A FEW years ago a few men began to think, to investigate, to reason.
They began to doubt the legends of the church, the miracles of the past.
They began to notice what happened. They found that eclipses came at
certain intervals and that their coming could be foretold. They became
satisfied that the conduct of men had nothing to do with eclipses--and
that the stars moved in their orbits unconscious of the sons of men.
Galileo, Copernicus, and Kepler' destroyed the astronomy of the Bible,
and demonstrated that the "inspired" story of creation could not be
true, and that the church was as ignorant as the priests were dishonest.
They found that the myth-makers were mistaken, that the sun and stars
did not revolve about the earth, that the firmament was not solid,
that the earth was not flat, and that the so-called philosophy of the
theologians was absurd and idiotic.
The stars became witnesses against the creeds of superstition.
With the telescope the heavens were explored. The New Jerusalem could
not be found.
It had faded away.
The church persecuted the astronomers and denied the facts. In
February, in the year of grace sixteen hundred, the Catholic Church, the
"Triumphant Beast," having in her hands, her paws, the keys of heaven
and hell, accused Giordano Bruno of having declared that there were
other worlds than this. He was tried, convicted, imprisoned in a dungeon
for seven years. He was offered his liberty if he would recant. Bruno,
the atheist, the philosopher, refused to stain his soul by denying what
he believed to be true. He was taken from his cell by the priests, by
those who loved their enemies, led to the place of execution. He was
clad in a robe on which representations of devils had been painted--the
devils that were soon to claim his soul. He was chained to a stake and
about his body the wood was piled. Then priests, followers of Christ,
lighted the fagots and flames consumed the greatest, the most perfect
martyr, that ever suffered death.
And yet the Italian agent of God, the infallible Leo XIII., only a few
years ago, denounced Bruno, the "bravest of the brave," as a coward.
The church murdered him, and the pope maligned his memory. Fagot and
falsehood--two weapons of the church.
A little while ago a few men began to examine rocks and soils,
mountains, islands, reefs and seas. They noticed the valleys and deltas
that had been formed by rivers, the many strata of lava that had been
changed to soil, the vast deposits of metals and coal, the immense reefs
that the coral had formed, the work of glaciers in the far past, the
production of soil by the disintegration of rock, by the growth and
decay of vegetation and the countless evidences of the countless ages
through which the Earth has passed. The geologists read the history
of the world written by wave and flame, attested by fossils, by the
formation of rocks, by mountain ranges, by volcanoes, by rivers,
islands, continents and seas.
The geology of the Bible--of the "divinely inspired" church, of the
"infallible" pope, was found to be utterly false and foolish.
The Earth became a witness against the creeds of superstition.
Then came Watt and Galvani with the miracles of steam and electricity,
while countless inventors created the wonderful machines that do the
work of the world. Investigation took the place of credulity. Men became
dissatisfied with huts and rags, with crusts and creeds. They longed for
the comforts, the luxuries of life. The intellectual horizon enlarged,
new truths were discovered, old ideas were thrown aside, the brain was
developed, the heart civilized and science was born. Humboldt, Laplace
and hundreds of others explained the phenomena of nature, called
attention to the ancient and venerable mistakes of sanctified ignorance
and added to the sum of knowledge. Darwin and Haeckel gave their
conclusions to the world. Men began to really think, the myths began
to fade, the miracles to grow mean and small, and the great structure,
known as theology, fell with a crash.
Science denies the truth of myth and miracle, denies that human
testimony can substantiate the miraculous, denies the existence of the
supernatural. Science asserts the absolute, the unvarying uniformity
of nature. Science insists that the present is the child of all the
past,--that no power can change the past, and that nature is forever the
same.
The chemist has found that just so many atoms of one kind unite with
just so many of another--no more, no less, always the same. No caprice
in chemistry; no interference from without.
The astronomers know that the planets remain in their orbits--that their
forces are constant. They know that light is forever the same,
always obeying the angle of incidence, traveling with the same
rapidity,--casting the same shadow, under the same circumstances in
all worlds. They know that the eclipses will occur at the times
foretold--neither hastening nor delaying. They know that the attraction
of gravitation is always the same, always in perfect proportion to mass
and distance, neither weaker nor stronger, unvarying forever. They know
that the facts in nature cannot be changed or destroyed, and that the
qualities of all things are eternal.
