"_We believe that Jesus Christ came to establish among men the Kingdom
of God, the reign of truth and love, of righteousness and peace!_"
Well, that may have been the object of Jesus Christ. I do not deny it.
But what was the result? The Christian world has caused more war than
all the rest of the world beside. Most of the cunning instruments of
death have been devised by Christians. All the wonderful machinery by
which the life is blown from men, by which nations are conquered and
enslaved--all these machines have been born in Christian brains. And yet
he came to bring peace, they say; but the Testament says otherwise: "I
came not to bring peace, but a sword." And the sword was brought. What
are the Christian nations doing to-day in Europe? Is there a solitary
Christian nation that will trust any other? How many millions of
Christians are in the uniform of forgiveness, armed with the muskets of
love?
There was an old Spaniard on the bed of death, who sent for a priest,
and the priest told him that he would have to forgive his enemies before
he died. He said, "I have none." "What! no enemies?" "Not one," said the
dying man; "I killed the last one three months ago."
How many millions of Christians are now armed and equipped to destroy
their fellow-Christians? Who are the men in Europe crying against war?
Who wishes to have the nations disarmed? Is it the church? No; the men
who do not believe in what they call this religion of peace. When there
is a war, and when they make a few thousand widows and orphans; when
they strew the plain with dead patriots, Christians assemble in their
churches and sing "Te Deum Laudamus." Why? Because he has enabled a
few of his children to kill some others of his children. This is the
religion of peace--the religion that invented the Krupp gun, that will
hurl a ball weighing two thousand pounds through twenty-four inches
of solid steel. This is the religion of peace that covers the sea with
men-of-war, clad in mail, in the name of universal forgiveness. This is
the religion that drills and uniforms five millions of men to kill their
fellows.
The Wars It Brought.
What effect has this religion had upon the nations of the earth? What
have the nations been fighting about? What was the Thirty Years' War
in Europe for? What was the war in Holland for? Why was it that England
persecuted Scotland? Why is it that England persecutes Ireland even to
this day? At the bottom of every one of these conflicts you will find
a religious question. The religion of Jesus Christ, as preached by his
church, causes war, bloodshed, hatred, and all uncharitableness; and
why? Because, they say, a certain belief is necessary to salvation. They
do not say, if you behave yourself you will get there; they do not say,
if you pay your debts and love your wife and love your children, and are
good to your friends, and your neighbors, and your country, you will
get there; that will do you no good; you have got to believe a certain
thing. No matter how bad you are, you can instantly be forgiven; and no
matter how good you are, if you fail to believe that which you cannot
understand, the moment you get to the day of judgment nothing is left
but to damn you, and all the angels will shout "hallelujah."
What do they teach to-day? Nearly every murderer goes to heaven; there
is only one step from the gallows to God, only one jerk between the
halter and heaven. That is taught by this church.
I believe there ought to be a law to prevent the giving of the slightest
religious consolation to any man who has been found guilty of murder.
Let a Catholic understand that if he imbrues his hands in his brother's
blood, he can have no extreme unction. Let it be understood that he
can have no forgiveness through the church; and let the Protestant
understand that when he has committed that crime the community will not
pray him into heaven. Let him go with his victim. The victim, dying in
his sins, goes to hell, and the murderer has the happiness of seeing him
there. If heaven grows dull and monotonous, the murderer can again give
life to the nerve of pleasure by watching the agony of his victim.
The truth is, Christianity has not made friends; it has made enemies. It
is not, as taught, the religion of peace, it is the religion of war.
Why should a Christian hesitate to kill a man that his God is waiting
to damn? Why should a Christian not destroy an infidel who is trying to
assassinate his soul? Why should a Christian pity an unbeliever--one who
has rejected the Bible--when he knows that God will be pitiless forever?
And yet we are told, in this creed, that "_we believe in the ultimate
prevalence of the Kingdom of Christ over all the earth._"
What makes you? Do you judge from the manner in which you are getting
along now? How many people are being born a year? About fifty millions.
How many are you converting a year, really, truthfully? Five or six
thousand. I think I have overstated the number. Is orthodox Christianity
on the increase? No. There are a hundred times as many unbelievers in
orthodox Christianity as there were ten years ago. What are you doing in
the missionary world? How long is it since you converted a Chinaman?
A fine missionary religion, to send missionaries with their Bibles and
tracts to China, but if a Chinaman comes here, mob him, simply to show
him the difference between the practical and theoretical workings of the
Christian religion. How long since you have had an intelligent convert
in India? In my judgment, never; there never has been an intelligent
Hindoo converted from the time the first missionary put his foot on
that soil; and never, in my judgment, has an intelligent Chinaman been
converted since the first missionary touched that shore. Where are they?
We hear nothing of them, except in the reports. They get money from poor
old ladies, trembling on the edge of the grave, and go and tell them
stories, how hungry the average Chinaman is for a copy of the New
Testament, and paint the sad condition of a gentleman in the interior
of Africa without the works of Dr. McCosh, longing for a copy of _The
Princeton Review_,--in my judgment, a pamphlet that would suit a savage.
Thus money is scared from the dying, and frightened from the old and
feeble.
About how long is it before this kingdom is to be established? No one
objects to the establishment of peace and good will. Every good man
longs for the time when war shall cease. We are all hoping for a day of
universal justice--a day of universal freedom--when man shall control
himself, when the passions shall become obedient to the intelligent
will. But the coming of that day will not be hastened by preaching the
doctrines of total depravity and eternal revenge. That sun will not rise
the quicker for preaching salvation by faith. The star that shines
above that dawn, the herald of that day, is Science, not
superstition,--Reason, not religion.
To show you how little advance has been made, how many intellectual bats
and mental owls still haunt the temple, still roost above the altar,
I call your attention to the fact that the Congregational Church,
according to this creed; still believes in the resurrection of the dead,
and in their Confession of Faith, attached to the creed, I find that
they also believe in the literal resurrection of the body.
The Resurrection.
Does anybody believe that, who has the courage to think for himself?
