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NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY
Old Thoughts
FOR
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BEING SELECTIONS
From the “ Pensees Philosophiques ” of Diderot,
TRANSLATED
WILLIAM
AND
ARRANGED BY
HARDAKER.
“ Neither do men light a candle, and pnt it under a bushel, but
on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house.”
—St. Matthew v., 15.
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L0ND0N:PUBLISHING COMPANY,
28 Stonecutter Street, E.C.
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�DIDEROT
Was born in the town of Langres, France, in October,
1718. The illustrious creator of the “ French Encyclo
pedia” commenced his education at the Jesuits’ College
in his native town, where the sagacity of the priests of that
astute order soon discovered his rare talents, and persuaded
him to leave home without the knowledge of his parents, in order
to qualify in Paris for the priesthood. But, like Voltaire,
Denis Diderot was not destined to render the order of Loyala
illustrious. At Harcourt College he received one of those
solid educations which the reverend fathers knew so well
how to give. In the office of the lawyer, Clement de Ris, he
learned everything of law except its chicanery.
In 1743 he married against the wish of his father, and indeed
of his mother-in-law, who knew him to be without means save a
golden tongue. His married life was not happy. The first
money he earned by literature was the translation of the History
of Greece from the English. Being advanced in years, and
still poor, he resolved to sell his library so that he might assure
the future of his daughter, which was bought, without his solici
tation, by the Empress of Russia, who also supplied him with
the means to live in comfort for the short remainder of his days.
Diderot died on the 30th July, 1784, on the threshold of the
Great Revolution, which he, with Rousseau and Voltaire, helped
so materially to hasten.
�OLD THOUGHTS
FOR
NEW THINKERS.
BEING
Selections from the “ Pensees Philosophiques ” of Diderot.
TRANSLATED AND ARRANGED BY
WILLIAM
HARDAKEK.
---------- »----------
“I
of God; I count on but few readers, and small
approval. If these thoughts find favor with none, they
may possibly be simply crass; but I hold them detest
able if they please everyone.”
write
I know the bigots : they are prompt to take alarm. If for a
moment they judged that this book contained something con
trary to their ideas, I should expect to hear all the calumnies
they have spread abroad against a thousand men of greater worth
than myself. If I am only a Deist; and only a scoundrel, I shall
get off cheaply. They long ago damned Descartes, Montaigne,
Locke, and Bayle, and I hope they will yet damn a great many
others. I, however, declare to them that I do not count myself
to be either a more honest man, or a better Christian, than the
greater part of these philosophers. I was born in the Roman
Catholic Apostolic Church, and I submit, with all my might, to
her decisions. I wish to die in the religion of my fathers, and I
believe in it as much as it is possible for anyone who has never
had direct intercourse with the Divinity, and who has never
been eye-witness to any miracle. This is my profession of faith ;
I am almost certain they will be dissatisfied with it, although
they have not, perhaps, one among them in a condition to make
a better.
You present to an unbeliever a volume of writings which you
profess to demonstrate are of divine origin. But before enter
�4
ing upon an examination of your proofs, he will not fail to ask
you : Has it always been the same ? Why is it at present less
ample than it was some centuries ago? By what authority
have you banished such and such a work, revered by another
sect, and retained such and such another which it has rejected?
On what foundation have you given the preference to this
manuscript? . Who has directed you in the choice you have
made between so many differing copies ? What are the incon
testable proofs that these sacred authors have been transmitted
to you in their pristine purity ? But if the ignorance of copyists,
or the malice of heretics, has corrupted them, as you may
easily imagine is possible, you will be obliged to restore them
to their natural state before proving their divinity; for it is
not from a collection of mutilated writings that proofs will fall
with which to establish my faith; therefore to whom will you
entrust this restorat on ? To the Church. But I am not able
to believe in the infallibility of the Church until the divinity of
the scriptures is proved. You see me, then, in an inevitable
state of scepticism.
There is no answer to this difficulty, except by acknowledging
that the first foundations of the faithare purely human ; that the
choice between the manuscripts^ that the restitution of passages,
in fact, that the collection is made ..by the rules of criticism, and
I do not refuse to allow to the divinity of the sacred books a
degree of faith in proportion to their consonance with the canons
of criticism.
