admitted that it was merely the allegorical meaning in its doctrines
that was true, it would be deprived of all efficacy, and such rigorous
treatment would put an end to its invaluable and beneficial influence on
the morals and feelings of mankind. Instead of insisting on that with
pedantic obstinacy, look at its great achievements in a practical way
both as regards morality and feelings, as a guide to conduct, as a
support and consolation to suffering humanity in life and death. How
greatly you should guard against rousing suspicion in the masses by
theoretical wrangling, and thereby finally taking from them what is an
inexhaustible source of consolation and comfort to them; which in their
hard lot they need very much more than we do: for this reason alone,
religion ought not to be attacked.
_Phil_. With this argument Luther could have been beaten out of the
field when he attacked the selling of indulgences; for the letters of
indulgence have furnished many a man with irreparable consolation and
perfect tranquillity, so that he joyfully passed away with perfect
confidence in the little packet of them which he firmly held in his hand
as he lay dying, convinced that in them he had so many cards of
admission into all the nine heavens. What is the use of grounds of
consolation and peacefulness over which is constantly hanging the
Damocles-sword of deception? The truth, my friend, the truth alone holds
good, and remains constant and faithful; it is the only solid
consolation; it is the indestructible diamond.
_Demop_. Yes, if you had truth in your pocket to bless us with whenever
we asked for it. But what you possess are only metaphysical systems in
which nothing is certain but the headaches they cost. Before one takes
anything away one must have something better to put in its place.
_Phil_. I wish you would not continually say that. To free a man from
error does not mean to take something from him, but to give him
something. For knowledge that something is wrong is a truth. No error,
however, is harmless; every error will cause mischief sooner or later to
the man who fosters it. Therefore do not deceive any one, but rather
admit you are ignorant of what you do not know, and let each man form
his own dogmas for himself. Perhaps they will not turn out so bad,
especially as they will rub against each other and mutually rectify
errors; at any rate the various opinions will establish tolerance. Those
men who possess both knowledge and capacity may take up the study of
philosophy, or even themselves advance the history of philosophy.
_Demop_. That would be a fine thing! A whole nation of naturalised
metaphysicians quarrelling with each other, and _eventualiter_ striking
each other.
_Phil_. Well, a few blows here and there are the sauce of life, or at
least a very slight evil compared with priestly government--prosecution
of heretics, plundering of the laity, courts of inquisition, crusades,
religious wars, massacres of St. Bartholomew, and the like. They have
been the results of chartered popular metaphysics: therefore I still
hold that one cannot expect to get grapes from thistles, or good from
lies and deception.
_Demop_. How often must I repeat that religion is not a lie, but the
truth itself in a mythical, allegorical dress? But with respect to your
plan of each man establishing his own religion, I had still something to
say to you, that a particularism like this is totally and absolutely
opposed to the nature of mankind, and therefore would abolish all social
order. Man is an _animal metaphysicum_--in other words, he has
surpassingly great metaphysical requirements; accordingly he conceives
life above all in its metaphysical sense, and from that standpoint
wishes to grasp everything. Accordingly, odd as it may sound with regard
to the uncertainty of all dogmas, accord in the fundamental elements of
metaphysics is the principal thing, in so much as it is only among
people who hold the same views on this question that a genuine and
lasting fellowship is possible. As a result of this, nations resemble
and differ from each other more in religion than in government, or even
language. Consequently, the fabric of society, the State, will only be
perfectly firm when it has for a basis a system of metaphysics
universally acknowledged. Such a system, naturally, can only be a
popular metaphysical one--that is, a religion. It then becomes
identified with the government, with all the general expressions of the
national life, as well as with all sacred acts of private life. This was
the case in ancient India, among the Persians, Egyptians, Jews, also the
Greeks and Romans, and it is still the case among the Brahman, Buddhist,
and Mohammedan nations. There, are three doctrines of faith in China, it
is true, and the one that has spread the most, namely, Buddhism, is
exactly the doctrine that is least protected by the State; yet there is
a saying in China that is universally appreciated and daily applied,
_the three doctrines are only one_--in other words, they agree in the
main thing. The Emperor confesses all three at the same time, and agrees
with them all. Europe is the confederacy of _Christian_ States;
Christianity is the basis of each of its members and the common bond of
