and pretend they must always be in the wrong to prefer natural sense
to their authority. But in this decision they occupy the place of both
judges and parties, and the verdict should be rendered by
disinterested persons. In the mean time the priests themselves seem to
doubt the soundness of their own allegations; they call the secular
arm to the aid of their arguments; they marshal on their side fines,
imprisonment, confiscation of goods, boring and branding, with hot
irons, and death at the stake, at this time in France, and in other
and in most countries of Christendom; they use the scourge to drive
men into paradise; they enlighten men by the blaze of the fagot; they
inculcate faith by furious and bloody strokes of the sword; and they
have the baseness to stand in dread of men who cannot announce
themselves or openly promulgate their opinions without running the
risk of punishment, and even death. This conduct does not manifest
that the priests are strongly persuaded of the power of their
arguments. If our clerical theologians acted in good faith, would
they not rejoice to open a free course to thorough discussion? Would
they not be gratified to allow doubters to propose difficulties, the
solution of which, if Christianity is so plain and clear, would serve
to render it more firm and solid? They find it answers their ends
better to use their adversaries as the Mexicans do their slaves, whom
they shackle before attacking, and then kill for daring to defend
themselves.
It is very probable unbelievers may be found whose conduct is
blamable, and this is because they in this respect follow the same
line of reasoning as the devotee. The most fanatical partisans of
religion are forced to confess that among their adherents a small
number of the elect only are rendered virtuous. By what right, then,
do they exact that incredulity, which pretends to nothing
supernatural, should produce effects which, according to their own
admissions, their pretended divine religion fails to accomplish? If
all believers were invariably good men, the cause of religion would be
provided with an adamantine bulwark, and especially if unbelievers
were persons without morality or virtue. But whatever the priests may
aver, the unbelievers are more virtuous than the devotees. A happy
temperament, a judicious education, the desire of living a peaceable
life, the dislike to attract hatred or blame, and the habit of
fulfilling the moral duties, always furnish motives to abstain from
vice and to practise virtue more powerful and more true than those
presented by religion. Besides, the incredulous person has not an
infinity of resources which Christianity bestows upon its
superstitious followers. The Christian can at any time expiate his
crimes by confession and penance, and can thus reconcile himself with
God, and give repose to his conscience; the unbeliever, on the other
hand, who has perpetrated a wrong, can reconcile himself neither with
society, which he has outraged, nor with himself, whom he is compelled
to hate. If he expects no reward in another life, he has no interest
but to merit the homage that in all enlightened countries is rendered
to virtue, to probity, and to a conduct constantly honest; he has no
inducement but to avoid the penalties and the disdain that society
decrees against those who trouble its well-being, and who refuse to
contribute to its welfare.
It appears evident that every man who consults his understanding
should be more reasonable than one who only consults his imagination.
It is evident that he who consults his own nature and that of the
beings who surround him, ought to have truer ideas of good and evil,
of justice and injustice, and of honesty and dishonesty, than he who,
to regulate his conduct, consults only the records of a concealed God,
whom his priests picture as wicked, unjust, changeable, contradicting
himself, and who has sometimes ordered actions the most contrary to
morality and to all the ideas that we have of virtue. It is evident
that he who regulates his conduct upon sacerdotal morality will only
follow the caprice and passions of the priests, and will be a very
dangerous man, while believing himself very virtuous. In fine, it is
evident that while conforming himself to the precepts and counsels of
religion, a man may be extremely pious without possessing the shadow
of a virtue. Experience has proved that it is quite possible to adhere
to all the unintelligible dogmas of the priests, to observe most
scrupulously all the forms, and ceremonies, and services they
recommend, and orally to profess all the Christian virtues, without
having any of the qualities necessary to his own happiness, and to
that of the beings with whom he lives. The saints, indeed, who are
proposed to us as models, were useless members of society. We see them
to have been either gloomy fanatics, who sacrificed themselves to the
desolating ideas of their religion, or excited fanatics, who, under
pretext of serving religion, have perpetually disturbed the repose of
nations, or enthusiastic theologians, who from their own dreams have
deduced systems exactly calculated to infuriate the brains of their
adherents. A saint, when he is tranquil, proposes nothing whose
accomplishment will benefit mankind, and only aims to keep himself
safe and secluded in his retreat. A saint, when he is active, only
appears to promulgate reveries dangerous to the world, and to uphold
the interests of the church, that he confounds with the interest of
God.