—'
I tell you there is no God; that the creation is a chimera ; that
the eternity of the universe is no more inconceivable than the
eternity of a spirit; that because I do not know how motion has
been able to engender this universe, which it knows so well to con
serve, it is ridiculous to remove this difficulty by the suppositious
existence of a being that I know still less ; thatif the brilliant mar
vels of the physical world discover an intelligence, the disturbances
so rife in the moral world, wipe out providence. I say to you
that if all is the work of a God, all should be the best possible ;
therefore, if all is not the best possible, God is either incapable
or malevolent. This being so, of what good are your revelations ?
Even were it as well demonstrated as it is not, that all evil is
the source of a good ; that it was good that a Britannicus, one of
the best of princes, perish ; that a Nero, the worst of men, reign.
How will it prove that it was impossible to attain the same end
by other means ? To permit vice in order that virtue may shine
with greater lustre by contrast, is but a frivolous advantage
to set against so serious an evil. This, says the Atheist, is what
I object; what have you to say ? . . . “ That I am a wretch; and
�i&rf if I had nothing to fear of God, I should not dispute his
existence."
Let us leave this phrase to the bigots; it may be untrue,
politeness proscribes it, and is besides uncharitable. Because
a man is wrong not to believe in God, shall we revile him ?
Invective is resorted to only in default of proofs. Between two
disputants it is a hundred to one that he who is in the wrong
will grow angry.
“Thou layest hold of thy thunder-bolts instead of replying,
said Menippus to Jupiter; “thou art then in the wrong.”
I open the book of a celebrated professor, and I read :
“ Atheists, I grant you that movement is essential to matter;
what can you make of it ? ... . That the world is the outcome
of a fortuitous aggregation of atoms? You may as well tell me
that Homer’s Iliad or la Henriade of Voltaire are the result of
fortuitous combinations of accidents.” I should be very care
ful not to offer such reasoning to an Atheist. The illustration
would give him fine play.
According to the laws of the analysis of chances, he would
say to me, I have no right to be surprised that a thing happens
so long as it is possible, and that the difficulty of the event is
compensated by the quantity of throws. In a certain number
of throws I will wager, with the odds in my favor, that I turn
up a hundred thousand sixes at a time with a hundred thousand
dice. Whatever might be the definite number of characters
with which it might be proposed I should fortuitously engender
the Iliad, there is a possible sum of throws, which renders the
proposition advantageous; my advantage would be infinite even,
if the number of throws granted were infinite. You will, no doubt,
agree with me, he would continue, that matter existed from all
eternity, and that movement is essential to it. In return for
this favor, I shall suppose, with you, that the world is boundless,
that the multitude of atoms are infinite, and the marvellous order
which fills you with astonishment does not belie the supposition.
Then, from these reciprocal concessions, there results nothing
more than that the possibility of engendering the universe by
accident is very small, but that the number of chances is
infinite ; that is to say, that the difficulty of the event is more
than sufficiently compensated by the multitude of throws.
Therefore, if anything should be repugnant to reason, it
should be the supposition that matter being self moved from
all eternity, and that their being perchance, in the infinite
number possible of combinations of forms, an infinite number of
admirable arrangements, there should not be any of these suit
able arrangements encountered in the infinite number of those
�6
she has taken successively. Therefore, the hypothetic duration
of chaos is more astounding than the real birth of the universe.
I divide Atheists into three classes. There are some who
would tell you distinctly that there is no God, and would believe
" what they said; these are true Atheists. Another numerous
class, who do not know what to think, and who would willingly
decide the question by tossing heads or tails; these are sceptics
Atheistic. There are many more who would like very much
that there should not be a God, who seem to persuade themselves
there is not, and who live as if they were so persuaded ; these
are blusterers, humbugs. I detest them ; they are false. I pity
the true Atheists. To me all consolation seems dead for them
and I pray to God for the sceptics that they may be enlightened’.
