a little
comfort and ease; let him scorn to sacrifice those gifts
with which God endowed him at the gloomy shrines of
a vulgar superstition; let him stand forth as the
champion of truth, of the light of reason and the law
of conscience; and howsoever the hysterical screams
of weak women and sentimental clergymen may annoy
him, he will find higher sympathy and a more serene
intellectual repose in that unclouded atmosphere
which is breathed by the loftiest spirits of our age.
Nay more, posterity will bless him, and call him noblehearted and brave; and he will shine as a benignant
star on the path of many a weary pilgrim to the shrine
of truth. I have no doubt that many remain in the
Churches from higher motives than those of mere ease
and comfort. They hope, perhaps, or fancy they can
“reform” the Church from within, and render it, if
not attractive, at least as little offensive as possible to
the scientific intellect of the day. Such motives might
be ably defended by those who are honestly influenced
by them ; but, in my opinion, that man places himself
in a false position—and all false positions are weak and
untenable—who professes friendship to the Church and
secretly undermines its foundations. The world cannot
much admire a traitor, even if he should betray a false
cause; men cannot make him a hero who is a spy in
�6
Religion :
his own camp, who reveals to the enemy all the best
modes of attack on a citadel which he pledged himself
to defend. He may do useful work for the world, but
the world will not give him credit for it; his work
lacks all the elements which go to constitute heroism.
Place the grand figure of Luther or of John Knox
beside that of Origen or Pelagius, and say which would
you most admire, that of the dreamy spiritual Reformer,
or that of the terrible Iconoclast and matter-of-fact
denunciator? Surely the latter, for it stands alone,
picturesque, bold, and transfigured by the divine
radiancy of truth, seeking no protection from a Church
which he abhors, uttering no “ uncertain sounds ” for
battle, but a peal which was responded to by thousands
of bewildered and benighted souls, who yearned after
a brighter, freer, and happier life.
We want such men now. There never was a time
in which society would more gladly welcome a true
hero than at the present; never a time in which such
a hero would be more worshipped or adored. We feel
so much oppressed by the conventionalities and un
realities of modern life—by its gross materialism on
the one hand, and its downright spiritual charlatanism
on the other, that we should hail with unbounded
enthusiasm any great Thunderer whose flashes of
genius would clarify our social atmosphere, and
purge it of that fulsome incense which daily rises from
the altars of our little gods. In commercial and poli
tical development we are no doubt daily advancing,
and far be it from us to indulge in the cant phraseology
of the pulpit against material wealth and prosperity;
on the contrary, we regard all these as among the
noblest triumphs and achievements of modern science
in its application to the industrial arts. But the
miserable state of our religious institutions, the effemi
nacy and debilitating effect of the instruction there
obtained on the one hand, and the absurd, antiquated
nature of their dogmas on the other, have well-nigh
killed all spirituality out of us.
�Its Place in Human Culture.