In a word, Madam, I cannot too often repeat it, every system of
religion appears to be designed for the utility of the priests; the
morality of Christianity has in view only the interests of the
priesthood; all the virtues that it teaches have solely for an object
the church and its ministers; and these ends are always to subject the
people, to draw a profit from their toil, and to inspire them with a
blind credulity. We ought, therefore, to practise morality and virtue
without entering into these conspiracies. If the priests disapprove of
those who do not agree with them, and refuse to award any probity to
the thinkers who reject their injurious and useless notions, society,
which needs for its own sustenance real and human virtues, will not
adopt the sentiments nor espouse the quarrels of these men, visibly
leagued together against it. If the ministers of religion require
their dogmas, their mysteries, and their fanatical virtues to support
their usurped empire, the civil government has a need of reasonable
virtues, of an evident, and above all, of a pacific morality, in order
to exercise its legitimate rights. In fine, the individuals, who
compose every society, demand a morality which will render them happy
in _this_ world, without embarrassing themselves with what only
pretends to secure their felicity in an imaginary sphere, of which
they have no ideas except those received from the priests themselves.
The priests have had the art to unite their religious system with some
moral tenets which are really good. This renders their mysteries more
sacred, and lends authority to their ambiguous dogmas. By the aid of
this artifice, they have given currency to the opinion that without
religion there can be neither morality nor virtue. I hope, Madam, in
my next letter, to complete the exposure of this prejudice, and to
demonstrate, to whoever will reflect, how uncertain, abstract, and
deceitful are the notions which religion has inspired. I shall clearly
show, that they have often infected philosophers themselves; that up
to the present time, they have retarded the progress of morality; and
that they have transformed a science the most certain, plain, and
sensible to every thinking man, into a system at once doubtful and
enigmatical, and full of difficulties. I am, Madam, &c.
LETTER XI.
Of Human or Natural Morality.
By this time, Madam, you will have reflected on what I had the honor
to address to you, and perceived how impossible it is to found a
certain and invariable morality on a religion enthusiastic, ambiguous,
mysterious, and contradictory, and which never agreed with itself. You
know that the God who appears to have taken pleasure in rendering
himself unintelligible, that the God who is partial and changeable,
that the God whose precepts are at variance one with another, can
never serve as the base on which to rear a morality that shall become
practicable among the inhabitants of the earth. In short, how can we
found justice and goodness on attributes that are unjust and evil; yet
attributes of a Being who tempts man, whom he created, for the purpose
of punishing him when tempted? How can we know when we do the will of
a God who has said, _Thou shalt not kill_, and who yet allows his
people to exterminate whole nations? What idea can we form of the
morality of that God who declares himself pleased with the sanguinary
conduct of Moses, of the rebel, the assassin, the adulterer, David? Is
it possible to found the holy duties of humanity on a God whose
favorites have been inhuman persecutors and cruel monsters? How can we
deduce our duties from the lessons of the priests of a God of peace,
who, nevertheless, breathes only sedition, vengeance, and carnage? How
can we take as models for our conduct _saints_, who were useless
enthusiasts, or turbulent fanatics, or seditious apostates; who, under
the pretext of defending the cause of God, have stirred up the
greatest ravages on the earth? What wholesome morality can we reap
from the adoption of impracticable virtues, from their being
supernatural, which are visibly useless to ourselves, to those among
whom we live, and in their consequences often dangerous? How can we
take as guides in our conduct priests, whose lessons are a tissue of
unintelligible opinions, (_for all religion is but opinion_,) puerile
and frivolous practices, which these gentlemen prefer to real virtues?
