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Other things being equal, that man is happiest who is
nearest just--who is truthful, merciful and intelligent--
in other words, the one who lives in accordance with
the conditions of life.
3. The time to be happy is now, and the place to
be happy, is here.
4. Reason is the lamp of the mind--the only torch
of progress; and instead of blowing that out and de-
pending upon darkness and dogma, it is far better to
increase that sacred light.
5. Every man should be the intellectual proprietor
of himself, honest with himself, and intellectually
hospitable; and upon every brain reason should be
enthroned as king.
6. Every man must bear the consequences, at
least of his own actions. If he puts his hands in
the fire, his hands must smart, and not the hands of
another. In other words: each man must eat the
fruit of the tree he plants.
I can not conceive that the teaching of these doc-
trines would fill penitentiaries, or crowd the gallows.
The doctrine of forgiveness--the idea that somebody
else can suffer in place of the guilty--the notion that
just at the last the whole account can be settled--
these ideas, doctrines, and notions are calculated to fill
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penitentiaries. Nothing breeds extravagance like the
credit system.
Most criminals of the present day are orthodox be-
lievers, and the gallows seems to be the last round of
the ladder reaching from earth to heaven. The Rev.
Dr. Sunderland, of this city, in his sermon on the assas-
sination of Garfield, takes the ground that God per-
mitted the murder for the purpose of opening the eyes
of the people to the evil effects of infidelity. Accord-
ing to this minister, God, in order to show his hatred
of infidelity, "inspired," or allowed, one Christian to
assassinate another.
Religion and morality do not necessarily go together.
Mr. Talmage will insist to-day that morality is not
sufficient to save any man from eternal punishment.
As a matter of fact, religion has often been the enemy
of morality. The moralist has been denounced by the
theologians. He sustains the same relation to Chris-
tianity that the moderate drinker does to the total-
abstinence society. The total-abstinence people say
that the example of the moderate drinker is far worse
upon the young than that of the drunkard--that the
drunkard is a warning, while the moderate drinker is
a perpetual temptation. So Christians say of moral-
ists. According to them, the moralist sets a worse
23
example than the criminal. The moralist not only in-
sists that a man can be a good citizen, a kind husband,
an affectionate father, without religion, but demon-
strates the truth of his doctrine by his own life;
whereas the criminal admits that in and of himself he
is nothing, and can do nothing, but that he needs
assistance from the church and its ministers.
The worst criminals of the modern world have been
Christians--I mean by that, believers in Christianity--
and the most monstrous crimes of the modern world
have been committed by the most zealous believers.
There is nothing in orthodox religion, apart from the
morality it teaches, to prevent the commission oF crime.
On the other hand, the perpetual proffer of forgiveness
is a direct premium upon what Christians are pleased
to call the commission of sin.
Christianity has produced no greater character than
Epictetus, no greater sovereign than Marcus Aurelius.
The wickedness of the past was a good deal like that
of the present. As a rule, kings have been wicked in
direct proportion to their power--their power having
been lessened, their crimes have decreased. As a
matter of fact, paganism, of itself, did not produce any
great men; neither has Christianity. Millions of in-
fluences determine individual character, and the re-
24
ligion of the country in which a man happens to be
born may determine many of his opinions, without
influencing, to any great extent, his real character.
There have been brave, honest, and intelligent men
in and out of every church.
_Question_. Mr. Talmage says that you insist that,
according to the Bible, the universe was made out of
nothing, and he denounces your statement as a gross
misrepresentation. What have you stated upon that
subject?
_Answer_. What I said was substantially this: "We
"are told in the first chapter of Genesis, that in the
"beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
"If this means anything, it means that God pro-
"duced--caused to exist, called into being--the
"heaven and the earth. It will not do to say that
"God formed the heaven and the earth of previously
"existing matter. Moses conveys, and intended to
"convey, the idea that the matter of which the
"universe is composed was created."
This has always been my position. I did not sup-
pose that nothing was used as the raw material; but
if the Mosaic account means anything, it means that
whereas there was nothing, God caused something to
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exist--created what we know as matter. I can not
conceive of something being made, created, without
anything to make anything with. I have no more
confidence in fiat worlds than I have in fiat money.
Mr. Talmage tells us that God did not make the uni-
verse out of _nothing_, but out of "omnipotence."
Exactly how God changed "omnipotence" into matter
is not stated. If there was _nothing_ in the universe,
_omnipotence_ could do you no good. The weakest man
in the world can lift as much _nothing_ as God.
Mr. Talmage seems to think that to create something
from nothing is simply a question of strength--that it
requires infinite muscle--that it is only a question of
biceps. Of course, omnipotence is an attribute, not an
entity, not a raw material; and the idea that something
can be made out of omnipotence--using that as the
raw material--is infinitely absurd. It would have
been equally logical to say that God made the universe
out of his omniscience, or his omnipresence, or his
unchangeableness, or out of his honesty, his holiness,
or his incapacity to do evil. I confess my utter in-
ability to understand, or even to suspect, what the
reverend gentleman means, when he says that God
created the universe out of his "omnipotence."