7
To a calm outsider—that is, to a man who is not
accustomed to feel intensely on any of the great prob
lems which concern human happiness—it may appear
very strange that we should make any attacks on the
Church, or charge it with any of the social vices of our
age. But a little reflection can hardly fail to satisfy
even the most unimpassioned intellect that we have
good reasons for the attitude which we bear towards
that venerable institution. The religious emotion or
sentiment which arises from reverence, love, and fear
are at once the weakest and the strongest, as well as
the noblest, elements of our nature. When a man’s
religion is made for him—not made to order, as we say,
but ready-made before he was bom—it arrests the
growth of all his mental powers. If he is an ordinary
man he remains a stinted and timorous soul all his life;
it is only when he has that vitality in him, the develop
ment of which into the highest spirituality cannot be
forecast by theology, it is only when he has snapped
the cords which bound down his growing energies, that
he can realize the intense joy of being free to develop
himself religiously. If, then, pure theological training
is so fatal to the growth and development of the indi
vidual mind, it is clear that it must be so to society at
large. Every branch of human knowledge has certainly
advanced more rapidly in proportion as it disengaged
itself from the influence of theology. All the physical
sciences are now free, and no man of any note mixes
them up with crude theological arguments: and mark
the result. More advance has been made' in these
sciences during the last fifteen years than during all
the centuries which preceded them. Political economy
is also free, although in the practical application of it
in our legislative assemblies it is still encumbered by
religious notions, and trammelled by theological pre
possessions. Nevertheless, we may say that political
science is virtually free; and the result is that we have
advanced rapidly in liberal reform during the last teji
or fifteen years,
�8
Religion:
Now, observe the vast difference between the pre
sent state of these departments of human knowledge
which I have just mentioned, and those which are still
claimed by the Church, and conceded to it as its legiti
mate sphere of operation. I mean the general education
of the country, at least in its more elementary aspect,
with which I may couple all those social questions
which bear on the comfort and happiness of the poorest
part of our population, of those miserable outcasts which
crowd together in the east ends of our large cities, de
prived not only of the light of reason and conscience,
but even of the light of the sun. What has become
of the boasted influence of that Christianity which
has been so often eulogised as the great civilizer of
mankind, when thus we behold its territories lying
waste, stricken with plague and famine, with all kinds
of physical and moral disease? O mockery! tell me
not that we are to stand idly by, and see, without
a murmur, our fellowmen perish for want of truth and
light, while white-robed hypocrisy builds its temples
and synagogues, fares sumptuously, languishes for want
of work, and preaches to the poor the Sermon on the
Mount, or threatens them with phials of the Apoca
lypse. Is this not enough to stir you up to mutiny
and rage, not against our social laws, but against those
who have, or who profess to have, the direction of
them?
But it may be asked, if the progress of intellect is
so great in our age, and the advancement of civiliza
tion so rapid as you represent them to be—in other
words, if men of science are the benefactors of mankind,
and the Church a mere stumbling-block in their way,
why do not scientific men ameliorate the worst aspects
of our social life ? I answer, so they have; and so
they are still doing for all those who have the wisdom
to listen to them. They have purified and ennobled
everything they have yet touched, and when that light
they have shed on man’s nature, and on his relation to
the external universe, shall stream down into the lowest
�Its Place in Human Culture.
9
stratum of society, then we shall see a state of things
for which few men venture to hope. We shall see
wretchedness and crime banished out of the world, and
even war itself slain by the mightiness of its own
weapons; for if men of science have not yet been able
to extinguish the unruly passions of mankind, they
have at least been able to bring the implements of war
to such a degree of perfection that they can only hence
forth be used in defence of the most sacred cause, and
can only be taken up when every other means will have
failed for the maintenance of our freedom, and the pre
servation of truth and justice. We shall see also that
great enemy of human progress and liberty, the Church,
branded with shame, and vanishing like a spectral
shadow into eternal silence; we shall see, in short, all
the civilized nations of our earth living in peace and
human brotherhood.
We often hear it asserted, and nowhere more fre
quently than in the pulpit, that pure intellect is not a
safe guide, that we must not confide too implicitly in
its cool judgments. “Intellect,” it has been said, “can
destroy, but cannot restore life.” Now these state
ments, and many such as these, are absolutely without
meaning. They are simply the wise aphorisms—should
we not rather say sophistries ?—of men who have been
trained in scholastic theology, and who have received
their knowledge of the human mind through the
logic of the schoolmen. Yet these neat epigrammatic
assertions take hold of the popular mind, and pass as
current coin, stamped with the authority of some
“great” man, who could not in the least explain his
own meaning, till half uneducated people begin to think
that there is something wicked in “pure” intellect.
So strongly has this feeling taken hold of the popular
mind that many timorous hearts, even in this en
lightened age, tremble with alarm at the least mani
festation of intellect, either in their own heads or in
those of their neighbours. Hence also the suspicion
with which semi-theological writers, and indeed all
�IO
Religion.
writers who have not attained to a scientific habit of
thought, regard what they call the “destructive school,”
by which they mean those men who expose the fallacies
which permeate all the great religions of the world.