Here is a man, for instance, that weighs 200 pounds and gets sick
and dies weighing 120; how much will he weigh in the morning of the
resurrection? Here is a cannibal, who eats another man; and we know that
the atoms you eat go into your body and become a part of you. After
the cannibal has eaten the missionary, and appropriated his atoms to
himself, and then dies, to whom will the atoms belong in the morning of
the resurrection? Could the missionary maintain an action of replevin,
and if so, what would the cannibal do for a body? It has been
demonstrated, in so far as logic can demonstrate anything, that there
is no creation and no destruction in Nature. It has been demonstrated,
again and again, that the atoms in us have been in millions of other
beings; have grown in the forests and in the grass, have blossomed in
flowers, and been in the metals. In other words, there are atoms in each
one of us that have been in millions of others; and when we die, these
atoms return to the earth, again appear in grass and trees, are again
eaten by animals, and again devoured by countless vegetable mouths and
turned into wood; and yet this church, in the nineteenth century,'in a
council composed of, and presided over by, professors and presidents
of colleges and theologians, solemnly tells us that it believes in the
literal resurrection of the body. This is almost enough to make
one despair of the future--almost enough to convince a man of the
immortality of the absurd. They know better. There is not one so
ignorant but knows better.
The Judgment-Day.
And what is the next thing?
"_We believe in a final judgment, the issues of which are everlasting
punishment and everlasting life!_"
At the final judgment all of us will be there. The thousands, and
millions, and billions, and trillions, and quadrillions that have died
will be there. The books will be opened, and each case will be called.
The sheep and the goats will be divided. The unbelievers will be sent to
the left, while the faithful will proudly walk to the right. The saved,
without a tear, will bid an eternal farewell to those who loved them
here--to those they loved. Nearly all the human race will go away to
everlasting punishment, and the fortunate few to eternal life. This
is the consolation of the Congregational Church! This is the hope that
dispels the gloom of life!
Pious Evasions.
When the clergy are caught, they give a different meaning to the
words and say the world was not made in seven days. They say "good
whiles"--"epochs."
And in this same Confession of Faith and in this creed they say that the
Lord's day is holy--every seventh day. Suppose you lived near the North
Pole where the day is three months long. Then which day would you keep?
If you could get to the North Pole you could prevent Sunday from ever
overtaking you. You could walk around the other way faster than the
world could revolve. How would you keep Sunday then? Suppose we invent
something that can go one thousand miles an hour? We can chase Sunday
clear around the globe. Is there anything that can be more perfectly
absurd than that a space of time can be holy? You might as well talk
about a virtuous vacuum. We are now told that the Bible is not a
scientific book, and that after all we cannot depend on what God said
four thousand years ago--that his ways are not as our ways--that we must
accept without evidence, and believe without understanding.
I heard the other night of an old man. He was not very well educated,
and he got into the notion that he must have reading of the Bible and
family worship. There was a bad boy in the family, and they were reading
the Bible by course. In the fifteenth chapter of Corinthians is this
passage: "Behold, brethren, I show you a mystery; we shall not all
die, but we shall all be changed." This boy had rubbed out the "c" in
"changed." So when the old man put on his spectacles, and got down his
Bible, he read: "Behold, brethren, I show you a mystery, we shall not
all die, but we shall all be hanged." The old lady said, "Father, I
don't think it reads that way." He said, "Who is reading this?" "Yes
mother, it says 'hanged,' and, more than that, I see the sense of it.
Pride is the besetting sin of the human heart, and if there is anything
calculated to take the pride out of a man it is hanging." It is in this
way that ministers avoid and explain the discoveries of Science.
People ask me, if I take away the Bible what are we going to do? How can
we get along without the revelation that no one understands? What are
we going to do if we have no Bible to quarrel about What are we to do
without hell? What are we going to do with our enemies? What are we
going to do with the people we love but don't like?
"No Bible, No Civilization."
They tell me that there never would have been any civilization if it had
not been for this Bible. The Jews had a Bible; the Romans had not. Which
had the greater and the grander government? Let us be honest. Which of
those nations produced the greatest poets, the greatest soldiers, the
greatest orators, the greatest statesmen, the greatest sculptors? Rome
had no Bible. God cared nothing for the Roman Empire. He let the men
come up by chance. His time was taken up with the Jewish people. And
yet Rome conquered the world, including the chosen people of God. The
people who had the Bible were defeated by the people who had not. How
was it possible for Lucretius to get along without the Bible?--how did
the great and glorious of that empire? And what shall we say of Greece?
No Bible. Compare Athens with Jerusalem. From Athens come the beauty and
intellectual grace of the world. Compare the mythology of Greece with
the mythology of Judea; one covering the earth with beauty, and the
other filling heaven with hatred and injustice. The Hindoos had no
Bible; they had been forsaken by the Creator, and yet they became the
greatest metaphysicians of the world. Egypt had no Bible. Compare Egypt
with Judea. What are we to do without the Bible? What became of the Jews
who had a Bible? Their temple was destroyed and their city was taken;
and they never found real prosperity until their God deserted them. The
Turks attributed all their victories to the Koran. The Koran gave them
their victories over the believers in the Bible. The priests of each
nation have accounted for the prosperity of that nation by its religion.
The Christians mistake an incident for a cause, and honestly imagine
that the Bible is the foundation of modern liberty and law. They forget
physical conditions, make no account of commerce, care nothing for
inventions and discoveries, and ignorantly give the credit to their
inspired book.
The foundations of our civilization were laid centuries before
Christianity was known. The intelligence of courage, of self-government,
of energy, of industry, that uniting made the civilization of this
century, did not come alone from Judea, but from every nation of the
ancient world.
Miracles of the New Testament.
There are many things in the New Testament that I cannot accept as true.
I cannot believe in the miraculous origin of Jesus Christ. I believe he
was the son of Joseph and Mary; that Joseph and Mary had been duly and
legally married; that he was the legitimate offspring of that union.
Nobody ever believed the contrary until he had been dead at least one
hundred and fifty years. Neither Matthew, Mark, nor Luke ever dreamed
that he was of divine origin. He did not say to either Matthew, Mark,
or Luke, or to any one in their hearing, that he was the Son of God,
or that he was miraculously conceived. He did not say it. It may be
asserted that he said it to John, but John did not write the gospel
that bears his name. The angel Gabriel, who, they say, brought the news,
never wrote a word upon the subject. The mother of Christ never wrote
a word upon the subject. His alleged father never wrote a word upon
the subject, and Joseph never admitted the story. We are lacking in
the matter of witnesses. I would not believe such a story now. I cannot
believe that it happened then. I would not believe people I know, much
less would I believe people I do not know.