In fine, how can we be taught _the truth_, conducted in an unerring
path, by men of a changeable morality, calculated upon and actuated by
their present interests, and who, although they pretend to preach
good-will to men, humanity, and peace, have, as their text-book, a
volume stained with the records of injustice, inhumanity, sedition,
and perfidy?
You know, Madam, that it is impossible to found morality on notions
that are so unfixed and so contrary to all our natural ideas of
virtue. By virtue, we ought to understand the habitual dispositions to
do whatever will procure us the happiness of ourselves and our
species. By virtue, religion understands only that which may
contribute to render us favorable to a hidden God, who attaches his
favor to practices and opinions that are too often hurtful to
ourselves, and little beneficial to others. The morality of the
Christians is a mystic morality, which resembles the dogmas of their
religion; it is obscure, unintelligible, uncertain, and subject to the
interpretation of frail creatures. This morality is never fixed,
because it is subordinate to a religion which varies incessantly its
principles, and which is regulated according to the pleasure of a
despotic divinity, and, more especially, according to the pleasure of
priests, whose interests are changing daily, whose caprices are as
variable as the hours of their existence, and who are, consequently,
not always in agreement with one another. The writings which are the
sources whence the Christians have drawn their morality, are not only
an abyss of obscurity, but demand continual explications from their
masters, the priests, who, in explaining, make them still more
obscure, still more contradictory. If these oracles of heaven
prescribe to us in one place the virtues truly useful, in another part
they approve, or prescribe, actions entirely opposed to all the ideas
that we have of virtue. The same God who orders us to be good,
equitable, and beneficent, who forbids the revenging of injuries, who
declares himself to be the God of clemency and of goodness, shows
himself to be implacable in his rage; announces himself as bringing
_the sword, and not peace_; tells us that he is come to set mankind at
variance; and, finally, in order to revenge his wrongs, orders rapine,
treason, usurpation, and carnage. In a word, it is impossible to find
in the Scriptures any certain principles or sure rules of morality.
You there see, in one part, a small number of precepts, useful and
intelligible, and in another part maxims the most extravagant, and the
most destructive to the good and happiness of all society.
It is in punctuality to fulfil the superstitious and frivolous duties,
that the morality of the Jews in the Old Testament writings is chiefly
conspicuous; legal observances, rites, ceremonies, are all that
occupied the people of Israel. In recompense for their scrupulous
exactness to fulfil these duties, they were permitted to commit the
most frightful of crimes. The virtues recommended by the Son of God,
in the New Testament, are not in reality the same as those which God
the Father had made observable in the former case. The New Testament
contradicts the Old. It announces that God is not pacified by
sacrifices, nor by offerings, nor by frivolous rites. It substitutes
in place of these, supernatural virtues, of which I believe I have
sufficiently proved the inutility, the impossibility, and the
incompatibility with the well-being of man living in society. The Son
of God, by the writers of the New Testament, is set at variance with
himself; for he destroys in one place what he establishes in another;
and, moreover, the priests have appropriated to themselves all the
principles of his mission. They are in unison only with God when the
precepts of the Deity accord with their present interest. Is it their
interest to persecute? They find that God ordains persecution. Are
they themselves persecuted? They find that this pacific God forbids
persecution, and views with abhorrence the persecution of his
servants. Do they find that superstitious practices are lucrative to
themselves? Notwithstanding the aversion of Jesus Christ from
offerings, rites, and ceremonies, they impose them on the people, they
surcharge them with mysterious rites: they respect these more than
those duties which are of essential benefit to society. If Jesus has
not wished that they should avenge themselves, they find that his
Father has delighted in vengeance. If Jesus has declared that his
kingdom is not of this world, and if he has shown contempt of riches,
they nevertheless find in the Old Testament sufficient reasons for
establishing a hierarchy for the governing of the world in a spiritual
sense, as kings do in a political one,--for the disputing with kings
about their power,--for exercising in this world an authority the most
unlimited, a license the most terrific. In a word, if they have found
in the Bible some precepts of a moral tendency and practical utility,
they have also found others to justify crimes the most atrocious.
