_Question_. Do you regard the Briggs trial as any evidence of the
growth of Liberalism in the church itself?
_Answer_. When men get together, and make what they call a creed,
the supposition is that they then say as nearly as possible what
they mean and what they believe. A written creed, of necessity,
remains substantially the same. In a few years this creed ceases
to give exactly the new shade of thought. Then begin two processes,
one of destruction and the other of preservation. In every church,
as in every party, and as you may say in every corporation, there
are two wings--one progressive, the other conservative. In the
church there will be a few, and they will represent the real
intelligence of the church, who become dissatisfied with the creed,
and who at first satisfy themselves by giving new meanings to old
words. On the other hand, the conservative party appeals to
emotions, to memories, and to the experiences of their fellow-
members, for the purpose of upholding the old dogmas and the old
ideas; so that each creed is like a crumbling castle. The
conservatives plant ivy and other vines, hoping that their leaves
will hide the cracks and erosions of time; but the thoughtful see
beyond these leaves and are satisfied that the structure itself is
in the process of decay, and that no amount of ivy can restore the
crumbling stones.
The old Presbyterian creed, when it was first formulated, satisfied
a certain religious intellect. At that time people were not very
merciful. They had no clear conceptions of justice. Their lives
were for the most part hard; most of them suffered the pains and
pangs of poverty; nearly all lived in tyrannical governments and
were the sport of nobles and kings. Their idea of God was born of
their surroundings. God, to them, was an infinite king who delighted
in exhibitions of power. At any rate, their minds were so constructed
that they conceived of an infinite being who, billions of years
before the world was, made up his mind as to whom he would save
and whom he would damn. He not only made up his mind as to the
number he would save, and the number that should be lost, but he
saved and damned without the slightest reference to the character
of the individual. They believed then, and some pretend to believe
still, that God damns a man not because he is bad, and that he
saves a man not because he is good, but simply for the purpose of
self-glorification as an exhibition of his eternal justice. It
would be impossible to conceive of any creed more horrible than
that of the Presbyterians. Although I admit--and I not only admit
but I assert--that the creeds of all orthodox Christians are
substantially the same, the Presbyterian creed says plainly what
it means. There is no hesitation, no evasion. The horrible truth,
so-called, is stated in the clearest possible language. One would
think after reading this creed, that the men who wrote it not only
believed it, but were really glad it was true.
Ideas of justice, of the use of power, of the use of mercy, have
greatly changed in the last century. We are beginning dimly to
see that each man is the result of an infinite number of conditions,
of an infinite number of facts, most of which existed before he
was born. We are beginning dimly to see that while reason is a
pilot, each soul navigates the mysterious sea filled with tides
and unknown currents set in motion by ancestors long since dust.
We are beginning to see that defects of mind are transmitted
precisely the same as defects of body, and in my judgment the time
is coming when we shall not more think of punishing a man for
larceny than for having the consumption. We shall know that the
thief is a necessary and natural result of conditions, preparing,
you may say, the field of the world for the growth of man. We
shall no longer depend upon accident and ignorance and providence.
We shall depend upon intelligence and science.
The Presbyterian creed is no longer in harmony with the average
sense of man. It shocks the average mind. It seems too monstrous
to be true; too horrible to find a lodgment in the mind of the
civilized man. The Presbyterian minister who thinks, is giving
new meanings to the old words. The Presbyterian minister who feels,
also gives new meanings to the old words. Only those who neither
think nor feel remain orthodox.
For many years the Christian world has been engaged in examining
the religions of other peoples, and the Christian scholars have
had but little trouble in demonstrating the origin of Mohammedanism
and Buddhism and all other isms except ours. After having examined
other religions in the light of science, it occurred to some of
our theologians to examine their own doctrine in the same way, and
the result has been exactly the same in both cases. Dr. Briggs,
as I believe, is a man of education. He is undoubtedly familiar
with other religions, and has, to some extent at least, made himself
familiar with the sacred books of other people. Dr. Briggs knows
that no human being knows who wrote a line of the Old Testament.
He knows as well as he can know anything, for instance, that Moses
never wrote one word of the books attributed to him. He knows that
the book of Genesis was made by putting two or three stories
together. He also knows that it is not the oldest story, but was
borrowed. He knows that in this book of Genesis there is not one
word adapted to make a human being better, or to shed the slightest
light on human conduct. He knows, if he knows anything, that the
Mosaic Code, so-called, was, and is, exceedingly barbarous and not
adapted to do justice between man and man, or between nation and
nation. He knows that the Jewish people pursued a course adapted
to destroy themselves; that they refused to make friends with their
neighbors; that they had not the slightest idea of the rights of
other people; that they really supposed that the earth was theirs,
and that their God was the greatest God in the heavens. He also
knows that there are many thousands of mistakes in the Old Testament
as translated. He knows that the book of Isaiah is made up of
several books. He knows the same thing in regard to the New
Testament. He also knows that there were many other books that
were once considered sacred that have been thrown away, and that
nobody knows who wrote a solitary line of the New Testament.