At that time Matthew and Luke believed that Christ was the son of Joseph
and Mary. And why? they say he descended from David, and in order to
show that he was of the blood of David, they gave the genealogy of
Joseph. And if Joseph was not his father, why did they not give the
genealogy of Pontius Pilate or of Herod? Could they, by giving the
genealogy of Joseph, show that he was of the blood of David if Joseph
was in no way related to Christ? And yet that is the position into which
the Christian world is driven. In the New Testament we find that in
giving the genealogy of Christ it says, "who was the son of Joseph?" and
the church has interpolated the words "as was supposed." Why did they
give a supposed genealogy? It will not do. And that is a thing that
cannot in any way, by any human testimony, be established.
If it is important for us to know that he was the Son of God, I say,
then, that it devolves upon God to give us the evidence. Let him write
it across the face of the heavens, in every language of mankind. If it
is necessary for us to believe it, let it grow on every leaf next
year. No man should be damned for not believing, unless the evidence is
overwhelming. And he ought not to be made to depend upon say so, or upon
"as was supposed." He should have it directly, for himself. A man says
that God told him a certain thing, and he tells me, and I have only his
word. He may have been deceived. If God has a message for me he ought
to tell it to me, and not to somebody that has been dead four or five
thousand years, and in another language.
Besides, God may have changed his mind on many things; he has on
slavery, and polygamy at least, according to the church; and yet his
church now wants to go and destroy polygamy in Utah with the sword. Why
do they not send missionaries there with copies of the Old Testament?
By reading the lives of Abraham and Isaac, and Lot, and a few other
patriarchs who ought to have been in the penitentiary, maybe they can
soften their hearts.
More Miracles.
There is another miracle I do not believe,--the resurrection. I want to
speak about it as we would about any ordinary transaction. In the first
place, I do not believe that any miracle was ever performed, and if
there was, you cannot prove it. Why? Because it is altogether more
reasonable to believe that the people were mistaken about it than that
it happened. And why? Because, according to human experience, we know
that people will not always tell the truth, and we never saw a miracle
ourselves, and we must be governed by our experience; and if we go by
our experience, we must say that the miracle never happened--that the
witnesses were mistaken.
A man comes into Jerusalem, and the first thing he does is to cure the
blind. He lets the light of day visit the night of blindness. The eyes
are opened, and the world is again pictured upon the brain. Another man
is clothed with leprosy. He touches him and the disease falls from
him, and he stands pure, and clean, and whole. Another man is deformed,
wrinkled, and bent. He touches him, and throws around him again the
garment of youth. A man is in his grave, and he says, "Come forth!"
And the man walks in life, feeling his heart throb and his blood going
joyously through his veins. They say that actually happened. I do not
know.
There is one wonderful thing about the dead people that were raised--we
do not hear of them any more. What became of them? If there was a man
in this city who had been raised from the dead, I would go to see him
to-night. I would say, "Where were you when you got the notice to come
back? What kind of a country is it? What kind of opening there for a
young man? How did you like it? Did you meet there the friends you had
lost? Is there a world without death, without pain, without a tear? Is
there a land without a grave, and where good-bye is never heard?" Nobody
ever paid the slightest attention to the dead who had been raised. They
did not even excite interest when they died the second time. Nobody
said, "Why, that man is not afraid. He has been there once. He has
walked through the valley of the shadow." Not a word. They pass quietly
away.
I do not believe these miracles. There is something wrong somewhere
about that business. I may suffer eternal punishment for all this, but I
cannot, I do not, believe.
There was a man who did all these things, and thereupon they crucified
him. Let us be honest. Suppose a man came into this city and should meet
a funeral procession, and say, "Who is dead?" and they should reply,
"The son of a widow; her only support." Suppose he should say to the
procession, "Halt!" and to the undertaker, "Take out that coffin,
unscrew that lid. Young man, I say unto thee, arise!" and the dead
should step from the coffin and in a moment afterward hold his mother in
his arms. Suppose this stranger should go to your cemetery and find some
woman holding a little child in each hand, while the tears fell upon a
new-made grave, and he should say to her, "Who lies buried here?"
and she should reply, "My husband;" and he should cry, "I say unto
thee, oh grave, give up thy dead!" and the husband should rise, and in a
moment after have his lips upon his wife's, and the little children with
their arms around his neck; do you think that the people of this city
would kill him? Do you think any one would wish to crucify him? Do
you not rather believe that every one who had a loved one out in that
cemetery would go to him, even upon their knees, and beg him to give
back their dead? Do you believe that any man was ever crucified who was
the master of death?
Let me tell you to-night if there shall ever appear upon this earth the
master, the monarch, of death, all human knees will touch the earth. He
will not be crucified. All the living who fear death; all the living who
have lost a loved one, will bow to him. And yet we are told that this
worker of miracles, this man who could clothe the dead dust in the
throbbing flesh of life, was crucified. I do not believe that he worked
the miracles, I do not believe that he raised the dead, I do not believe
that he claimed to be the Son of God, These things were told long after
he was dead; told because the ignorant multitude demanded mystery and
wonder; told, because at that time the miraculous was believed of all
the illustrious dead. Stories that made Christianity powerful then,
weaken it now. He who gains a triumph in a conflict with a devil, will
be defeated by science.
There is another thing about these foolish miracles. All could have
been imitated. Men could pretend to be blind; confederates could feign
sickness, and even death.
It is not very difficult to limp or to hold an arm as though it were
paralyzed; or to say that one is afflicted with "an issue of blood." It
is easy to say that the son of a widow was raised from the dead, and
if you fail to give the name of the son, or his mother, or the time and
place where the wonder occurred, it is quite difficult to show that it
did not happen.
No one can be called upon to disprove anything that has not apparently
been established. I say apparently, because there can be no real
evidence in support of a miracle.
How could we prove, for instance, the miracle of the loaves and fishes?
There were plenty of other loaves and other fishes in the world? Each
one of the five thousand could have had a loaf and a fish with him. We
would have to show that there was no other possible way for the people
to get the bread and fish except by miracle, and then we are only half
through. We must then show that they did, in fact, get enough to
feed five thousand people, and that more was left than was had in the
beginning.