,
! Scepticism is not possible for everyone: It supposes pro
found and disinterested examination; he who doubts only be
cause he does not understand the reasons for believing is simply
one of the ignorant. The true sceptic has counted and weighed
the reasons; but to weigh reasons is no small affair. Who
among us knows exactly the value of reasoning ? Bring a hun
dred proofs of the same truth, each one will have its partisans ;
each mind looking through its own telescope in its own fashion’
An objection, which to my view appears a colossus, will diminish
to the vanishing point in yours. You find a reason light, which
crushes me under its weight. If we are divided on the question
of intrinsic value, how can we hope to be agreed on the relative
value ? Tell me, how many moral proofs does it take to'counter
balance a metaphysical conclusion? Are they my spectacles
which sin, or yours ? If then, it is so difficult to weigh reasons,
and if there are no questions in which there is not a pro and a con’
and almost always in equal measure why are we so peremptory?
From whence comes this tone of decision? What is more
revolting than a dogmatic self-sufficiency ? “ I am made to hate
the things which appear true,” said the author of the Essais
“when they are forced upon me as infallible.”
I love words which soften and moderate the boldness of our
propositions, such as, “Perhaps it maybe so,” “Let us see,”
“ It is so said,” “ I think,” and others similar; and if I had the
care of children, I would put into their mouths the habit of
replying by questions and not by affirmation; as, “I do not
understand,” “ It may possibly be so,” “ Is it true,” so that they
should rather use the manner of students at sixty than seem to
be professors at sixteen.
___
Men of passionate temperament, of ardent imagination,
cannot reconcile themselves to the indolence of the sceptic. They
�7
will choose at hazard rather than not make a choice at all;
deceive themselves rather than live in uncertainty. Whether it
be that they mistrust their strength, or that they fear the depth
of the flood, we see them for ever hanging to the branches of
which they feel all the frailty, and to which they cling in
preference to abandoning themselves to the torrent. They are
sure in all things although nothing have they examined with care.
They doubt of nothing, because they lack both the patience and
the courage. Deciding by emotion, if by chance they encounter
truth, it is not hesitatingly, but with a shock, and as a revelation.
They are, amongst the dogmatic, such as were in the religious
world styled the Illuminati. I have seen individuals of this
uneasy species who could not conceive it possible to ally tran
quillity of mind with indecision.
To be able to live happy without knowing what we are, from
whence we came, where we go, why we are here!
I pride myself on ignoring all that without being more un
happy, coldly replies the sceptic. It is not my fault if I have
found my reason mute when I have questioned it on these
things.
I shall never make myself unhappy over that which it is
impossible for me to know. Why should I regret the want of
a knowledge I am unable to procure, and which, doubtless, is
not very necessary since I am deprived of it ?
“I would as soon,” said one of the first genuises of our age,
“seriously afflict myself because I have not four eyes, four feet,
and a pair of wings.”
It may be required that I seek for truth, but not that I find it.
May not, possibly, a sophism be to me more forcible than a
solid proof ? I am in the necessity to consent to the false which
I take for truth, and to reject the truth which I take for false ;
but what have I to fear if I deceive myself innocently ? Since
we are not rewarded in the next world for having had a brilliant
intellect in this, should we be punished for our lack of under
standing ? To damn a man for being a bad reasoner, is to forget
that he is a fool in order to punish him for wickedness.
What is a sceptic ? A philosopher who has doubted of all
which he believes, and believes that which a legitimate use of
his reason and his senses have demonstrated true. If you wish
a more precise definition, render the pyrrhonian sincere and you
will have the sceptic.
IA sem2 <'5epticism is the mark of a weak mind; it shows a
�8
pusillanimous reasoner who allows himself to be. afraid of the
consequences ; a superstitions person who fears to unmask to
himself even; for if the truth has nothing to lose by examination,
as the semi-sceptic is convinced, what does he think at the
bottom of his heart of those concealed speculations, which he
is afraid to bring to the light, and which are shrouded in a corner
of his brain as in a sanctuary which he dare not approach ?
That which has never been questioned has not been proved;
that which has never been examined without prejudice has never
been thoroughly examined. Scepticism is then the first step
towards truth. It ought to be general, for it is the touchstone
of truth. If, to assure himself of the existence of God, the
philosopher commences by doubting his existence, is there any
proposition which ought to be withheld from proof ?