The men of science know that the atomic integrity of the metals is
always the same, that each metal is true to its nature and that the
particles cling to each other with the same tenacity,--the same force.
They have demonstrated the persistence of force, that it is forever
active, forever the same, and that it cannot be destroyed.
These great truths have revolutionized the thought of the world.
Every art, every employment, all study, all experiment, the value of
experience, of judgment, of hope, all rest on a belief in the uniformity
of nature, on the eternal persistence and indestructibility of force.
Break one link in the infinite chain of cause and effect, and the Master
of Nature appears. The broken link would become the throne of a god.
The uniformity of Nature denies the supernatural and demonstrates that
there is no interference from without. There is no place, no office left
for gods. Ghosts fade from the brain and the shrivelled deities fall
palsied from their thrones.
The uniformity of Nature renders a belief in "special providence"
impossible. Prayer becomes a useless agitation of the air, and religious
ceremonies are but motions, pantomimes, mindless and meaningless.
The naked savage, worshiping a wooden god, is the religious equal of the
robed pope kneeling before an image of the Virgin. The poor African who
carries roots and bark to protect himself from evil spirits is on the
same intellectual plane of one who sprinkles his body with "holy water."
All the creeds of Christendom, all the religions of the heathen world
are equally absurd. The cathedral, the mosque and the joss house have
the same foundation. Their builders do not believe in the uniformity
of Nature, and the business of all priests is to induce a so-called
infinite being to change the order of events, to make causes barren of
effects and to produce effects without, and in spite of, natural causes.
They all believe in the unthinkable and pray for the impossible.
Science teaches us that there was no creation and that there can be no
destruction. The infinite denies creation and defies destruction. An
infinite person, an "infinite being" is an infinite impossibility.
To conceive of such a being is beyond the power of the mind. Yet all
religions rest upon the supposed existence of the unthinkable, the
inconceivable. And the priests of these religions pretend to be
perfectly familiar with the designs, will, and wishes of this
unthinkable, this inconceivable.
Science teaches that that which really is has always been, that behind
every effect is the efficient and necessary cause, that there is in the
universe neither chance nor interference, and that energy is eternal.
Day by day the authority of the theologian grows weaker and weaker. As
the people become intelligent they care less for preachers and more for
teachers. Their confidence in knowledge, in thought and investigation
increases. They are eager to know the discoveries, the useful truths,
the important facts made, ascertained and demonstrated by the explorers
in the domain of the natural. They are no longer satisfied with the
platitudes of the pulpit, and the assertions of theologians. They are
losing confidence in the "sacred Scriptures" and in the protecting power
and goodness of the supernatural. They are satisfied that credulity is
not a virtue and that investigation is not a crime.
Science is the providence of man, the worker of true miracles, of
real wonders. Science has "read a little in Nature's infinite book of
secrecy." Science knows the circuits of the winds, the courses of the
stars. Fire is his servant, and lightning his messenger. Science freed
the slaves and gave liberty to their masters. Science taught man to
enchain, not his fellows, but the forces of nature, forces that have no
backs to be scarred, no limbs for chains to chill and eat, forces that
have no hearts to break, forces that never know fatigue, forces that
shed no tears. Science is the great physician. His touch has given
sight. He has made the lame to leap, the deaf to hear, the dumb to
speak, and in the pallid face his hand has set the rose of health.
Science has given his beloved sleep and wrapped in happy dreams the
throbbing nerves of pain. Science is the destroyer of disease, builder
of happy homes, the preserver of life and love. Science is the teacher
of every virtue, the enemy of every vice. Science has given the true
basis of morals, the origin and office of conscience, revealed the
nature of obligation, of duty, of virtue in its highest, noblest forms,
and has demonstrated that true happiness is the only possible good.
Science has slain the monsters of superstition, and destroyed the
authority of inspired books. Science has read the records of the rocks,
records that priestcraft cannot change, and on his wondrous scales has
weighed the atom and the star.
Science has founded the only true religion. Science is the only Savior
of this world.