What, “destroy life?” Pure intellect cannot destroy,
it rather creates. As well might you say that Kepler
and Newton destroyed the mechanism of the heavens
when they flung back the astrological and superstitious
veil which hid their grandeur for ages from the intel
lectual vision of mankind; as well might you say that
these master minds destroyed the life of the soul
when they only purified its vision, and revealed to its
awakened consciousness the majesty of those laws
which embrace in one grand universal sweep the whole
of infinite space, as say that the results of modern
science (which are certainly the achievements of pure
intellect), when brought to bear on the creeds of former
ages, will be more detrimental than beneficial, more
degrading than ennobling, to the free spirit of -man.
No. Intellect does not destroy, but constructs; and in
proportion as the intellect is pure and unprejudiced, its
work is more enduring, because more free from error.
“Dry light,” says Bacon, “is always the best.” Dry
light, or light unclouded by the passions and emo
tions of the man, or by the prejudices of early train
ing; that is, pure light, fed by the warmth of a large
human heart. I do not say that the intellectual powers
ought to receive exclusive attention from us, and be
cultivated at the expense of other elements of our
being, such as the moral and religious sentiments; but
I do say that unless the intellectual or rational part of
our nature is supreme, unless it is free to exercise itself
without prejudice on all human problems, we never
can be safe guides to others, for we are ever liable to
be carried away, either by the impulse of excited
emotion or by the whims of an undisciplined imagina
tion. Need I remind you that it was not pure intellect,
but intellect perverted by the undue cultivation of the
religious sentiment, which caused all those frightful
�Its Place in Human Culture,
n
ecclesiastical persecutions and massacres which deluged
Europe with human blood during the Middle Ages ?
Need I remind you of the fact that religion, when not
subordinated to the light of reason, destroys every
vestige of natural love and affection in the heart of
man; that, to use the language of Christianity, it “sets
a man at variance against his father, and the daughter
against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against
her mother-in-law,” and that it makes a man’s enemies
those of his own household1? This one sentiment,
morbidly cultivated, has caused more blood to be shed
in Europe since the establishment of Christianity than
all other passions put together. It nursed the madness
and fury of the Crusaders, it kindled those dismal
funeral piles which consumed the wretched bodies of
thousands of poor women who went by the name of
“witches,” it was at the root of the French Revolution,
and bore its full purple blossom in the massacre of
Saint Bartholomew.
It is clear, therefore, from the experience of the
past, that we need not trust to the power of religion
for the improvement of the individual or the elevation
of the human race. Everything that has hitherto been
done in that direction has been effected, not by means
of religion, but in spite of it—not by the aid of the
Church, but by repudiating her pretensions and ignor
ing her authority. Do we then say that all religions
should be abolished1? By no means. The religious
sentiment is a radical part of our nature, and it is as
natural for a good man to be religious and pious as it
is for a flower to blossom. If great crimes and most
lamentable human sufferings have too frequently fol
lowed in the wake of religious organizations, we must
also admit that there is a kind of inspiring power in re
ligion which gives moral force and character not only
to individuals, but to nations. In the absence of that
mental and moral culture which the higher education
confers, the religious sentiment is the strongest motive
that can influence a man to deeds of self-sacrifice and
�12
Religion:
noble heroism. Uneducated men cannot appreciate
philosophical arguments, they cannot follow out a train
of thought which involves a logical and analytical
power of reasoning; but they can easily understand
figures and metaphors, and all those personifications of
natural phenomena which assume a bodied form in the
imagination. A child can understand the meaning of
a Sinai in flames, and of a God delivering his laws to
a rebellious world amid thunder and lightning; he can
understand and realise with intense vividness the
Undying torment of those lost souls which are supposed
to bum for ever in fires unquenchable; for the im
agination, which is nothing more or less than the image
of the external world reflected in the mind, is vivid
and in full play long before the reasoning faculty is
called into active exercise. Every uneducated man,
every man who not only has not mastered the elements
of physical science, but who has not the mental capacity
and culture necessary for the appreciation of the results
of philosophical and historical criticism, I say every
such man is, all his life, precisely in the position of a
child. Early impressions, whether he has received
them direct from external nature or from early training,
are to him a part, indeed the whole, of his being. They
are incorporated in his very organization, and sooner
than surrender them he would surrender his life. If
you reflect for a moment how much pain and suffering
are endured by the best minds before they can emanci
pate themselves from the errors of imagination, and
from the bondage of superstition; if you consider
how frequently it happens that the superstitions of
early childhood return in old age when the mind
shows symptoms of decay, you can then appreciate the
enormous difficulties which men of science had to en
counter; you can understand the strength of the motive
power which opposed them; and you will wonder rather
that they should succeed at all, than that their success
should be so slow. We know that when the errors of
imagination are regarded, not as mere “airy nothings”
�Its Place in Human Culture.
