According to Mr. Black, there will be slavery in Heaven, and fast by the throne of G.o.d will be the auction-block, and the streets of the New Jerusalem will be adorned with the whipping-post, while the music of the harp will be supplemented by the crack of the driver"s whip. If some good Republican would catch Mr. Black, "incorporate him into his family, tame him, teach him to think, and give him a knowledge of the true principles of human liberty and government, he would confer upon him a most beneficent boon." Mr. Black is too late with his protest against the freedom of his fellow-men. Liberty is making the tour of the world.
Russia has emanc.i.p.ated her serfs; the slave trade is prosecuted only by thieves and pirates; Spain feels upon her cheek the burning blush of shame; Brazil, with proud and happy eyes, is looking for the dawn of freedom"s day; the people of the South rejoice that slavery is no more, and every good and honest man (excepting Mr. Black) of every land and clime hopes that the limbs of men will never feel again the weary weight of chains.
442. Jehovah Breaking His Own Laws
A very curious thing about these Commandments is that their supposed author violated nearly every one. From Sinai, according to the account, He said: "Thou shalt not kill," and yet He ordered the murder of millions; "Thou shalt not commit adultery," and He gave captured maidens to gratify the l.u.s.t of captors; "Thou shalt not steal," and yet He gave to Jewish marauders the flocks and herds of others; "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor"s house, nor his wife," and yet He allowed His chosen people to destroy the homes of neighbors and to steal their wives; "Honor thy father and mother," and yet this same G.o.d had thousands of fathers butchered, and with the sword of war killed children yet unborn; "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor," and yet He sent abroad "lying spirits" to deceive His own prophets, and in a hundred ways paid tribute to deceit. So far as we know, Jehovah kept only one of these Commandments--He worshiped no other G.o.d.
443. Who Designed the Designer?
I know as little as anyone else about the "pla" of the universe; and as to the "design," I know just as little. It will not do to say that the universe was designed, and therefore there must be a designer. There must first be proof that it was "designed." It will not do to say that the universe has a "plan," and then a.s.sert that there must have been an infinite maker. The idea that a design must have a beginning, and that a designer need not, is a simple expression of human ignorance. We find a watch, and we say: "So curious and wonderful a thing must have had a maker." We find the watchmaker, and we say: "So curious and wonderful a thing as man must have had a maker." We find G.o.d and we then say: "He is so wonderful that he must _not_ have had a maker." In other words, all things a little wonderful must have been created, but it is possible for something to be so wonderful that it always existed. One would suppose that just as the wonder increased the necessity for a creator increased, because it is the wonder of the thing that suggests the idea of creation. Is it possible that a designer exists from all eternity without design? Was there no design in having an infinite designer? For me, it is hard to see the plan or design in earthquakes and pestilences.
It is somewhat difficult to discern the design or the benevolence in so making the world that billions of animals live only on the agonies of others. The justice of G.o.d is not visible to me in the history of this world. When I think of the suffering and death, of the poverty and crime, of the cruelty and malice, of the heartlessness of this "design"
and "plan," where beak and claw and tooth tear and rend the quivering flesh of weakness and despair, I cannot convince myself that it is the result of infinite wisdom, benevolence, and justice.
444. What we Know of the Infinite
Of course, upon a question like this, nothing can be absolutely known.
We live on an atom called Earth, and what we know of the infinite is almost infinitely limited; but, little as we know, all have an equal right to give their honest thought. Life is a shadowy, strange, and winding road on which we travel for a little way--a few short steps--just from the cradle, with its lullaby of love, to the low and quiet wayside inn, where all at last must sleep, and where the only salutation is--Good-night.
445. The Universe Self-Existent
The universe, according to my idea, is, always was, and forever will be. It did not "come into being;" it is the one eternal being--the only thing that ever did, does, or can exist. It did not "make its own laws."