all; hence Turkey, although it is in Europe, is really not to be
reckoned in it. Similarly the European princes are such "by the grace of
God," and the Pope is the delegate of God; accordingly, as his throne
was the highest, he wished all other thrones to be looked upon only as
held in fee from him. Similarly Archbishops and Bishops, as such, had
temporal authority, just as they have still in England a seat and voice
in the Upper House; Protestant rulers are, as such, heads of their
churches; in England a few years ago this was a girl of eighteen. By the
revolt from the Pope, the Reformation shattered the European structure,
and, in particular, dissolved the true unity of Germany by abolishing
its common faith; this unity, which had as a matter of fact come to
grief, had accordingly to be replaced later by artificial and purely
political bonds. So you see how essentially connected is unity of faith
with common order and every state. It is everywhere the support of the
laws and the constitution--that is to say, the foundation of the social
structure, which would stand with difficulty if faith did not lend power
to the authority of the government and the importance of the ruler.
_Phil_. Oh, yes, princes look upon God as a goblin, wherewith to
frighten grown-up children to bed when nothing else is of any avail; it
is for this reason that they depend so much on God. All right; meanwhile
I should like to advise every ruling lord to read through, on a certain
day every six months, the fifteenth chapter of the First Book of Samuel,
earnestly and attentively; so that he may always have in mind what it
means to support the throne on the altar. Moreover, since burning at the
stake, that _ultima ratio theologorum_, is a thing of the past, this
mode of government has lost its efficacy. For, as you know, religions
are like glowworms: before they can shine it must be dark. A certain
degree of general ignorance is the condition of every religion, and is
the element in which alone it is able to exist. While, as soon as
astronomy, natural science, geology, history, knowledge of countries and
nations have spread their light universally, and philosophy is finally
allowed to speak, every faith which is based on miracle and revelation
must perish, and then philosophy will take its place. In Europe the day
of knowledge and science dawned towards the end of the fifteenth century
with the arrival of the modern Greek philosophers, its sun rose higher
in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, which were so productive,
and scattered the mists of the Middle Age. In the same proportion, both
Church and Faith were obliged to gradually disappear; so that in the
eighteenth century English and French philosophers became direct
antagonists, until finally, under Frederick the Great, Kant came and
took away from religious belief the support it had formerly received
from philosophy, and emancipated the _ancilla theologiae_ in that he
attacked the question with German thoroughness and perseverance, whereby
it received a less frivolous, that is to say, a more earnest tone. As a
result of this we see in the nineteenth century Christianity very much
weakened, almost stripped entirely of serious belief, nay, fighting for
its own existence; while apprehensive princes try to raise it up by an
artificial stimulant, as the doctor tries to revive a dying man by the
aid of a drug. There is a passage from Condorcet's _Des Progrès de
l'esprit humain_, which seems to have been written as a warning to our
epoch: _Le zèle religieux des philosophes et des grands n'était qu'une
dévotion politique: et toute religion, qu'on se permet de défendre comme
une croyance qu'il est utile de laisser au peuple, ne peut plus espérer
qu'une agonie plus ou moins prolongée_. In the whole course of the
events which I have pointed out you may always observe that belief and
knowledge bear the same relation to each other as the two scales of a
balance: when the one rises the other must fall. The balance is so
sensitive that it indicates momentary influences. For example, in the
beginning of this century the predatory excursions of French robbers
under their leader Buonaparte, and the great efforts that were requisite
to drive them out and to punish them, had led to a temporary neglect of
science, and in consequence to a certain decrease in the general
propagation of knowledge; the Church immediately began to raise her head
again and Faith to be revived, a revival partly of a poetical nature, in
keeping with the spirit of the times. On the other hand, in the more
than thirty years' peace that followed, leisure and prosperity promoted
the building up of science and the spread of knowledge in an exceptional
degree, so that the result was what I have said, the dissolution and
threatened fall of religion. Perhaps the time which has been so often
predicted is not far distant, when religion will depart from European
humanity, like a nurse whose care the child has outgrown; it is now
placed in the hands of a tutor for instruction. For without doubt
doctrines of belief that are based only on authority, miracles, and
revelation are only of use and suitable to the childhood of humanity.