13
which, have no foundation in fact, but as the veritable
revelations of Divine truth; when there is no longer
doubt in the religious mind, but faith and profound
conviction, then these errors, or delusions—as we call
them—become so powerful, that their authority over
the reasoning faculty is absolute, and from which there
is no appeal. Now, observe, that it is on faith and
absolute conviction of their Divine authority all reli
gions are founded. Every religion under the sun
claims a “ Divine Authority.” “ God spake these
words and said ” is the fundamental doctrine of them
all; and “ their motive-power over humanity has been
in proportion to the absoluteness of the belief they
commanded,” or in proportion to the conviction and
certainty they inspired. But though we know that
this high claim which is common to them all is itself
a mere delusion, yet such a claim is always necessary
to ensure their success—to unite men together in one
Faith, and to inspire them with enthusiasm for one
great work; for in the unity of one Faith all minor
differences merge and are lost sight of.
But, you may ask, if all religions have hitherto
been founded on false premises, to which of them
would you give the preference—to which of them
would you adhere ?■ I answer in the words of Schiller
—“ To none that thou mightest name. And wherefore
to none 1 For Religion’s sake.” Religion in itself, as
it is commonly understood, is useless, and worse than
useless, unless it is founded on a sound moral basis.
If the ethical part of religion is false, and, as it is in
many cases, revolting to our moral sentiment, then we
ought to abhor it with our whole heart, and to listen
to no fine disquisitions concerning its “ External and
Internal Evidences.” But is not Christianity founded
on a sound moral basis ? By no means. Paul makes
Faith the standard of human virtue, a position which
directly leads to the monstrous principle, that “ What
ever is of Faith is no sin.” How many noble hearts
that single dogma has crushed ! How many has it in
�14
Religion:
spired with ignorant zeal to perforin deeds of violence
and pitiless inhumanity; and how many, on the other
hand, has it reduced either to absolute despair or to
blasphemous rebellion against everything which hu
manity holds sacred ! I am well aware that, in the
mind of Paul, Faith meant something purer and in
finitely more exalted than it does in the mind of either
an ignorant man who has received but little moral
training, or of a superstitious man who has but mean
and vulgar ideas of God. Faith was to Paul religiously
what pure intellectual contemplation was to Aristotle
philosophically—it was to him the unity and harmony
of all thought, where the mind rests in undisturbed
repose, and enjoys the purest mental pleasure attain
able by man. It was to him, in short, the gravitating
force which unites in everlasting harmony the entire
spirituality of the universe, without distinction of
age or sex, of Greek or Roman, of Jew or Gentile.
But what is Faith in the mouth of the ordinary theo
logian? It is—“.Believe this formula, believe that
dogma; believe our interpretation of all the religions
and philosophies under the sun ; or, without doubt,
thou shalt perish everlastingly !” I need not say, that
to make Faith, in this peculiar acceptation, the standard
of moral virtue, is simply to banish all virtue and
intellect out of the world. We know that Faith
inspired the sublimest virtues, such as in the case of
Paul himself; but alas, we also know how often it has
inspired the most terrible crimes. Indeed if we make
Faith the standard of human virtue (observe that I use
the term in its strict theological sense), if we make it
the fundamental doctrine of religion, we shall find the
purest specimens of religious men among the inmates
of a lunatic asylum. We shall find there men who
believe absolutely and without doubt in all the dogmas
of that religion in which they were originally trained
—men who see visions and hear voices confirmatory of
their belief, and who would willingly go to the stake
as martyrs to their faith. It is indeed a most remark
�Its Place in Human Culture.