We know nothing of what we call the laws of Nature except as we gather the idea of law from the uniformity of phenomena springing from like conditions. To make myself clear: Water always runs down hill. The theist says that this happens because there is behind the phenomenon an active law. As a matter of fact law is this side of the phenomenon. Law does not cause the phenomenon, but the phenomenon causes the idea of law in our minds, and this idea is produced from the fact that under like circ.u.mstances the same phenomena always happens. Mr. Black probably thinks that the difference in the weight of rocks and clouds was created by law; that parallel lines fail to imite only because it is illegal; that diameter and circ.u.mference could have been so made that it would be a greater distance across than around a circle, that a straight line could inclose a triangle if not prevented by law, and that a little legislation could make it possible for two bodies to occupy the same s.p.a.ce at the same time. It seems to me that law can not be the cause of phenomena, but it is an effect produced in our minds by their succession and resemblance. To put a G.o.d back of the universe compels us to admit that there was a time when nothing existed except this G.o.d; that this G.o.d had lived from eternity in an infinite vacuum and in an absolute idleness. The mind of every thoughtful man is forced to one of these two conclusions, either that the universe is self-existent or that it was created by a self-existent being. To my mied there are far more difficulties in the second hypothesis than in the first.
446. Jehovah"s Promise Broken
If Jehovah was in fact G.o.d, He knew the end from the beginning. He knew that his Bible would be a breastwork behind which tyranny and hypocrisy would crouch; that it would be quoted by tyrants; that it would be the defense of robbers called kings and of hypocrites called priests. He knew that He had taught the Jewish people but little of importance. He knew that He found them free and left them captives. He knew that He had never fulfilled the promises made to them. He knew that while other nations had advanced in art and science his chosen people were savage still. He promised them the world, and gave them a desert. He promised them liberty, and He made them slaves. He promised them victory, and He gave them defeat. He said they should be kings, and He made them serfs. He promised them universal empire, and gave them exile. When one finishes the Old Testament, he is compelled to say: Nothing can add to the misery of a nation whose King is Jehovah!
447. Character Bather than Creed
For a thousand years the torch of progress was extinguished in the blood of Christ, and His disciples, moved by ignorant zeal, by insane, cruel creeds, destroyed with flame and sword a hundred millions of their fellow-men. They made this world a h.e.l.l. But if cathedrals had been universities--if dungeons of the Inquisition had been laboratories--if Christians had believed in character instead of creed--if they had taken from the Bible all the good and thrown away the wicked and absurd--if domes of temples had been observatories--if priests had been philosophers--if missionaries had taught the useful arts--if astrology had been astronomy--if the black art had been chemistry--if superst.i.tion had been science--if religion had been humanity--it would have been a heaven filled with love, with liberty, and joy.
448. Mohammed the Prophet of G.o.d
Mohammed was a poor man, a driver of camels. He was without education, without influence, and without wealth, and yet in a few years he consolidated thousands of tribes, and millions of men confess that there is "one G.o.d, and Mohammed is his prophet." His success was a thousand times greater during his life than that of Christ. He was not crucified; he was a conqueror. "Of all men, he exercised the greatest influence upon the human race." Never in the world"s history did a religion spread with the rapidity of his. It burst like a storm over the fairest portions of the globe. If Mr. Black is right in his position that rapidity is secured only by the direct aid of the Divine Being, then Mohammed was most certainly the prophet of G.o.d. As to wars of extermination and slavery, Mohammed agreed with Mr. Black, and upon polygamy with Jehovah. As to religious toleration, he was great enough to say that "men holding to any form of faith might be saved, provided they were virtuous." In this he was far in advance both of Jehovah and Mr. Black.
449. Wanted!--A Little More Legislation
We are informed by Mr. Black that "polygamy is neither commanded or prohibited in the Old Testament--that it is only discouraged." It seems to me that a little legislation on that subject might have tended to its "discouragement." But where is the legislation? In the moral code, which Mr. Black a.s.sures us "consists of certain immutable rules to govern the conduct of all men at all times and at all places in their private and personal relations with others," not one word is found on the subject of polygamy. There is nothing "discouraging" in the Ten Commandments, nor in the records of any conversation Jehovah is claimed to have had with Moses upon Sinai. The life of Abraham, the story of Jacob and Laban, the duty of a brother to be the husband of the widow of his deceased brother, the life of David, taken in connection with the practice of one who is claimed to have been the wisest of men--all these things are probably relied on to show that polygamy was at least "discouraged."