Of course this is simply impossible. And let me ask, why was not the
miracle substantiated by some of the multitude?
Would it not have been a greater wonder if Christ had _created_ instead
of multiplied the loaves and fishes?
How can we now prove that a certain person more than eighteen hundred
years ago was possessed by seven devils?
How was it ever possible to prove a thing like that?
How can it be established that some evil spirits could talk while others
were dumb, and that the dumb ones were the hardest to control?
If Christ wished to convince his fellow-men by miracles, why did he not
do something that could not by any means have been a counterfeit?
Instead of healing a withered arm, why did he not find some man whose
arm had been cut off, and make another grow?
If he wanted to raise the dead, why did he not raise some man of
importance, some one known to all?
Why did he do his miracles in the obscurity of the village, in the
darkness of the hovel?
Why call back to life people so insignificant that the public did not
know of their death?
Suppose that in May, 1865, a man had pretended to raise some person by
the name of Smith from the dead, and suppose a religion had been founded
on that miracle, would it not be natural for people, hundreds of years
after the pretended miracle, to ask why the founder of that religion
did not raise from the dead Abraham Lincoln, instead of the unknown and
obscure Mr. Smith?
How could any man now, in any court, by any known rule of evidence,
substantiate one of the miracles of Christ?
Must we believe anything that cannot in any way be substantiated?
If miracles were necessary to convince men eighteen centuries ago, are
they not necessary now?
After all, how many men did Christ convince with his miracles? How many
walked beneath the standard of the master of Nature?
How did it happen that so many miracles convinced so few? I will
tell you. The miracles were never performed. No other explanation is
possible.
It is infinitely absurd to say that a man who cured the sick, the halt
and blind, raised the dead, cast out devils, controlled the winds and
waves, created food and held obedient to his will the forces of the
world, was put to death by men who knew his superhuman power and who
had seen his wondrous works. If the crucifixion was public, the miracles
were private. If the miracles had been public, the crucifixion could not
have been. Do away with the miracles, and the superhuman character of
Christ is destroyed. He becomes what he really was--a man. Do away with
the wonders, and the teachings of Christ cease to be authoritative. They
are then worth the reason, the truth that is in them, and nothing more.
Do away with the miracles, and then we can measure the utterances of
Christ with the standard of our reason. We are no longer intellectual
serfs, believing what is unreasonable in obedience to the command of a
supposed god. We no longer take counsel of our fears, of our cowardice,
but boldly defend what our reason maintains.
Christ takes his appropriate place with the other teachers of mankind.
His life becomes reasonable and admirable. We have a man who hated
oppression; who despised and denounced superstition and hypocrisy; who
attacked the heartless church of his time; who excited the hatred of
bigots and priests, and who rather than be false to his conception of
truth, met and bravely suffered even death.
The Resurrection.
The miracle of the resurrection I do not and cannot believe. If it was
the fact, if the dead Christ rose from the grave, why did he not appear
to his enemies? Why did he not visit Pontius Pilate? Why did he not call
upon Caiaphas, the high priest? upon Herod? Why did he not again enter
the temple and end the old dispute with demonstration? Why did he not
confront the Roman soldiers who had taken money to falsely swear that
his body had been stolen by his friends? Why did he not make another
triumphal entry into Jerusalem? Why did he not say to the multitude:
"Here are the wounds in my feet, and in my hands, and in my side. I am
the one you endeavored to kill, but Death is my slave"? Simply because
the resurrection is a myth. It makes no difference with his teachings.
They are just as good whether he wrought miracles or not. Twice two are
four; that needs no miracle. Twice two are five--a miracle can not help
that. Christ's teachings are worth their effect upon the human race.
It makes no difference about miracle or wonder. In that day every
one believed in the impossible. Nobody had any standing as teacher,
philosopher, governor, king, general, about whom there was not supposed
to be something miraculous. The earth was covered with the sons and
daughters of gods and goddesses.
In Greece, in Rome, in Egypt, in India, every great man was supposed to
have had either a god for his father, or a goddess for his mother. They
accounted for genius by divine origin. Earth and heaven were at that
time near together. It was but a step for the gods from the blue arch
to the green earth. Every lake and valley and mountain top was made rich
with legends of the loves of gods. How could the early Christians have
made converts to a man, among a people who believed so thoroughly in
gods--in gods that had lived upon the earth; among a people who had
erected temples to the sons and daughters of gods? Such people could not
have been induced to worship a man--a man born among barbarous people,
citizen of a nation weak and poor and paying tribute to the Roman power.
The early Christians therefore preached the gospel of a god.
The Ascension.
I cannot believe in the miracle of the ascension, in the bodily
ascension of Jesus Christ. Where was he going? In the light shed upon
this question by the telescope, I again ask, where was he going?
The New Jerusalem is not above us. The abode of the gods is not there.
Where was he going? Which way did he go? Of course that depends upon
the time of day he left. If he left in the evening, he went exactly
the opposite way from that he would have gone had he ascended in the
morning. What did he do with his body? How high did he go? In what way
did he overcome the intense cold? The nearest station is the moon, two
hundred and forty thousand miles away. Again I ask, where did he go? He
must have had a natural body, for it was the same body that died. His
body must have been material, otherwise he would not as he rose have
circled with the earth, and he would have passed from the sight of his
disciples at the rate of more than a thousand miles per hour.
It may be said that his body was "spiritual." Then what became of the
body that died? Just before his ascension we are told that he partook of
broiled fish with his disciples. Was the fish "spiritual?"
Who saw this miracle?
They say the disciples saw it. Let us see what they say. Matthew did not
think it was worth mentioning. He does not speak of it. On the contrary,
he says that the last words of Christ were:
"Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." Is it
possible that Matthew saw this, the most miraculous of miracles, and
yet forgot to put it in his life of Christ? Think of the little miracles
recorded by this saint, and then determine whether it is probable that
he witnessed the ascension of Jesus Christ.
Mark says: "So, then, after the Lord had spoken unto them he was
received up into heaven and sat on the right hand of God." This is all
he says about the most wonderful vision that ever astonished human eyes,
a miracle great enough to have stuffed credulity to bursting; and yet
all we have is this one, poor, meagre verse. We know now that most of
the last chapter of Mark is an interpolation, and as a matter of fact,
the author of Mark's gospel said nothing about the ascension one way or
the other.