That a race, which all physical and historical data confirm as having
been in existence only about a hundred times the life of a man sixty
years old, is still in its first childhood is a fact that every one will
admit.
_Demop_. If instead of prophesying with undisguised pleasure the
downfall of Christianity, you would only consider how infinitely
indebted European humanity is to it, and to the religion which, after
the lapse of some time, followed Christianity from its old home in the
East! Europe received from it a drift which had hitherto been unknown to
it--it learnt the fundamental truth that life cannot be an
end-in-itself, but that the true end of our existence lies beyond it.
The Greeks and Romans had placed this end absolutely in life itself, so
that, in this sense, they may most certainly be called blind heathens.
Correspondingly, all their virtues consist in what is serviceable to the
public, in what is useful; and Aristotle says quite naïvely, "_Those
virtues must necessarily be the greatest which are the most useful to
others_" (ἀναγκη δε μεγιστας εἰναι ἀρετας τας τοις ἀλλοις χρησιμωτατας,
_Rhetor_. I. c. 9). This is why the ancients considered love for one's
country the greatest virtue, although it is a very doubtful one, as it
is made up of narrowness, prejudice, vanity, and an enlightened
self-interest. Preceding the passage that has just been quoted,
Aristotle enumerates all the virtues in order to explain them
individually. They are _Justice, Courage, Moderation, Magnificence_
(μεγαλοπρεπεια), _Magnanimity, Liberality, Gentleness, Reasonableness,
and Wisdom_. How different from the Christian virtues! Even Plato,
without comparison the most transcendental philosopher of pre-Christian
antiquity, knows no higher virtue than _Justice_; he alone recommends it
unconditionally and for its own sake, while all the other philosophers
make a happy life--_vita beata_--the aim of all virtue; and it is
acquired through the medium of moral behaviour. Christianity released
European humanity from its superficial and crude absorption in an
ephemeral, uncertain, and hollow existence.
... _coelumque tueri
Jussit, et erectos ad sidera tollere vultus_.
Accordingly, Christianity does not only preach Justice, but the _Love of
Mankind, Compassion, Charity, Reconciliation, Love of one's Enemies,
Patience, Humility, Renunciation, Faith, and Hope_. Indeed, it went even
further: it taught that the world was of evil and that we needed
deliverance; consequently it preached contempt of the world,
self-denial, chastity, the giving up of one's own will, that is to say,
turning away from life and its phantom-like pleasures; it taught further
the healing power of suffering, and that an instrument of torture is the
symbol of Christianity, I willingly admit that this serious and only
correct view of life had spread in other forms throughout Asia thousands
of years previously, independently of Christianity as it is still; but
this view of life was a new and tremendous revelation to European
humanity. For it is well known that the population of Europe consists of
Asiatic races who, driven out from their own country, wandered away, and
by degrees hit upon Europe: on their long wanderings they lost the
original religion of their homes, and with it the correct view of life;
and this is why they formed in another climate religions for themselves
which were somewhat crude; especially the worship of Odin, the Druidic
and the Greek religions, the metaphysical contents of which were small
and shallow. Meanwhile there developed among the Greeks a quite special,
one might say an instinctive, sense of beauty, possessed by them alone
of all the nations of the earth that have ever existed--a peculiar,
fine, and correct sense of beauty, so that in the mouths of their poets
and in the hands of their artists, their mythology took an exceptionally
beautiful and delightful form. On the other hand, the earnest, true, and
profound import of life was lost to the Greeks and Romans; they lived
like big children until Christianity came and brought them back to the
serious side of life.