Certainly Jehovah had time to instruct Moses as to the infamy of polygamy. He could have spared a few moments from a description of patterns of tongs and basins for a subject so important as this. A few-words in favor of the one wife and one husband--in favor of the virtuous and loving home--might have taken the place of instructions as to cutting the garments of priests and fashioning candlesticks and ounces of gold. If he had left out simply the order that rams" skins should be dyed red, and in its place had said, "A man shall have but one wife, and the wife but one husband," how much better it would have been.
450. Is all that Succeeds Inspired?
Again, it is urged that "the acceptance of Christianity by a large portion of the generation contemporary with its Founder and His Apostles, was under the circ.u.mstances, an adjudication as solemn and authoritative as mortal intelligence could p.r.o.nounce." If this is true, then "the acceptance of Buddhism by a large portion of the generation contemporary with its Founder was an adjudication as solemn and authoritative as mortal intelligence could p.r.o.nounce." The same could be said of Mohammedanism, and, in fact, of every religion that has ever benefited or cursed this world. This argument, when reduced to its simplest form, is this: All that succeeds is inspired.
451. The Morality in Christianity
The morality in Christianity has never opposed the freedom of thought.
It has never put, nor tended to put, a chain on a human mind, nor a manacle on a human limb; but the doctrines distinctively Christian--the necessity of believing a certain thing; the idea that eternal punishment awaited him who failed to believe; the idea that the innocent can suffer for the guilty--these things have |opposed, and for a thousand years substantially destroyed the freedom of the human mind. All religions have, with ceremony, magic, and mystery, deformed, darkened, and corrupted, the soul. Around the st.u.r.dy oaks of morality have grown and clung the parasitic, poisonous vines of the miraculous and monstrous.
452. Miracle Mongers
St. Irenaeus a.s.sures us that all Christians possessed the power of working miracles; that they prophesied, cast out devils, healed the sick, and even raised the dead. St. Epiphanius a.s.serts that some rivers and fountains were annually trans.m.u.ted into wine, in attestation of the miracle of Cana, adding that he himself had drunk of these fountains.
St. Augustine declares that one was told in a dream where the bones of St. Stephen were buried and the bones were thus discovered and brought to Hippo, and that they raised five dead persons to life, and that in two years seventy miracles were performed with these relics. Justin Martyr states that G.o.d once sent some angels to guard the human race, that these angels fell in love with the daughters of men, and became the fathers of innumerable devils. For hundreds of years miracles were about the only things that happened. They were wrought by thousands of Christians, and testified to by millions. The saints and martyrs, the best and greatest, were the witnesses and workers of wonders. Even heretics, with the a.s.sistance of the devil, could suspend the "laws of nature." Must we believe these wonderful accounts because they were written by "good men," by Christians," who made their statements in the presence and expectation of death"? The truth is that these "good men"
were mistaken. They expected the miraculous. They breathed the air of the marvelous. They fed their minds on prodigies, and their imaginations feasted on effects without causes. They were incapable of investigating.
Doubts were regarded as "rude disturbers of the congregation." Credulity and sanct.i.ty walked hand in hand. Reason was danger. Belief was safety.
As the philosophy of the ancients was rendered almost worthless by the credulity of the common people, so the proverbs of Christ, his religion of forgiveness, his creed of kindness, were lost in the mist of miracle and the darkness of superst.i.tion.
453. The Honor Due to Christ
For the man Christ--for the reformer who loved his fellow-men--for the man who believed in an Infinite Father, who would shield the innocent and protect the just--for the martyr who expected to be rescued from the cruel cross, and who at last, finding that his rope was dust, cried out in the gathering gloom of death; "My G.o.d! My G.o.d! Why hast thou forsaken me?"--for that great and suffering man, mistaken though he was, I have the highest admiration and respect. That man did not, as I believe, claim a miraculous origin; he did not pretend to heal the sick nor raise the dead. He claimed simply to be a man, and taught his fellow-men that love is stronger far than hate. His life was written by reverent ignorance. Loving credulity belittled his career with feats of jugglery and magic art, and priests wishing to persecute and slay, put in his mouth the words of hatred and revenge. The theological Christ is the impossible union of the human and divine--man with the attributes of G.o.d, and G.o.d with the limitations and weakness of man.