Luke says: "And it came to pass while he blessed them he was parted from
them and was carried up into Heaven."
John does not mention it. He gives as Christ's last words this address
to Peter: "Follow thou Me." Of course, he did not say that as he
ascended. It seems to have made very little impression upon him; he
writes the account as though tired of the story. He concludes with an
impatient wave of the hand.
In the Acts we have another account. A conversation is given not
spoken of in any of the others, and we find there two men clad in white
apparel, who said: "Ye men of Galilee why stand ye here gazing up into
heaven? This same Jesus that was taken up into heaven shall so come in
like manner as ye have seen him go up into heaven."
Matthew did not see the men in white apparel, did not see the ascension.
Mark forgot the entire transaction, and Luke did not think the men in
white apparel worth mentioning. John had not confidence enough in the
story to repeat it. And yet, upon such evidence, we are bound to believe
in the bodily ascension, or suffer eternal pain.
And here let me ask, why was not the ascension in public?
Casting out Devils.
Most of the miracles said to have been wrought by Christ were recorded
to show his power over evil spirits. On many occasions, he is said to
have "cast out devils"--devils who could speak, and devils who were
dumb.
For many years belief in the existence of evil spirits has been fading
from the mind, and as this belief grew thin, ministers endeavored to
give new meanings to the ancient words. They are inclined now to put
"disease" in the place of "devils," and most of them say, that the
poor wretches supposed to have been the homes of fiends, were simply
suffering from epileptic fits! We must remember that Christ and these
devils often conversed together. Is it possible that fits can talk?
These devils often admitted that Christ was God. Can epilepsy certify to
divinity? On one occasion the fits told their name, and made a contract
to leave the body of a man provided they would be permitted to take
possession of a herd of swine. Is it possible that fits carried Christ
himself to the pinnacle of a temple? Did fits pretend to be the owner
of the whole earth? Is Christ to be praised for resisting such a
temptation? Is it conceivable that fits wanted Christ to fall down and
worship them?
The church must not abandon its belief in devils. Orthodoxy cannot
afford to put out the fires of hell. Throw away a belief in the devil,
and most of the miracles of the New Testament become impossible, even
if we admit the supernatural. If there is no devil, who was the original
tempter in the garden of Eden? If there is no hell, from what are
we saved; to what purpose is the atonement? Upon the obverse of the
Christian shield is God, upon the reverse, the devil. No devil, no hell.
No hell, no atonement. No atonement, no preaching, no gospel.
Necessity of Belief.
Does belief depend upon evidence? I think it does somewhat in some
cases. How is it when a jury is sworn to try a case, hearing all the
evidence, hearing both sides, hearing the charge of the judge, hearing
the law, are upon their oaths equally divided, six for the plaintiff and
six for the defendant? Evidence does not have the same effect upon all
people. Why? Our brains are not alike. They are not the same shape. We
have not the same intelligence, or the same experience, the same sense.
And yet I am held accountable for my belief. I must believe in the
Trinity--three times one is one, once one is three, and my soul is to be
eternally damned for failing to guess an arithmetical conundrum. That
is the poison part of Christianity--that salvation depends upon
belief. That is the accursed part, and until that dogma is discarded
Christianity will be nothing but superstition.
No man can control his belief. If I hear certain evidence I will believe
a certain thing. If I fail to hear it I may never believe it. If it is
adapted to my mind I may accept it; if it is not, I reject it. And what
am I to go by? My brain. That is the only light I have from Nature, and
if there be a God it is the only torch that this God has given me to
find my way through the darkness and night called life. I do not depend
upon hearsay for that. I do not have to take the word of any other man
nor get upon my knees before a book. Here in the temple of the mind I
consult the God, that is to say my reason, and the oracle speaks to me
and I obey the oracle. What should I obey? Another man's oracle? Shall
I take another man's word--not what he thinks, but what he says some God
has said to him?
I would not know a god if I should see one. I have said before, and I
say again, the brain thinks in spite of me, and I am not responsible for
my thoughts. I cannot control the beating of my heart. I cannot stop
the blood that flows through the rivers of my veins. And yet I am held
responsible for my belief. Then why does not God give me the evidence?
They say he has. In what? In an inspired book. But I do not understand
it as they do. Must I be false to my understanding? They say: "When you
come to die you will be sorry if you do not." Will I be sorry when I
come to die that I did not live a hypocrite? Will I be sorry that I
did not say I was a Christian when I was not? Will the fact that I was
honest put a thorn in the pillow of death? Cannot God forgive me for
being honest? They say that when he was in Jerusalem he forgave his
murderers, but now he will not forgive an honest man for differing from
him on the subject of the Trinity.
They say that God says to me, "Forgive your enemies." I say, "I do;" but
he says, "I will damn mine." God should be consistent. If he wants me to
forgive my enemies he should forgive his. I am asked to forgive enemies
who can hurt me. God is only asked to forgive enemies who cannot hurt
him. He certainly ought to be as generous as he asks us to be. And I
want no God to forgive me unless I am willing to forgive others, and
unless I do forgive others. All I ask, if that be true, is that this God
should act according to his own doctrine. If I am to forgive my enemies,
I ask him to forgive his. I do not believe in the religion of faith,
but of kindness, of good deeds. The idea that man is responsible for his
belief is at the bottom of religious intolerance and persecution.
How inconsistent these Christians are! In St. Louis the other day I read
an interview with a Christian minister--one who is now holding a
revival. They call him the boy preacher--a name that he has borne for
fifty or sixty years. The question was whether in these revivals, when
they were trying to rescue souls from eternal torture, they would allow
colored people to occupy seats with white people; and that revivalist,
preaching the unsearchable riches of Christ, said he would not allow the
colored people to sit with white people; they must go to the back of the
church. These same Christians tell us that in heaven there will be no
distinction. That Christ cares nothing for the color of the skin. That
in Paradise white and black will sit together, swap harps, and cry
hallelujah in chorus; yet this minister, believing as he says he does,
that all men who fail to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ will eternally
perish, was not willing that a colored man should sit by a white man and
hear the gospel of everlasting peace.