Besides all this, Dr. Briggs knows that the Old and New Testaments
are filled with interpolations, and he knows that the passages of
Scripture which have been taken as the foundation stones for creeds,
were written hundreds of years after the death of Christ. He knows
well enough that Christ never said: "I came not to bring peace,
but a sword." He knows that the same being never said: "Thou art
Peter, and on this rock will I build my church." He knows, too,
that Christ never said: "Whosoever believes shall be saved, and
whosoever believes not shall be damned." He knows that these were
interpolations. He knows that the sin against the Holy Ghost is
another interpolation. He knows, if he knows anything, that the
gospel according to John was written long after the rest, and that
nearly all of the poison and superstition of orthodoxy is in that
book. He knows also, if he knows anything, that St. Paul never
read one of the four gospels.
Knowing all these things, Dr. Briggs has had the honesty to say
that there was some trouble about taking the Bible as absolutely
inspired in word and punctuation. I do not think, however, that
he can maintain his own position and still remain a Presbyterian
or anything like a Presbyterian. He takes the ground, I believe,
that there are three sources of knowledge: First, the Bible;
second, the church; third, reason. It seems to me that reason
should come first, because if you say the Bible is a source of
authority, why do you say it? Do you say this because your reason
is convinced that it is? If so, then reason is the foundation of
that belief. If, again, you say the church is a source of authority,
why do you say so? It must be because its history convinces your
reason that it is. Consequently, the foundation of that idea is
reason. At the bottom of this pyramid must be reason, and no man
is under any obligation to believe that which is unreasonable to
him. He may believe things that he cannot prove, but he does not
believe them because they are unreasonable. He believes them
because he thinks they are not unreasonable, not impossible, not
improbable. But, after all, reason is the crucible in which every
fact must be placed, and the result fixes the belief of the
intelligent man.
It seems to me that the whole Presbyterian creed must come down
together. It is a scheme based upon certain facts, so-called.
There is in it the fall of man. There is in it the scheme of the
atonement, and there is the idea of hell, eternal punishment, and
the idea of heaven, eternal reward; and yet, according to their
creed, hell is not a punishment and heaven is not a reward. Now,
if we do away with the fall of man we do away with the atonement;
then we do away with all supernatural religion. Then we come back
to human reason. Personally, I hope that the Presbyterian Church
will be advanced enough and splendid enough to be honest, and if
it is honest, all the gentlemen who amount to anything, who assist
in the trial of Dr. Briggs, will in all probability agree with him,
and he will be acquitted. But if they throw aside their reason,
and remain blindly orthodox, then he will be convicted. To me it
is simply miraculous that any man should imagine that the Bible is
the source of truth. There was a time when all scientific facts
were measured by the Bible. That time is past, and now the believers
in the Bible are doing their best to convince us that it is in
harmony with science. In other words, I have lived to see a change
of standards. When I was a boy, science was measured by the Bible.
Now the Bible is measured by science. This is an immense step.
So it is impossible for me to conceive what kind of a mind a man
has, who finds in the history of the church the fact that it has
been a source of truth. How can any one come to the conclusion
that the Catholic Church has been a source of truth, a source of
intellectual light? How can anyone believe that the church of John
Calvin has been a source of truth? If its creed is not true, if
its doctrines are mistakes, if its dogmas are monstrous delusions,
how can it be said to have been a source of truth?
My opinion is that Dr. Briggs will not be satisfied with the step
he has taken. He has turned his face a little toward the light.
The farther he walks the harder it will be for him to turn back.
The probability is that the orthodox will turn him out, and the
process of driving out men of thought and men of genius will go on
until the remnant will be as orthodox as they are stupid.
_Question_. Do you think mankind is drifting away from the
supernatural?
_Answer_. My belief is that the supernatural has had its day.
The church must either change or abdicate. That is to say, it must
keep step with the progress of the world or be trampled under foot.
The church as a power has ceased to exist. To-day it is a matter
of infinite indifference what the pulpit thinks unless there comes
the voice of heresy from the sacred place. Every orthodox minister
in the United States is listened to just in proportion that he
preaches heresy. The real, simon-pure, orthodox clergyman delivers
his homilies to empty benches, and to a few ancient people who know
nothing of the tides and currents of modern thought. The orthodox
pulpit to-day has no thought, and the pews are substantially in
the same condition. There was a time when the curse of the church
whitened the face of a race, but now its anathema is the food of
laughter.