We risk as much by believing too much as by believing too
little. There is neither more nor less danger by being polytheist
as Atheist, hence scepticism alone can guarantee equally, in all
times and all places, from those two opposed excesses.
When the religious cry out against scepticism, it seems to me
that they understand their interest badly, or that they contra
dict themselves. If it is certain that a true religion in order to
be embraced, and a false religion in order to be abandoned, has
need only to be well known, it ought to be wished that a
universal doubt should spread over the whole surface of the
earth, and that all the world should earnestly question the
truth of their religions; our missionaries would thus find the
better half of their great labors spared them.
Reasoning which may be used equally by opposite parties
proves nothing; either for the one or the other. If fanaticism
has its martyrs as well as true religion ; and if among those who
have died for the true religion there were fanatics, we must
either believe in proportion to the number of martyrs, or
seek other motives for belief.
Nothing is more calculated to confirm irreligious ideas than
loose reasons for conversion. Sceptics are eternally taunted
with—
“ Who are you, to venture to attack a religion defended so
courageously by a Paul, a Tertullian, an Athanasius, a Chry
�9
sostom, an Augustine, a Cyprian, and so many other illustrious
personages ? You have, no doubt, perceived some difficulty which
had escaped these great men; show us,then, how much you
know more than they, or sacrifice your doubts to their decisions,
if you are agreed that they were wiser than yourself.”
Most frivolous reasoning. The profound learning of ministers
is not a proof of the truth of a religion. What cult could be more
absurd than that of the Egyptians, and what ministers more en
lightened? . . . No, I cannot adore an onion; w’hat merit has
it over other vegetables ? I should be idiotic to prostitute my
homage to things destined for my nourishment. The plant I
water and tend, and which grows and dies in my garden-plot, is
a droll sort of divinity ! “Hold, wretch, thy blasphemies make
me tremble. Wno art thou to set thy reason against the sacred
college ? Who art thou to attack the gods and give lessons to
their ministers ? Art thou more enlightened than those oracles
who were consulted by the entire universe ? Whatsoever thy
reply, I am astounded at thy impertinence and temerity.” . . .
Will Christians never abandon these miserable sophistries?
Moral: Prodigies and dogmatic authority may make dupes or
hypocrites; reason alone can make believers.
It is allowed to be of the last importance not to employ other
than solid reasons in the defence of religion, and yet those who
expose its weaknesses are assailed with virulence. What! is
not enough to be a Christian ?—must one be so illogically ?
It was in the search for -proofs that I found the difficulties.
The books which held the motives for my belief offered at the same
time reasons for being incredulous ; they are a common arsenal.
There I saw the Deist arm against the Atheist; the Deist and
the Atheist contend with the Jew; the Atheist, the Deist, and
the Jew league against the Christian; the Christian, the Jew,
the Deist, and the Atheist take sides against the Mussulman;
the Atheist, the Deist, the Jew, the Mussulman, and the multi
tudinous sects of Christianity come down upon the Christian,
and the sceptic alone against all. I was judge of the blows ; I
held the balance between the combatants ; the beam went up
and dowu according to the weight of their respective argument.
After long oscillations, the balance trembled almost imperceptibly
on the side of the Christian. I will answer for my equity: it
was not my fault if the difference were not greater; I call God
to witness my sincerity.
This diversity of opinion has evolved an argument for the
�10
Deists more singular perhaps than solid.
Cicero, having io
prove the Romans the most bellicose people in the world,
adroitly extracted this avowal from the mouths of their rivals:—
“ Gauls, to whom would you yield in courage if you yielded to
any ?—To the Romans. Parthians, after you, who are the most
courageous?—The Romans. Africans, whom would you fear, if
fear could enter your minds ?—The Romans.” Let us, following
his example, interrogate the rest of the religions, say the Deists:—
“ Chinese, what religion would be the best, if it were not yours?