Thus, in the Christian religion, morality uniformly depends on the
fanaticism of priests, their passions, their interests: its principles
are never fixed; they vary according to circumstances: the God of whom
they are the organs, and the interpreters, has not said any thing but
what agrees best with their views, and what never contravenes their
interest. Following their caprices, he changes his advice continually;
he approves, and disapproves, of the same actions: he loves, or
detests, the same conduct; he changes crime into virtue, and virtue
into crime.
What is the result from all this? It is that the Christians have not
sure principles in morality: it varies with the policy of the priests,
who are in a situation to command the credulity of mankind, and who,
by force of menaces and terrors, oblige men to shut their eyes on
their contradictions, and minds the most honest to commit faults the
greatest which can be committed against religion. It is thus that
under a God who recommends the love of our neighbor, the Christians
accustom themselves from infancy to detest an heretical neighbor, and
are almost always in a disposition to overwhelm him by a crowd of
arguments received from their priests. It is thus that, under a God
who ordains we should love our enemies and forgive their offences, the
Christians hate and destroy the enemies of their priests, and take
vengeance, without measure, for injuries which they pretend to have
received. It is thus, that under a just God, a God who never ceases to
boast of his goodness, the Christians, at the signal of their
spiritual guides, become unjust and cruel, and make a merit of having
stifled the cries of nature, the voice of humanity, the counsels of
wisdom, and of public interest.
In a word, all the ideas of justice and of injustice, of good and
evil, of happiness and of misfortune, are necessarily confounded in
the head of a Christian. His despotic priest commands him, in the name
of God, to put no reliance on his reason, and the man who is compelled
to abandon it for the guidance of a troubled imagination will be far
more likely to consult and admit the most stupid fanaticism as the
inspiration of the Most High. In his blindness, he casts at his feet
duties the most sacred, and he believes himself virtuous in outraging
every virtue. Has he remorse? his priest appeases it speedily, and
points out some easy practices by which he may soon recommend himself
to God. Has he committed injustice, violence, and rapine? he may
repair all by giving to the church the goods of which he has despoiled
worthy citizens; or by repaying by largesses, which will procure him
the prayers of the priests and the favor of heaven. For the priests
never reproach men, who give them of this world's goods, with the
injustice, the cruelties, and the crimes they have been guilty, to
support the church and befriend her ministers; the faults which have
almost always been found the most unpardonable, have always been those
of most disservice to the clergy. To question the faith and reject the
authority of the priesthood, have always been the most frightful
crimes; they are truly the sin against the Holy Ghost, which can never
be forgiven either in this world or in that which is to come. To
despise these objects which the priests have an interest in making to
be respected, is sufficient to qualify one for the appellation of a
blasphemer and an impious man. These vague words, void of sense,
suffice to excite horror in the mind of the weak vulgar. The terrible
word sacrilege designates an attempt on the person, the goods, and the
rights of the clergy. The omission of some useless practice is
exaggerated and represented as a crime more detestable than actions
which injure society. In favor of fidelity to fulfil the duties of
religion, the priest easily pardons his slave submitting to vices,
criminal debaucheries, and excesses the most horrible. You perceive,
then, Madam, that the Christian morality has really in view but the
utility of the priests. Why, then, should you be surprised that they
endeavor to make themselves arbitrary and sovereign; that they deem as
faults, and as criminal, all the virtues which agree not with their
marvellous systems? The Christian morality appears only to have been
proposed to blind men, to disturb their reason, to render them abject
and timid, to plunge them into vassalage, to make them lose sight of
the earth which they inhabit, for visions of bliss in heaven. By the
aid of this morality, the priests have become the true masters here
below; they have imagined virtues and practices useful only to
themselves; they have proscribed and interdicted those which were
truly useful to society; they have made slaves of their disciples, who
make virtue to consist in blind submission to their caprices.
