WHEN I became convinced that the Universe is natural--that all the
ghosts and gods are myths, there entered into my brain, into my soul,
into every drop of my blood, the sense, the feeling, the joy of freedom.
The walls of my prison crumbled and fell, the dungeon was flooded with
light and all the bolts, and bars, and manacles became dust. I was no
longer a servant, a serf or a slave. There was for me no master in all
the wide world--not even in infinite space. I was free--free to think,
to express my thoughts--free to live to my own ideal--free to live
for myself and those I loved--free to use all my faculties, all my
senses--free to spread imagination's wings--free to investigate, to
guess and dream and hope--free to judge and determine for myself--free
to reject all ignorant and cruel creeds, all the "inspired" books that
savages have produced, and all the barbarous legends of the past--free
from popes and priests--free from all the "called" and "set apart"--free
from sanctified mistakes and holy lies--free from the fear of eternal
pain--free from the winged monsters of the night--free from devils,
ghosts and gods. For the first time I was free. There were no prohibited
places in all the realms of thought--no air, no space, where fancy could
not spread her painted wings--no chains for my limbs--no lashes for my
back--no fires for my flesh--no master's frown or threat--no following
another's steps--no need to bow, or cringe, or crawl, or utter lying
words. I was free. I stood erect and fearlessly, joyously, faced all
worlds.
And then my heart was filled with gratitude, with thankfulness, and went
out in love to all the heroes, the thinkers who gave their lives for
the liberty of hand and brain--for the freedom of labor and thought--to
those who fell on the fierce fields of war, to those who died in
dungeons bound with chains--to those who proudly mounted scaffold's
stairs--to those whose bones were crushed, whose flesh was scarred and
torn--to those by fire consumed--to all the wise, the good, the brave of
every land, whose thoughts and deeds have given freedom to the sons of
men. And then I vowed to grasp the torch that they had held, and hold it
high, that light might conquer darkness still.
Let us be true to ourselves--true to the facts we know, and let us,
above all things, preserve the veracity of our souls.
If there be gods we cannot help them, but we can assist our fellow-men.
We cannot love the inconceivable, but we can love wife and child and
friend.
We can be as honest as we are ignorant. If we are, when asked what is
beyond the horizon of the known, we must say that we do not know. We can
tell the truth, and we can enjoy the blessed freedom that the brave have
won. We can destroy the monsters of superstition, the hissing snakes
of ignorance and fear. We can drive from our minds the frightful things
that tear and wound with beak and fang. We can civilize our fellow-men.
We can fill our lives with generous deeds, with loving words, with art
and song, and all the ecstasies of love. We can flood our years with
sunshine--with the divine climate of kindness, and we can drain to the
last drop the golden cup of joy.