_Phil_. And to form an idea of the result we need only compare antiquity
with the Middle Age that followed--that is, the time of Pericles with
the fourteenth century. It is difficult to believe that we have the same
kind of beings before us. There, the finest development of humanity,
excellent constitutional regulations, wise laws, cleverly distributed
offices, rationally ordered freedom, all the arts, as well as poetry and
philosophy, at their best; the creation of works which after thousands
of years have never been equalled and are almost works of a higher order
of beings, whom we can never approach; life embellished by the noblest
fellowship, as is portrayed in the _Banquet_ of Xenophon. And now look
at this side, if you can. Look at the time when the Church had
imprisoned the minds, and violence the bodies of men, whereby knights
and priests could lay the whole weight of life on the common beast of
burden--the third estate. There you have club-law, feudalism, and
fanaticism in close alliance, and in their train shocking uncertainty
and darkness of mind, a corresponding intolerance, discord of faiths,
religious wars, crusades, persecution of heretics and inquisitions; as
the form of fellowship, chivalry, an amalgam of savagery and
foolishness, with its pedantic system of absurd affectations, its
degrading superstitions, and apish veneration for women; the survival of
which is gallantry, deservedly requited by the arrogance of women; it
affords to all Asiatics continual material for laughter, in which the
Greeks would have joined. In the golden Middle Age the matter went as
far as a formal and methodical service of women and enjoined deeds of
heroism, _cours d'amour_, bombastic Troubadour songs and so forth,
although it is to be observed that these last absurdities, which have an
intellectual side, were principally at home in France; while among the
material phlegmatic Germans the knights distinguished themselves more by
drinking and robbing. Drinking and hoarding their castles with plunder
were the occupations of their lives; and certainly there was no want of
stupid love-songs in the courts. What has changed the scene so?
Migration and Christianity.
_Demop_. It is a good thing you reminded me of it. Migration was the
source of the evil, and Christianity the dam on which it broke.
Christianity was the means of controlling and taming those raw, wild
hordes who were washed in by the flood of migration. The savage man must
first of all learn to kneel, to venerate, and to obey; it is only after
that, that he can be civilised. This was done in Ireland by St. Patrick,
in Germany by Winifred the Saxon, who was a genuine Boniface. It was
migration of nations, this last movement of Asiatic races towards
Europe, followed only by their fruitless attempts under Attila, Gengis
Khan, and Timur, and, as a comic after-piece, by the gipsies: it was
migration of nations which swept away the humanity of the ancients.
Christianity was the very principle which worked against this savagery,
just as later, through the whole of the Middle Age, the Church and its
hierarchy were extremely necessary to place a limit to the savagery and
barbarism of those lords of violence, the princes and knights: it was
the ice-breaker of this mighty flood. Still, the general aim of
Christianity is not so much to make this life pleasant as to make us
worthy of a better. It looks beyond this span of time, this fleeting
dream, in order to lead us to eternal salvation. Its tendency is ethical
in the highest sense of the word, a tendency which had hitherto been
unknown in Europe; as I have already pointed out to you by comparing the
morality and religion of the ancients with those of Christianity.
_Phil_. That is right so far as theory is concerned; but look at the
practice. In comparison with the Christian centuries that followed, the
ancient world was undoubtedly less cruel than the Middle Age, with its
deaths by frightful torture, its countless burnings at the stake;
further, the ancients were very patient, thought very highly of justice,
and frequently sacrificed themselves for their country, showed traits of
magnanimity of every kind, and such genuine humanity, that, up to the
present time, an acquaintance with their doings and thoughts is called
the study of Humanity. Religious wars, massacres, crusades,
inquisitions, as well as other persecutions, the extermination of the
original inhabitants of America and the introduction of African slaves
in their place, were the fruits of Christianity, and among the ancients
one cannot find anything analogous to this, anything to counterpoise it;
for the slaves of the ancients, the _familia_, the _vernae_, were a
satisfied race and faithfully devoted to their masters, and as widely
distinct from the miserable negroes of the sugar plantations, which are
a disgrace to humanity, as they were in colour. The censurable
toleration of pederasty, for which one chiefly reproaches the morality
of the ancients, is a trifle compared with the Christian horrors I have
cited, and is not so rare among people of to-day as it appears to be.