To lay the foundations of a good morality, it is absolutely necessary
to destroy the prejudices which the priests have inspired in us; it is
necessary to begin by rendering the mind of man energetic, and freeing
it from those vain terrors which have enthralled it; it is necessary
to renounce those supernatural notions which have, till now, hindered
men from consulting the volume of nature, which have subjected reason
to the yoke of authority; it is necessary to encourage man, to
undeceive him as to those prejudices which have enslaved him; to
annihilate in his bosom those false theories which corrupt his nature,
and which are, in fact, infidel guides, destructive of the real
happiness of the species. It is necessary to undeceive him as to the
idea of his loathing himself, and especially that other idea, that
some of his fellow-creatures are not to labor with their hands for
their support, but in spiritual matters for his happiness. In fine, it
is necessary to influence him with self-love, that he may merit the
esteem of the world, the benevolence and consideration of those with
whom he is associated by the ties of nature or public economy.
The morality of religion appears calculated to confound society and
replunge its members into the savage state. The Christian virtues tend
evidently to isolate man, to detach him from those to whom nature has
united him, and to unite him to the priests--to make him lose sight of
a happiness the most solid, to occupy himself only with dangerous
chimeras. We only live in society to procure the more easily those
kindnesses, succors, and pleasures, which we could not obtain living
by ourselves. If it had been destined that we should live miserably in
this world, that we should detest ourselves, fly the esteem of others,
voluntarily afflict ourselves, have no attachment for any one, society
would have been one heap of confusion, the human kind savages and
strangers to one another.
However, if it is true that God is the author of man, it is God who
renders man sociable; it is God who wishes man to live in society
where he can obtain the greatest good. If God is good, he cannot
approve that men should leave society to become miserable; if God is
the author of reason, he can only wish that men who are possessed of
reason should employ this distinguishing gift to procure for
themselves all the happiness its exercise can bring them. If God has
revealed himself, it is not in some obscure way, but in a revelation
the most evident and clear of all those supposed revelations, which
are visibly contrary to all the notions we can form of the Divinity.
We are not, however, obliged to dive into the marvellous to establish
the duties man owes to man, since God has very plainly shown them in
the wants of one and the good offices of another person. But it is
only by consulting our reason that we can arrive at the means of
contributing to the felicity of our species. It is then evident that
in regarding man as the creature of God, God must have designed that
man should consult his reason, that it might procure him the most
solid happiness, and those principles of virtue which nature approves.
What, then, might not our opinions be were we to substitute the
morality of reason for the morality of religion? In place of a partial
and reserved morality for a small number of men, let us substitute a
universal morality, intelligible to all the inhabitants of the earth,
and of which all can find the principles in nature. Let us study this
nature, its wants, and its desires; let us examine the means of
satisfying it; let us consider what is the end of our existence in
society; we shall see that all those who are thus associated are
compelled by their natures to practise affection one to another,
benevolence, esteem, and relief, if desired; we shall see what is that
line of conduct which necessarily excites hatred, ill-will, and all
those misfortunes which experience makes familiar to mankind; our
reason will tell us what actions are the most calculated to excite
real happiness and good will the most solid and extensive; let us
weigh these with those that are founded on visionary theories; their
difference will at once be perceptible; the advantages which are
permanent we will not sacrifice for those that are momentary; we will
employ all our faculties to augment the happiness of our species; we
will labor with perseverance and courage to extirpate evil from the
earth; we will assist as much as we can those who are without friends;
we will seek to alleviate their distresses and their pains; we will
merit their regard, and thus fulfil the end of our being on earth.