According to this revivalist, the ship of the world is going down;
Christ is the only life-boat; and yet he is not willing that a colored
man, with a soul to save, shall sit by the side of a white brother,
and be rescued from eternal death. He admits that the white brother
is totally depraved; that if the white brother had justice done him he
would be damned; that it is only through the wonderful mercy of God that
the white man is not in hell; and yet such a being, totally depraved,
is too good to sit by a colored man! Total depravity becomes arrogant;
total depravity draws the color line in religion, and an ambassador of
Christ says to the black man, "Stand away; let your white brother hear
first about the love of God."
I believe in the religion of humanity. It is far better to love our
fellow-men than to love God. We can help them. We cannot help him. We
had better do what we can than to be always pretending to do what we
cannot.
Virtue is of no color; kindness, justice and love, of no complexion.
Eternal Punishment.
Now I come to the last part of this creed--the doctrine of eternal
punishment. I have concluded that I will never deliver a lecture in
which I will not attack the doctrine of eternal pain. That part of the
Congregational creed would disgrace the lowest savage that crouches
and crawls in the jungles of Africa. The man who now, in the nineteenth
century, preaches the doctrine of eternal punishment, the doctrine of an
eternal hell, has lived in vain. Think of that doctrine! The eternity of
punishment! I find in this same creed--in this latest utterance of
Congregationalism--that Christ is finally going to triumph in this world
and establish his kingdom. This creed declares that "we believe in the
ultimate prevalence of the kingdom of God over all the earth." If
their doctrine is true he will never triumph in the other world. The
Congregational Church does not believe in the ultimate prevalence of the
kingdom of Christ in the world to come. There he is to meet with eternal
failure. He will have billions in hell forever.
In this world we never will be perfectly civilized as long as a gallows
casts its shadow upon the earth. As long as there is a penitentiary,
within the walls of which a human being is immured, we are not a
perfectly civilized people. We shall never be perfectly civilized until
we do away with crime. And yet, according to this Christian religion,
God is to have an eternal penitentiary; he is to be an everlasting
jailer, an everlasting turnkey, a warden of an infinite dungeon, and
he is going to keep prisoners there forever, not for the purpose of
reforming them--because they are never going to get any better, only
worse--but for the purpose of purposeless punishment. And for what?
For something they failed to believe in this world. Born in ignorance,
supported by poverty, caught in the snares of temptation, deformed by
toil, stupefied by want--and yet held responsible through the countless
ages of eternity! No man can think of a greater horror; no man can dream
of a greater absurdity. For the growth of that doctrine ignorance was
soil and fear was rain. It came from the fanged mouths of serpents, and
yet it is called "glad tidings of great joy." Some Who are Damned.
We are told "God so loved the world" that he is going to damn almost
everybody. If this orthodox religion be true, some of the greatest, and
grandest, and best who ever lived are suffering God's torments to-night.
It does not appear to make much difference with the members of the
church. They go right on enjoying themselves about as well as ever. If
this doctrine is true, Benjamin Franklin, one of the wisest and best of
men, who did so much to give us here a free government, is suffering
the tyranny of God to-night, although he endeavored to establish freedom
among men. If the churches were honest, their preachers would tell their
hearers: "Benjamin Franklin is in hell, and we warn all the youth not to
imitate Benjamin Franklin. Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration
of Independence, with its self-evident truths, has been damned these
many years."
That is what all the ministers ought to have the courage to say. Talk
as you believe. Stand by your creed, or change it. I want to impress it
upon your minds, because the thing I wish to do in this world is to put
out the fires of hell. I will keep on as long as there is one little red
coal left in the bottomless pit. As long as the ashes are warm I shall
denounce this infamous doctrine.
I want you to know that according to this creed the men who founded this
great and splendid Government are in hell to-night. Most of the men who
fought in the Revolutionary war, and wrested from the clutch of Great
Britain this continent, have been rewarded by the eternal wrath of God.
Thousands of the old Revolutionary soldiers are in torment tonight. Let
the preachers have the courage to say so. The men who fought in 1812,
and gave to the United States the freedom of the seas, have nearly all
been damned. Thousands of heroes who served our country in the Civil
war, hundreds who starved in prisons, are now in the dungeons of God,
compared with which, Andersonville was Paradise. The greatest of heroes
are there; the greatest of poets, the greatest scientists, the men who
have made the world beautiful--they are all among the damned if this
creed is true.
Humboldt, who shed light, and who added to the intellectual wealth
of mankind; Goethe, and Schiller, and Lessing, who almost created the
German language--all gone--all suffering the wrath of God tonight, and
every time an angel thinks of one of those men he gives his harp an
extra twang. Laplace, who read the heavens like an open book--he is
there. Robert Burns, the poet of human love--he is there. He wrote
the "Prayer of Holy Willie." He fastened on the cross the Presbyterian
creed, and there it is, a lingering crucifixion. Robert Burns increased
the tenderness of the human heart. Dickens put a shield of pity before
the flesh of childhood--God is getting even with him. Our own Ralph
Waldo Emerson, although he had a thousand opportunities to hear
Methodist clergymen, scorned the means of grace, lived to his highest
ideal, gave to his fellow-men his best and truest thought, and yet his
spirit is the sport and prey of fiends to-night.
Longfellow, who has refined thousands of homes, did not believe in the
miraculous origin of the Savior, doubted the report of Gabriel, loved
his fellow-men, did what he could to free the slaves, to increase the
happiness of man, yet God was waiting for his soul--waiting to cast
him out and down forever. Thomas Paine, author of the "Rights of Man;"
offering his life in both hemispheres for the freedom of the human race;
one of the founders of this Republic, is now among the damned; and yet
it seems to me that if he could only get God's attention long enough
to point him to the American flag he would let him out. Auguste Comte,
author of the "Positive Philosophy," who loved his fellow-men to that
degree that he made of humanity a god, who wrote his great work in
poverty, with his face covered with tears--they are getting their
revenge on him now.
Voltaire, who abolished torture in France; who did more for human
liberty than any other man, living or dead; who was the assassin
of superstition, and whose dagger still rusts in the heart of
Catholicism--he is with the rest. All the priests who have been
translated have had their happiness increased by looking at Voltaire.