—Natural religion. Mussulmans, what cult would you embrace
if you abjured Mahomet?—Naturalism. Christians, which is
the true religion, if perchance it is not Christianity?—The
Jewish religion. But, you Jews, what is the true religion, if
Judaism be false ?—Naturalism.” Therefore, continued Cicero,
that which is by unanimous consent accorded the second place,
and which itself concedes the first to none, merits incontestably
to hold that position.
“I had imagined,” said Julian [called the Apostate], “ that the
chiefs of the Galileans would appreciate how greatly my pro
ceedings are different from those of my predecessor, and that they
would therefore bear me good will. Under his reign they suffered
exile and imprisonment, and a multitude of those they deemed
heretics among them were put to the sword. . . . Under mine the
exiles have been recalled, the prisoners set at liberty, and the
proscribed re-established in the possession of their estates. But
such is the restlessness and the fury of this sort of men that,
since they have lost the privilege of devouring each other,
of tormenting both those who are attached to their dogmas,
and those who follow the authorised religion; they spare no
pains, they allow no occasion to escape of exciting revolts; fellows
without regard for true piety, and without respect for our
constitutions. . . . Nevertheless, we do not hear that they are
dragged to the feet of our altars, or that they suffer violence.
. . With respect to the common people, it appears to be their
chiefs who foment among them a seditious spirit, furious at the
limits we have fixed to their powers; for we have banished them
from our tribunals, and they have not now facilities to dispose
of testaments, to supplant the legitimate heirs, and gobble up
the succession. . . . This is why we prohibit this people to
create tumultuous assemblies and cabal at the houses of their
seditious priests. . . . This ordinance is for the security of our
magistrates, whom the rascals have insulted more than once and
put in danger of being stoned. . . . That they go peaceably to
their meetings, to pray, to be instructed, and to satisfy their
desires in the culture of their religion, we permit; but they
�11
must renounce their factious designs. ... If these assemblies
are made an occasion for revolt, it will be at their risk and peril;
I warn them beforehand. . . . Infidel people, live in peace. . . .
And you who have remained faithful to the religion of your
country and to the gods of your fathers, do not persecute your
neighbors, your fellow-citizens, whose ignorance is more to be
pitied than their wickedness is to be blamed. ... It is by
reason, and not by violence, that men should be brought back
to the truth. We enjoin, then, on you all, our faithful subjects,
to leave the Galileans in peace.”
Such were the sentiments of this prince, against whom we
may bring the charge of paganism, but not of apostacy.
I am astonished at one thing, that is, that the works of this
wise emperor have come down to our times. They contain
passages which do no violence to the truth of Christianity, but
which are disadvantageous enough to some Christians of his
time, inasmuch as they show glimpses of the singular care which
the fathers of the Church had taken to suppress the works oftheir enemies. It is from these predecessors apparently that St.
Gregory the Great had inherited the barbarous zeal which ani
mated him against letters and the arts, so that, had it rested with
this pontiff, we should be in the case of the Mohammedans, who
are reduced for all their reading to that of their Koran. For
what had been the fate of these ancient writers in the hands of
a man who ignored critical rules from religious principle ; who
imagined that to observe the rules of grammar was to submit
Jesus Christ to Donat, and who believed himself obliged in con
science to increase the heaped up ruins of antiquity.
The divin ity of the scriptures is not, however, a characteristic
so clearly imprinted on the face of them that the authority of
the sacred historians is absolutely independent of the testimony
of profane authors. Where should we be if it was necessary to
recognise the finger of God in the style of our Bible ? How
wretched is the Latin version! The originals even are not
masterpieces of composition. The prophets, apostles, and
evangelists wrote according to their capacity. Were it permitted
to us to regard the history of the Jews as a simple human pro
ductions, Moses and his successors would not bear away the
palm from Titus Livy, Sallust, Caesar, and Josephus, all of them
writers of whom no one assuredly suspects that they wrote by
inspiration.
“What is God?” is a question asked of children, and to
which philosophers cannot give an answer. The age at
X
�which children should begin to learn to read, to write, to dance,
and to sing is pretty well understood. It is only in religious
matters that the capacity of the child is not considered. Almost
before he can speak he is asked, “ What is God ?” At the same
time, and from the same lips, he learns that there are goblins,
ghosts, vampires, and a God. The most important truths are
inculcated in a manner to render them liable to be discredited
at the tribunal of reason. It cannot be surprising if, finding, on
reaching manhood, the existence of God mixed up in his head
with a crowd of absurd and superstitious ideas, he should treat
God as the magistrate treats an honest man discovered in the
company of rogues.