15-
able fact that either religious enthusiasm, or religious
despondency is characteristic of almost all forms of
insanity. I cannot afford space to enter upon the
rationale of this singular phenomenon, but I may state
generally that if parents and teachers were more careful
in not filling up the minds of children with “vain
opinions, flattering hopes, false valuations, imagina
tions, as one would say, and the likeif they could
avoid the teaching of fable, and took more pains to
store the youthful mind with a knowledge of facts, and
to inspire it with a love for Nature and for Art, I
firmly believe that the number of our asylum patients
would soon diminish. What was the cause of so much
insanity in Europe during the earlier part of the Middle
Ages, when nearly all the religious world was dancing
mad with paralysis, epilepsy, St Vitus’ dance, and
other nervous diseases which are generally character
istic of the insane ? Was it not owing to the unnatural
mode of living peculiar to those times ; to the morbid
and vicious habit of dwelling exclusively on the
emotional part of human nature, and to the utter
ignoring of facts, and the profound contempt for
physical nature which such a habit cherishes ? Indeed
all nature was then regarded as a thing accursed, and
the first men who ventured to study her secrets, and
to explain her laws, were either imprisoned for heresy
or burnt for witchcraft. This battle between school
divinity and physical science has not yet ceased; it is
still carried on with a good deal of the old spirit in
some corners of the world. The iniquitous barrier,
however, which the imaginations of men had set up
between God and Nature, between the natural and the
supernatural, has been broken down; the outworks 'of
Christianity itself—its so-called external evidences—
have been levelled to the ground, and although a few
obscure individuals may be seen here and there endea
vouring to rebuild their Zion out of the debris of the
old ruins, yet their labour is in vain. Men of science
look on with infinite pity for such a waste of intellect,
�i6
Religion:
and of misguided ingenuity; literary men smile at them
for the small amount of culture and taste which their
works display; and even our intelligent working men
stand idly by, amused as they would be by the labours
of little children when they build their sand castles in
the face of a returning tide, while every wave from the
great deep, in its own majestic, irresistable manner,
overwhelms and sweeps them away for ever. Nature
is once more restored to her proper place; if we build
anything likely to endure, it must have its foundation
in her—if we wish to be enlightened intellectually and
morally we must live and act according to her eternal
laws. But “ a mixture of a lie,” says Bacon, “ doth
ever add pleasure ;” and it is quite true that men must
live, and cannot help living, on the mere shadows of
thought till they have' learned to begin with first
principles. “ A mixture of a lie doth evei' add plea
sure.” Now, eliminate the lie from our theologies,
apply the scientific method to our orthodox religion,
and the whole thing will shrivel up and vanish like
vapour before the sun. Religions are ■ built on what
Bacon calls a “lie.” Certain things are assumed as
axiomatic truths which not only cannot be proved, but
which are most repugnant to our enlightened reason,
a,nd on these barbarous assumptions our expert meta
physical theologians rear a superstructure of syllogisms
which makes one feel sad to look at. We will not
waste our time in exploding these superstructures,
whether they be Catholicism, Protestantism, Calvinism,
Mahometanism, or Christian Unitarianism. We will
not even turn aside to discuss such childish problems
as these—“Whether the Bible is the Word of God?”
“ Are miracles possible?” “ Can prayer alter the course
of nature?” We need not answer these—Science has
answered them long ago. When men are bewildered
by the conflicting voices of so many churches, when
they see the old mythologies dying out, and every
religion one after another strangled in the grasp of
science, they do not ask, “what are miracles?” or
�Its Place in Human Culture.