_Question_. What, in your judgment, is to be the outcome of the
present agitation in religious circles?
_Answer_. My idea is that people more and more are declining the
postponement of happiness to another world. The general tendency
is to enjoy the present. All religions have taught men that the
pleasures of this world are of no account; that they are nothing
but husks and rags and chaff and disappointment; that whoever
expects to be happy in this world makes a mistake; that there is
nothing on the earth worth striving for; that the principal business
of mankind should be to get ready to be happy in another world;
that the great occupation is to save your soul, and when you get
it saved, when you are satisfied that you are one of the elect,
then pack up all your worldly things in a very small trunk, take
it to the dock of time that runs out into the ocean of eternity,
sit down on it, and wait for the ship of death. And of course each
church is the only one that sells a through ticket which can be
depended on. In all religions, as far as I know, is an admixture
of asceticism, and the greater the quantity, the more beautiful
the religion has been considered, The tendency of the world to-
day is to enjoy life while you have it; it is to get something out
of the present moment; and we have found that there are things
worth living for even in this world. We have found that a man can
enjoy himself with wife and children; that he can be happy in the
acquisition of knowledge; that he can be very happy in assisting
others; in helping those he loves; that there is some joy in poetry,
in science and in the enlargement and development of the mind; that
there is some delight in music and in the drama and in the arts.
We are finding, poor as the world is, that it beats a promise the
fulfillment of which is not to take place until after death. The
world is also finding out another thing, and that is that the
gentlemen who preach these various religions, and promise these
rewards, and threaten the punishments, know nothing whatever of
the subject; that they are as blindly ignorant as the people they
pretend to teach, and the people are as blindly ignorant as the
animals below them. We have finally concluded that no human being
has the slightest conception of origin or of destiny, and that this
life, not only in its commencement but in its end, is just as
mysterious to-day as it was to the first man whose eyes greeted
the rising sun. We are no nearer the solution of the problem than
those who lived thousands of years before us, and we are just as
near it as those who will live millions of years after we are dead.
So many people having arrived at the conclusion that nobody knows
and that nobody can know, like sensible folks they have made up
their minds to enjoy life. I have often said, and I say again,
that I feel as if I were on a ship not knowing the port from which
it sailed, not knowing the harbor to which it was going, not having
a speaking acquaintance with any of the officers, and I have made
up my mind to have as good a time with the other passengers as
possible under the circumstances. If this ship goes down in mid-
sea I have at least made something, and if it reaches a harbor of
perpetual delight I have lost nothing, and I have had a happy
voyage. And I think millions and millions are agreeing with me.
Now, understand, I am not finding fault with any of these religions
or with any of these ministers. These religions and these ministers
are the necessary and natural products of sufficient causes.
Mankind has traveled from barbarism to what we now call civilization,
by many paths, all of which under the circumstances, were absolutely
necessary; and while I think the individual does as he must, I
think the same of the church, of the corporation, and of the nation,
and not only of the nation, but of the whole human race. Consequently
I have no malice and no prejudices. I have likes and dislikes.
I do not blame a gourd for not being a cantaloupe, but I like
cantaloupes. So I do not blame the old hard-shell Presbyterian
for not being a philosopher, but I like philosophers. So to wind
it all up with regard to the tendency of modern thought, or as to
the outcome of what you call religion, my own belief is that what
is known as religion will disappear from the human mind. And by
"religion" I mean the supernatural. By "religion" I mean living
in this world for another, or living in this world to gratify some
supposed being, whom we never saw and about whom we know nothing,
and of whose existence we know nothing. In other words, religion
consists of the duties we are supposed to owe to the first great
cause, and of certain things necessary for us to do here to insure
happiness hereafter. These ideas, in my judgment, are destined to
perish, and men will become convinced that all their duties are
within their reach, and that obligations can exist only between
them and other sentient beings. Another idea, I think, will force
itself upon the mind, which is this: That he who lives the best
for this world lives the best for another if there be one. In
other words, humanity will take the place of what is called
"religion." Science will displace superstition, and to do justice
will be the ambition of man.
My creed is this: Happiness is the only good. The place to be
happy is here. The time to be happy is now. The way to be happy
is to make others so.
_Question_. What is going to take the place of the pulpit?