From the picture which is drawn of the supreme being, from
his liking to be angry, from the rigor of his vengeance, from
certain comparisons which show us the difference in number
between those he leaves to perish and those to whom he deigns
to offer the hand of salvation, the most pious soul would be
tempted to wish that he did not exist. People would be com
fortable enough in this world were they well assured they had
nothing to fear in the other ; the thought that there is no God at
all has never yet affrighted mortal, but that there is such a God
as he is painted has affrighted many.
There are those who desire that God burn the wicked, who
are powerless against him, in an everlasting fire ; and it is not
permitted a father to slay his son, who, perhaps, imperils his
life, his honor, and his fortune !
O Christians! you have, then, two differing ideas of goodness
and of wickedness, of the truth and lies. You are either the
most absurd dogmatists, or the most outrageous pyhrronians.
All the evil of which one is capable is not all the evil possible i
therefore, it is only he who is able to commit all the wickedness
possible who can merit an eternal chastisement. To make Goda
being infinitely vindictive, you transform an earth-worm into
a being infinitely powerful [to suffer].
The word these atrocious Christians have translated by eternal
signifies in Hebrew only durable. It is from ignorance of a
Hebraism! and the ferocious humor of a translator whence comes
the eternity of punishment.
�The time of revelations, of prodigies, and of extraordinary
missions is passed. Christianity has no longer any need of this
kind of scaffolding. A man taking a fancy to play amongst us
the character of Jonah ; to run about the streets crying, “ Yea,
three days, and London will be destroyed; Cockneys, repent of
your sins, cover yourselves with sackcloth and ashes, or in three
days you will perish,” would be incontinently collared by the
first policeman he might fall in with, who would bring him
before the police-magistrate of his district, who, in his turn,
would not fail to have him dispatched to the county lunatic
asylum. He might shout himself hoarse crying, “Are you less
wicked than the men of Nineveh?” No one would trouble to
reply to him ; and to treat him as a madman, would not wait for
the term of his prediction.
Elie may come from the other world whenever he may take
the fancy. Men are so, in these days, that he will be compelled
to .perform stupendous miracles ere he be well received in this.
A person was asked if there were any true Atheists. “Do
you believe,” replied he, “ that there are any true Christians p”
I hear an outcry from all sides against impiety. The Chris
tian is impious in Asia, the Mussulman in Europe, the Papist in
London, and the Calvinist in Paris. Who, then, is impious ?
All the world, or no one ?
When God, of whom we hold our reason, requires its sacrifice,
he is like a mountebank who conjures away the gifts he pretends
to confer.
If my reason comes from on high, it is the voice of heaven
which speaks by it. It is my duty to be guided by its counsels
If reason is a gift of God, and if faith is also a gift of God, he
has endowed us with two gifts, incompatible and contradictory.
Bewildered in an immense forest in the night time, I have
only a feeble lantern to light my path. Comes a stranger, who
says to me: “Blow out thy candle to better find thy way.” This
stranger is the theologian.
It is as sure as that two and two make four that Caesar
existed; it i3 also as sure that Jesus Christ existed as Caesar.
Then, it is also as sure that Jesus Christ was raised ftom the
�14
dead as that he existed. What logic ! The existence of Jesus
Christ and of Csesar is not a miracle.
Man is as God or nature made him, and God or nature make
nothing bad.
Shade of Jenner! Iam compelled to vaccinate my child to
preserve it from the small-pox, and I am not allowed to kill it
in order to save it from eternal hell ? It is monstrous mockery!
The precepts of religion and the law of society, which prohibit
the murder of innocent children, are both absurd and cruel,
when, in killing them, they are assured of an infinite happiness,
and that, in leaving them to live, they are devoted almost
surely to eternal damnation.
The God of the Christians is a father who sets great store by
his apples, but precious little by his children.