17
“ what pi’ophecies are yet to be fulfilled ?” but they fall
back on first principles, and in a kind of half-despairing,
half-defiant spirit, they ask if there is a God at all, and
if Religion is not altogether a great imposture. They
see the intellectual force of the age overwhelming
everything that goes by the name of “God” and “Re
ligion,” and they wonder why any men should be so
foolish as ever to have believed in such a God or in
such a religion. All other questions, except the great
fundamental ones, “ What is God—what is Religion,”
are idle and impertinent. It is my duty, as your
teacher here, to work out these two problems from week
to week to the best of my power. It is my duty, and
it will be my infinite pleasure, to reconcile so far as I
am able the conflicting aspects of human thought, to
explain to you the significance and end of human life,
to throw some light on its dark enigmas, and to make
you feel the happiness and exquisite joy which are the
certain heritage of every man who lives righteously—
true to himself and true to his fellowmen.
I have thus far spoken of religion as a formulated
creed, or as a “ Body of Divinity,” which can be learned
out of books. Religion in this sense is what we com
monly understand by Systematic Theology; it is the
logical arrangement of metaphysical notions which
men have formed of God and of the universe. I say
the logical arrangement, for if we grant the soundness
of the premises which are assumed by theologians,
we have, logically, no fault to find with their “ sys
tems.” But a more liberal education, and a more
intimate acquaintance with the physical laws of
nature—in other words, both culture and science
have long since convinced us of the futility of all
conclusions which are based on mere metaphysical
speculations. Now it is clear to every man who is in
the least acquainted with the inductive mode of
reasoning, that all religions hitherto given to the
world are based on false premises. Let us take
Christianity as that form of religion with which most
�i8
Religion:
of us are best acquainted. First of all, the existence
of a personal God is assumed as an unquestionable
fact, and although we make no objection to this
position, we have no reason whatever to accept as
final and ultimate the psychological analysis which
theologians have given us of His nature and character.
In other words, we have no reason to believe in their
Science of God, for it is really not science but meta
physics. It is again assumed that God has once and
for all given to mankind a Revelation of Himself,
which contains, in the words of the Catechism, all
“that man is to believe concerning God, and what
duty God requires of man.” But we find that this
“ Revelation,” contained in the Bible, contains many
things which no intelligent man can believe con
cerning God, and that it inculcates duties which are
either impracticable in modern society, or simply
barbarous. To make the matter worse, and render
it still more bewildering, this so-called Revelation
contradicts itself on so many important points that
theologians have always found it necessary to write
large folios on the best method of “ reconciling” and
“ harmonising” the more glaringly contradictory pas
sages. And finally, we are gravely asked to believe
all this on the strength of prophecies which were
never meant by their writers to be prophecies at all,
and on the strength of miracles which, if they had
taken place, could only prove that the government of
the world is a mere blunder.
Now all this is theology, that is, the Science of
God, which ecclesiastics have evolved out of their
own imaginations; and we shall have frequent occa
sions to see that it is to theology, and not to religion
properly so-called, physical science is opposed. Nor
is science opposed to the Bible as a religious, any
more than it is opposed to Homer as a poetical, book.
Our position, which I may state in one sentence,
is this:—True culture has outgrown the barbarous
character which theologians ascribe to God. But
�Its Place in Human Culture.
19
theologians say that this character of Him. is revealed
in the Bible; therefore true culture has outgrown the
belief in Revelation. Science has also revealed to us
the majesty and immutability of natural laws. But
theologians say that in some dark periods of human
history, in certain rude ages when men had no con
ception of the grandeur of the universe, or of the
method of its creation and evolution, these laws were
capriciously interfered with by some supernatural
power; therefore scientific men refuse to believe in a
God who would “palter with them in a double sense,”
and reveal himself by what are called “ miracles.”
The question, then, is not between science and
religion, but between science and theology; not
between science and the Bible, but between science
and so-called Revelation.
What, then, is religion ?
Religion has been defined as a “self-surrender of
the soul to God.” This is quite a theological defini
tion, and a very feeble and sentimental one it is. It
proceeds, of course, on a knowledge of the Science of
God which theologians have developed in a cloud of
metaphysics. Matthew Arnold defines religion as
simply “ morality enkindled, or lit up by emotion.”
