The sense of obligation, of duty, was naturally produced.
Among savages, the immediate consequences of actions are taken into
consideration. As people advance, the remote consequences are perceived.
The standard of conduct becomes higher. The imagination is cultivated.
A man puts himself in the place of another. The sense of duty becomes
stronger, more imperative. Man judges himself.
He loves, and love is the commencement, the foundation of the highest
virtues. He injures one that he loves. Then comes regret, repentance,
sorrow, conscience. In all this there is nothing supernatural.
Man has deceived himself. Nature is a mirror in which man sees his own
image, and all supernatural religions rest on the pretence that the
image, which appears to be behind this mirror, has been caught.
All the metaphysicians of the spiritual type, from Plato to Swedenborg,
have manufactured their facts, and all founders of religion have done
the same.
Suppose that an infinite God exists, what can we do for him? Being
infinite, he is conditionless; being conditionless, he cannot be
benefited or injured. He cannot want. He has.
Think of the egotism of a man who believes that an infinite being wants
his praise!