Giordano Bruno, the first star of the morning after the long night;
Benedict Spinoza, the pantheist, the metaphysician, the pure and
generous man; Diderot, the encyclopedist, who endeavored to get all
knowledge in a small compass, so that he could put the peasant on an
equality intellectually with the prince; Diderot, who wished to sow all
over the world the seed of knowledge, and loved to labor for mankind,
while the priests wanted to burn; who did all he could to put out the
fires--he was lost, long, long ago. His cry for water has become so
common that his voice is now recognized through all the realms of
heaven, and the angels laughing, say to one another, "That is Diderot."
David Hume, the Scotch philosopher, is there, with his inquiry about
the "Human Understanding" and his argument against miracles. Beethoven,
master of music, and Wagner, the Shakespeare of harmony, who made the
air of this world rich forever, they are there; and to-night they have
better music in hell than in heaven!
Shelley, whose soul, like his own "Skylark," was a winged joy, has been
damned for many, many years; and Shakespeare, the greatest of the human
race, who did more to elevate mankind than all the priests who ever
lived and died, he is there; but founders of inquisitions, builders
of dungeons, makers of chains, inventors of instruments of torture,
tearers, and burners, and branders of human flesh, stealers of babes,
and sellers of husbands and wives and children, and they who kept the
horizon lurid with the fagot's flame for a thousand years--are in heaven
to-night. I wish heaven joy!
That is the doctrine with which we are polluting the souls of children.
That is the doctrine that puts a fiend by the dying bed and a prophecy
of hell over every cradle. That is "glad tidings of great joy."
Only a little while ago, when the great flood came upon the Ohio, sent
by him who is ruling the world and paying particular attention to the
affairs of nations, just in the gray of the morning they saw a house
floating down and on its top a human being. A few men went out to the
rescue. They found there a woman, a mother, and they wished to save her
life. She said: "No, I am going to stay where I am. In this house I
have three dead babes; I will not desert them." Think of a love so
limitless--stronger and deeper than despair and death! And yet, the
Christian religion says, that if that woman, that mother, did not happen
to believe in their creed God would send her soul to eternal fire! If
there is another world, and if in heaven they wear hats, when such a
woman climbs the opposite bank of the Jordan, Christ should lift his to
her.
The doctrine of eternal pain is my trouble with this Christian religion.
I reject it on account of its infinite heartlessness. I cannot tell them
too often, that during our last war Christians, who knew that if they
were shot they would go right to heaven, went and hired wicked men to
take their places, perfectly willing that these men should go to hell
provided they could stay at home. You see they are not honest in it,
or they do not believe it, or as the people say, "they don't sense it."
They have not imagination enough to conceive what it is they believe,
and what a terrific falsehood they assert. And I beg of every one
who hears me to-night, I beg, I implore, I beseech you, never to give
another dollar to build a church in which that lie is preached. Never
give another cent to send a missionary with his mouth stuffed with
that falsehood to a foreign land. Why, they say, the heathen will go to
heaven, any way, if you let them alone. What is the use of sending them
to hell by enlightening them? Let them alone. The idea of going and
telling a man a thing that if he does not believe, he will be damned,
when the chances are ten to one that he will not believe it, is
monstrous. Do not tell him here, and as quick as he gets to the other
world and finds it is necessary to believe, he can say "Yes." Give him a
chance.
Another Objection.
My objection to orthodox religion is that it destroys human love, and
tells us that the love of this world is not necessary to make a heaven
in the next.
No matter about your wife, your children, your brother, your sister--no
matter about all the affections of the human heart--when you get there,
you will be with the angels. I do not know whether I would like the
angels. I do not know whether the angels would like me. I would rather
stand by the ones who have loved me and whom I know; and I can conceive
of no heaven without the loved of this earth. That is the trouble with
this Christian relief-ion. Leave your father, leave your mother, leave
your wife, leave your children, leave everything and follow Jesus
Christ. I will not. I will stay with my people. I will not sacrifice on
the altar of a selfish fear all the grandest and noblest promptings of
my heart.
Do away with human love and what are we? What would we be in another
world, and what would we be here? Can any one conceive of music without
human love? Of art, or joy? Human love builds every home. Human love is
the author of all beauty. Love paints every picture, and chisels every
statue. Love builds every fireside. What could heaven be without human
love? And yet that is what we are promised--a heaven with your wife
lost, your mother lost, some of your children gone. And you expect to be
made happy by falling in with some angel! Such a religion is infamous.
Christianity holds human love for naught; and yet Love is the only bow
on Life's dark cloud. It is the morning and the evening star. It shines
upon the babe, and sheds its radiance on the quiet tomb. It is the
mother of art, inspirer of poet, patriot and philosopher. It is the air
and light of every heart--builder of every home, kindler of every fire
on every hearth. It was the first to dream of immortality. It fills the
world with melody--for music is the voice of love. Love is the magician,
the enchanter, that changes worthless things to joy, and makes right
royal kings and queens of common clay. It is the perfume of that
wondrous flower, the heart, and without that sacred passion, that divine
swoon, we are less than beasts; but with it, earth is heaven, and we are
gods.
And how are you to get to this heaven? On the efforts of another.
You are to be a perpetual heavenly pauper, and you will have to admit
through all eternity that you never would have been there if you had not
been frightened. "I am here," you will say, "I have these wings, I have
this musical instrument, because I was scared. I am here. The ones who
loved me are among the damned; the ones I loved are also there--but I am
here, that is enough."
What a glorious' world heaven must be! No reformation in that world--not
the slightest. If you die in Arkansas that is the end of you! Think of
telling a boy in the next world, who lived and died in Delaware, that he
had been fairly treated! Can anything be more infamous?
All on an equality--the rich and the poor, those with parents loving
them, those with every opportunity for education, on an equality with
the poor, the abject and the ignorant--and this little day called life,
this moment with a hope, a shadow and a tear, this little space between
your mother's arms and the grave, balances eternity.
God can do nothing for you when you get there. A Methodist preacher can
do more for the soul here than its creator can there. The soul goes to
heaven, where there is nothing but good society; no bad examples; and
they are all there, Father, Son and Holy Ghost, and yet they can do
nothing for that poor unfortunate except to damn him. Is there any sense
in that?