If this is not the whole truth, it is the nearest to the
truth that has ever been given, and it coincides
exactly with all that I have ever thought on the sub
ject. Morality is the groundwork of refigion, the
very life and soul of religion, and without morality all
religion is a false glare. It is for this reason that I
admire Aristotle more than Plato, because he is more
definite and clear in his rules of conduct. Religion is
to morality as poetry is to prose; and it is curious
that as Aristotle defined poetry to be imitation, so
Thomas a Kempis calls his religious meditations,
Imitations. Poetry has, like all the ideal arts, intellec
tual beauty for its object; religion has moral beauty
or holiness for its object. And both are imitations,
that is, imitations of ideal excellence. If, therefore,
�20
Religion:
religion—I mean true personal religion—be moralitylit up or enkindled by emotion, it is very clear that
the purity of religion must necessarily depend on the
moral enlightenment of society, or, in other words,
that religious development depends on moral develop
ment. This explains again how men are often a great
deal better than their theology; for as theology is
simply the religious experiences of past generations
fossilized in dogma, it is quite inadequate to the
expression of the religious experiences of succeeding
generations, which have far surpassed them in moral
and physical science. Hence it is that the life and
conduct of modern Christians are so very different
from what one would expect to result from their
theology. But the truth is, they have outgrown
Christianity, and they are not aware of it.
Again, we might say that religion, or the religious
sentiment, is one aspect of mental development, or
one phase of the collective thought of mankind. This
aspect is presented to us in bolder relief during a short
period in Jewish history, just as the ideal and fine-art
aspect is presented to us during a short period in
Greek history, and as the positive, and legal or poli
tical, aspect is presented to us in Roman history.
The Semitic race gave to humanity the religious
impulse and aspiration; the Greek and Latin races
gave to it respectively the sense of ideal beauty and
the method of government. Since the revival of
learning, all these elements have been tumultuously
struggling to blend and coalesce in the mind of the
great Indo-European races, and although the effer
vescence caused by the contact of these elements is
gradually settling down, although, in other words,
these various aspects are beginning to look more
approvingly on each other, the gloomy aspect of
Judaism through Christianity still frowns on science,
and its attitude would seem to indicate that many
hard blows will be exchanged between them before
science and so-called religion can understand each
�Its Place in Human Culture.
21
others temperament, and embrace as friends. It will
be part of our duty to reconcile, not science and
theology, for they are irreconcilable, but the scientific
and the religious aspects of thought. It will be our
duty also to show how the religious mind can be scien
tific, and the scientific mind religious; and how the
perfection and completeness of our nature depend,
not on religion alone nor on science alone, nor on
morality alone, but on the completeness by which we
are able to absorb into our very being the spirit of all
the three. It is then only we can be said to live
nobly, and in the front rank of our age, when we open
our souls freely for the reception of all light and
truth, whencesoever they come; it is then only we
can be said to think and act religiously, when we can
radiate that light and truth around us to bless and to
cheer our fellowmen, and to make them feel that life,
when lived truly, is indeed a joyous thing. Already
we see the collective wisdom of mankind rounding
itself into a perfect orb, and we can infer from the
light which it already sheds what shall be the bril
liancy of its full shining. What the destiny of our
race shall be—to what unknown shores the tide of
history rolls—are questions which we reserve for the
last lecture of our course on history. It is enough
for us at present to know that it does roll on, gathering
strength in its course; that it has come down to us
laden with all the wealth of human thought to which
all the nations have been tributaries; that it has
overwhelmed, and buried for ever, everything that
has resisted its progress, and that even now it roars
at the walls of our temples and at the gates of our
palaces; and that we see it pass by us bearing on its
bosom all that we have of real knowledge, of truth
and holiness, to scatter them as seeds for future
harvests in some happier climes, and under purer
heavens.
Smith & Brown, Printers, Edinburgh,
��
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Religion: its place in human culture.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Macleod, John
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 21 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: A lecture delivered in Freemasons' Hall, Edinburgh, on Sunday, May 18, 1873. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Printed by Smith and Brown, Edinburgh.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Thomas Scott
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1873
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
CT113
Subject
The topic of the resource
Religion
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Religion: its place in human culture.), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Conway Tracts
Culture
Religion
Religion and culture