Can you then, taking everything into consideration, maintain that
humanity has really become morally better by Christianity?
_Demop_. If the result has not everywhere corresponded with the purity
and accuracy of the doctrine, it may be because this doctrine has been
too noble, too sublime for humanity, and its aim set too high: to be
sure, it was much easier to comply with heathen morality or with the
Mohammedan. It is precisely what is most elevated that is the most open
to abuse and deception--_abusus optimi pessimus_; and therefore those
lofty doctrines have sometimes served as a pretext for the most
disgraceful transactions and veritable crimes. The downfall of the
ancient institutions, as well as of the arts and sciences of the old
world, is, as has been said, to be ascribed to the invasion of foreign
barbarians. Accordingly, it was inevitable that ignorance and savagery
got the upper hand; with the result that violence and fraud usurped
their dominion, and knights and priests became a burden to mankind. This
is partly to be explained by the fact that the new religion taught the
lesson of eternal and not temporal welfare, that simplicity of heart was
preferable to intellectual knowledge, and it was averse to all worldly
pleasures which are served by the arts and sciences. However, in so far
as they could be made serviceable to religion they were promoted, and so
flourished to a certain extent.
_Phil_. In a very narrow sphere. The sciences were suspicious
companions, and as such were placed under restrictions; while fond
ignorance, that element so necessary to the doctrines of faith, was
carefully nourished.
_Demop_. And yet what humanity had hitherto acquired in the shape of
knowledge, and handed down in the works of the ancients, was saved from
ruin by the clergy, especially by those in the monasteries. What would
have happened if Christianity had not come in just before the migration
of nations?
_Phil_. It would really be an extremely useful inquiry if some one, with
the greatest frankness and impartiality, tried to weigh exactly and
accurately the advantages and disadvantages derived from religions. To
do this, it would be necessary to have a much greater amount of
historical and psychological data than either of us has at our command.
Academies might make it a subject for a prize essay.
_Demop_. They will take care not to do that.
_Phil_. I am surprised to hear you say that, for it is a bad look-out
for religion. Besides, there are also academies which make it a secret
condition in submitting their questions that the prize should be given
to the competitor who best understands the art of flattering them. If
we, then, could only get a statistician to tell us how many crimes are
prevented yearly by religious motives, and how many by other motives.
There would be very few of the former. If a man feels himself tempted to
commit a crime, certainly the first thing which presents itself to his
mind is the punishment he must suffer for it, and the probability that
he will be punished; after that comes the second consideration, that his
reputation is at stake. If I am not mistaken, he will reflect by the
hour on these two obstacles before religious considerations ever come
into his mind. If he can get away from these two first safeguards
against crime, I am convinced that religion _alone_ will very rarely
keep him back from it.
_Demop_. I believe, however, that it will do so very often; especially
when its influence works through the medium of custom, and thereby
immediately makes a man shrink from the idea of committing a crime.
Early impressions cling to him. As an illustration of what I mean,
consider how many a man, and especially if he is of noble birth, will
often, in order to fulfil some promise, make great sacrifices, which are
instigated solely by the fact that his father has often impressed it
upon him in childhood that "a man of honour, or a gentleman, or a
cavalier, always keeps his word inviolate."
_Phil_. And that won't work unless there is a certain innate _probitas_.
You must not ascribe to religion what is the result of innate goodness
of character, by which pity for the one who would be affected by the
crime prevents a man from committing it. This is the genuine moral
motive, and as such it is independent of all religions.