Why should this be a period of probation? It says in the Bible, I
believe, "Now is the accepted time." When does that mean? That means
whenever the passage is pronounced. "Now is the accepted time." It will
be the same to-morrow, will it not? And just as appropriate then
as to-day, and if appropriate at any time, appropriate through all
eternity.
What I say is this: There is no world--there can be no world--in which
every human being will not have the eternal opportunity of doing right.
That is my objection to this Christian religion; and if the love
of earth is not the love of heaven, if those we love here are to be
separated from us there, then I want eternal sleep. Give me a good cool
grave rather than the furnace of Jehovah's wrath. I pray the angel of
the resurrection to let me sleep. Gabriel, do not blow! Let me alone!
If, when the grave bursts, I am not to meet the faces that have been my
sunshine in this life, let me sleep. Rather than that this doctrine of
endless punishment should be true, I would gladly see the fabric of our
civilization crumbling fall to unmeaning chaos and to formless dust,
where oblivion broods and even memory forgets. I would rather that the
blind Samson of some imprisoned force, released by chance, should so
wreck and strand the mighty world that man in stress and strain of want
and fear should shudderingly crawl back to savage and barbaric night. I
would rather that every planet should in its orbit wheel a barren star!
What I Believe.
I think it is better to love your children than to love God, a thousand
times better, because you can help them, and I am inclined to think that
God can get along without you. Certainly we cannot help a being without
body, parts, or passions!
I believe in the religion of the family. I believe that the roof-tree is
sacred, from the smallest fibre that feels the soft cool clasp of earth,
to the topmost flower that spreads its bosom to the sun, and like a
spendthrift gives its perfume to the air. The home where virtue dwells
with love is like a lily with a heart of fire--the fairest flower in all
the world. And I tell you God cannot afford to damn a man in the next
world who has made a happy family in this. God cannot afford to cast
over the battlements of heaven the man who has a happy home upon this
earth. God cannot afford to be unpitying to a human heart capable of
pity. God cannot clothe with fire the man who has clothed the naked
here; and God cannot send to eternal pain a man who has done something
toward improving the condition of his fellow-man. If he can, I had
rather go to hell than to heaven and keep the company of such a god.
Immortality.
They tell me that the next terrible thing I do is to take away the hope
of immortality! I do not, I would not, I could not. Immortality was
first dreamed of by human love; and yet the church is going to take
human love out of immortality. We love, therefore we wish to live. A
loved one dies and we wish to meet again; and from the affection of the
human heart grew the great oak of the hope of immortality. Around
that oak has climbed the poisonous vines of superstition. Theologians,
pretenders, soothsayers, parsons, priests, popes, bishops, have taken
advantage of that. They have stood by graves and promised heaven. They
have stood by graves and prophesied a future filled with pain. They have
erected their toll-gates on the highway of life and have collected money
from fear.
Neither the Bible nor the church gave us the idea of immortality. The
Old Testament tells us how we lost immortality, and it does not say a
word about another world, from the first mistake in Genesis to the last
curse in Malachi. There is not in the Old Testament a burial service.
No man in the Old Testament stands by the dead and says, "We shall meet
again." From the top of Sinai came no hope of another world.
And when we get to the New Testament, what do we find? "They that are
accounted worthy to obtain that world and the resurrection of the dead."
As though some would be counted unworthy to obtain the resurrection of
the dead. And in another place. "Seek for honor, glory, immortality."
If you have it, why seek it? And in another place, "God, who alone hath
immortality." Yet they tell us that we get our idea of immortality from
the Bible. I deny it.
I would not destroy the faintest ray of human hope, but I deny that
we got our idea of immortality from the Bible. It existed long before
Moses. We find it symbolized through all Egypt, through all India.
Wherever man has lived he has made another world in which to meet the
lost of this.
The history of this belief we find in tombs and temples wrought and
carved by those who wept and hoped. Above their dead they laid the
symbols of another life.
We do not know. We do not prophesy a life of pain. We leave the dead
with Nature, the mother of us all. Under the bow of hope, under the
seven-hued arch, let the dead sleep.
If Christ was in fact God, why did he not plainly say there is another
life? Why did he not tell us something about it? Why did he not turn
the tear-stained hope of immortality into the glad knowledge of another
life? Why did he go dumbly to his death and leave the world in darkness
and in doubt? Why? Because he was a man and did not know.
What consolation has the orthodox religion for the widow of the
unbeliever, the widow of a good, brave, kind man? What can the orthodox
minister say to relieve the bursting heart of that woman? What can he
say to relieve the aching hearts of the orphans as they kneel by the
grave of that father, if that father did not happen to be an orthodox
Christian? What consolation have they? When a Christian loses a friend
the tears spring from his eyes as quickly as from the eyes of others.
Their tears are as bitter as ours. Why? The echoes of the words spoken
eighteen hundred years ago are so low, and the sounds of the clods upon
the coffin are so loud; the promises are so far away, and the dead are
so near.
We do not know, we cannot say, whether death is a wall or a door; the
beginning or end of a day; the spreading of pinions to soar, or the
folding forever of wings; the rise or the set of a sun, or an endless
life that brings the rapture of love to everyone. A Fable.
There is the fable of Orpheus and Eurydice. Eurydice had been captured
and taken to the infernal regions, and Orpheus went after her, taking
with him his harp and playing as he went. When he came to Pluto's realm
he began to play, and Sysiphus, charmed by the music, sat down upon the
stone that he had been heaving up the mountain's side for so many years,
and which continually rolled back upon him; Ixion paused upon his wheel
of fire; Tantalus ceased his vain efforts for water; the daughters of
the Danaides left off trying to fill their sieves with water; Pluto
smiled, and for the first time in the history of hell the cheeks of the
Furies were wet with tears. The god relented, and said, "Eurydice may
go with you, but you must not look back." So Orpheus again threaded the
caverns, playing as he went, and as he reached the light he failed to
hear the footsteps of Eurydice. He looked back, and in a moment she was
gone. Again and again Orpheus sought his love. Again and again looked
back.
This fable gives the idea of the perpetual effort made by the human mind
to rescue truth from the clutch of error.
Some time Orpheus will not look back. Some day Eurydice will reach the
blessed light, and at last there will fade from the memory of men the
monsters of superstition.