No good father would wish to resemble our heavenly father, t'
And why does he get so mad, this God ? Are we not told that
we cannot add to or detract from his glory, do anything for or
against his repose, for or against his serene majesty ?
If it is necessary to believe in order to be saved, why was
Christ crucified?
If there are a hundred thousand damned for one saved, the
devil has always the advantage, notwithstanding the death of
Christ.
A true religion would compel the attention of all men, in all
times, in all conditions ; would be eternal, universal, and evident.
No religion has these three characteristics. All are therefore
thrice demonstrated false.
Facts of which only a few persons were witnesses are insuffi
cient to prove a religion which is required to be believed by all
the world.
\
�15
.The evidence in support of religion is ancient and marvellous;
that is to say, the most suspicious possible; in proof of things
the most incredible.
To prove the gospel by a miracle is to prove an absurdity by
an act contrary to nature.
Why are the miracles of Christ true, and those of Esculapius,
of Appollonius, of Tyanseus and of Mahomet false ?
The Jews living in Jerusalem at the time of Christ were no
doubt converted on seeing his miracles? Not at all. So far
from believing, they crucified him. It must be conceded that
the Jews are a peculiar people ; everywhere may be seen people
carried away by a single false miracle; and yet Jesus Christ
could not convert the Jews with a multitude of real miracles!
“ This God, who crucified God, to appease the wrath of God ” ;
is an antithesis of more force in its pithy ridicule than a hundred
folio volumes of grave controversy.
It is said that he retired to the Mount of Olives to pray. And
to whom prayed he ? To himself!
God the father judges all men worthy of eternal vengeance’*
God the son, worthy of infinite mercy; God the Holy Ghost
remains neutral. How is this to be reconciled with the unity of
the divine will.
The question has been put to the theologians an infinite
number of times—How can the dogma of eternal damnation
be reconciled with the infinite mercy of God ? They are still
struggling with it!
Tu es Petrus, et super hanc petrum cedifioabo ecclesiam meam
Is this the language of a God or of a Cogers’ Hall punster ?
In dolores paries (Genes).—“ Thou shalt engender in sorrow ”
said God to the prevaricating apple-eating woman. And what
fault had the females of other animals committed that they also
bring forth in pain ?
�If we must take literally the words, “Pater major me est,”
Jesus Christ is not God. If we must take literally, “Hoc est
corpus meum,” he gave his body to his apostles with his own.
hands—which is just as absurd as to say that Saint Denis kissed
his head after it was cut from his shoulders.
It is matchless impudence to cite the conformity of the
gospels, while there are in some,.very important statements of
which not one word is said in the others.
In the first centuries there were sixty gospels of almost equal
authority. Fifty-six have been rejected for puerility and
absurdity. Is there nothing of these in the four which have
been retained ?
Pascal said: “If our religion is false, we risk nothing in
believing it to be true; if it be true, we risk all in believing it
false.” A Mohammedan might say the same as Pascal.
That Jesus Christ, who is God, was tempted of the devil, is
a story worthy of the “ Thousand and One Nights.”
A young woman who lived a very secluded life was one day
visited by a young man, who brought a bird. She became
enceinte, and it was asked how it happened ? Ridiculous! It
was the bird.
Why do the stories of Leda and the swan excite a smile, and
the little flames of Castor and Pollux risibility, when we accept
in all seriousness the pigeon and the tongues of fire of the
gospels ?
Printed and Published by W J. Ramsey, at 28 Stonecutter
Street, London.
�
Dublin Core
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Title
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Victorian Blogging
Description
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
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2018
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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.
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Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Old thoughts for new thinkers : being selections from the "Pensees philosophiques" of Diderot
Creator
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Diderot, Denis [1713-1784]
Hardaker, William (tr)
Description
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 16 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Annotations in pencil. Printed and published by W.J. Ramsay, Stonecutter Street, London. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection.
Publisher
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Progressive Publishing Company
Date
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[n.d.]
Identifier
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N193
Subject
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Philosophy
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Old thoughts for new thinkers : being selections from the "Pensees philosophiques" of Diderot), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
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English
Denis Diderot
French
NSS
Philosophers-France
Philosophy