_Answer_. I have for a long time wondered why somebody didn't
start a church on a sensible basis. My idea is this: There are,
of course, in every community, lawyers, doctors, merchants, and
people of all trades and professions who have not the time during
the week to pay any particular attention to history, poetry, art,
or song. Now, it seems to me that it would be a good thing to have
a church and for these men to employ a man of ability, of talent,
to preach to them Sundays, and let this man say to his congregation:
"Now, I am going to preach to you for the first few Sundays--eight
or ten or twenty, we will say--on the art, poetry, and intellectual
achievements of the Greeks." Let this man study all the week and
tell his congregation Sunday what he has ascertained. Let him give
to his people the history of such men as Plato, as Socrates, what
they did; of Aristotle, of his philosophy; of the great Greeks,
their statesmen, their poets, actors, and sculptors, and let him
show the debt that modern civilization owes to these people. Let
him, too, give their religions, their mythology--a mythology that
has sown the seed of beauty in every land. Then let him take up
Rome. Let him show what a wonderful and practical people they
were; let him give an idea of their statesmen, orators, poets,
lawyers--because probably the Romans were the greatest lawyers.
And so let him go through with nation after nation, biography after
biography, and at the same time let there be a Sunday school
connected with this church where the children shall be taught
something of importance. For instance, teach them botany, and when
a Sunday is fair, clear, and beautiful, let them go into the fields
and woods with their teachers, and in a little while they will
become acquainted with all kinds of tress and shrubs and flowering
plants. They could also be taught entomology, so that every bug
would be interesting, for they would see the facts in science--
something of use to them. I believe that such a church and such
a Sunday school would at the end of a few years be the most
intelligent collection of people in the United States. To teach
the children all of these things and to teach their parents, too,
the outlines of every science, so that every listener would know
something of geology, something of astronomy, so that every member
could tell the manner in which they find the distance of a star--
how much better that would be than the old talk about Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob, and quotations from Haggai and Zephaniah, and
all this eternal talk about the fall of man and the Garden of Eden,
and the flood, and the atonement, and the wonders of Revelation!
Even if the religious scheme be true, it can be told and understood
as well in one day as in a hundred years. The church says, "He
that hath ears to hear let him hear." I say: "He that hath brains
to think, let him think." So, too, the pulpit is being displaced
by what we call places of amusement, which are really places where
men go because they find there is something which satisfies in a
greater or less degree the hunger of the brain. Never before was
the theatre as popular as it is now. Never before was so much
money lavished upon the stage as now. Very few men having their
choice would go to hear a sermon, especially of the orthodox kind,
when they had a chance to see a great actor.
The man must be a curious combination who would prefer an orthodox
sermon, we will say, to a concert given by Theodore Thomas. And
I may say in passing that I have great respect for Theodore Thomas,
because it was he who first of all opened to the American people
the golden gates of music. He made the American people acquainted
with the great masters, and especially with Wagner, and it is a
debt that we shall always owe him. In this day the opera--that is
to say, music in every form--is tending to displace the pulpit.
The pulpits have to go in partnership with music now. Hundreds of
people have excused themselves to me for going to church, saying
they have splendid music. Long ago the Catholic Church was forced
to go into partnership not only with music, but with painting and
with architecture. The Protestant Church for a long time thought
it could do without these beggarly elements, and the Protestant
Church was simply a dry-goods box with a small steeple on top of
it, its walls as bleak and bare and unpromising as the creed. But
even Protestants have been forced to hire a choir of ungodly people
who happen to have beautiful voices, and they, too, have appealed
to the organ. Music is taking the place of creed, and there is
more real devotional feeling summoned from the temple of the mind
by great music than by any sermon ever delivered. Music, of all
other things, gives wings to thought and allows the soul to rise
above all the pains and troubles of this life, and to feel for a
moment as if it were absolutely free, above all clouds, destined
to enjoy forever. So, too, science is beckoning with countless
hands. Men of genius are everywhere beckoning men to discoveries,
promising them fortunes compared with which Aladdin's lamp was weak
and poor. All these things take men from the church; take men from
the pulpit. In other words, prosperity is the enemy of the pulpit.
When men enjoy life, when they are prosperous here, they are in
love with the arts, with the sciences, with everything that gives
joy, with everything that promises plenty, and they care nothing
about the prophecies of evil that fall from the solemn faces of
the parsons. They look in other directions. They are not thinking
about the end of the world. They hate the lugubrious, and they
enjoy the sunshine of to-day. And this, in my judgment, is the
highest philosophy: First, do not regret having lost yesterday;
second, do not fear that you will lose to-morrow; third, enjoy to-
day.
Astrology was displaced by astronomy. Alchemy and the black art
gave way to chemistry. Science is destined to take the place of
superstition. In my judgment, the religion of the future will be
Reason.
--_The Tribune_, Chicago, Illinois, November, 1891.