* See Appendix R.
"And the value of Islam, the youngest of the great religions, is that
we are able to see how its first simple form became overlaid with legend
and foolish superstition, and thus learn how, in like manner, myth and
fable have grown around more ancient religions [and around our own].
"For example; although Mohammed came into the world like other children,
wonderful things are said to have taken place at his birth.
"He never claimed to be a perfect man; he did not pretend to foretell
events or to work miracles.
"In spite of all this, his followers said of him, while he was yet
living, that he worked wonders, and they believed the golden vision,
hinted at in Koran, to have been a real event, although Mohammed said
over and over again that it was but a dream.
"This religion is the guide in life and the support in death of _one
hundred and fifty millions of our fellow creatures_; like Christianity,
it has its missionaries scattered over the globe, and offers itself as a
faith needed by all men.
"The success of Islam was great. Not one hundred years after the death
of the prophet, it had converted half the then known world, and its
green flag waved from China to Spain. Christianity gave way before it,
and has never regained some of the ground then lost, while at this day
we see Islam making marked progress in Africa and elsewhere. Travelers
tell us that the gain is great when a tribe casts away its idols and
embraces Islam. Filth and drunkenness flee away, and the state of the
people is bettered in a high degree."
"Muslims have not treated Christ as we have treated Mohammed, for the
devout among them never utter his name without adding the touching
words, 'on whom be peace.'"
"Mohammed counseled men to live a good life, and to strive after the
mercy of God by fasting, charity, and prayer, which he called 'the key
of paradise.'"
"He abolished the frightful practice of killing female children, and
made the family tie more respected."
He said: "_A man's true wealth hereafter is the good he has done in this
world to his fellow-men_. When he dies, people will ask, What property
has he left behind him? But the angels will ask, What good deeds has he
sent before him?" [Which is a doctrine wholesome and just, so for as it
applies to this world, and inculcates the right sort of morals.]
"Mohammed commanded his followers to make no image of any living thing,
to show mercy to the weak and orphaned, and kindness to brutes; to
abstain from gambling, and the use of strong drink.
"The great truth which he strove to make real to them was that God is
one, that, as the Koran says, 'they surely are infidels who say that God
is the third of three, for there is no God but one God.'"
He was the great original Unitarian.
"I should add that the wars of Islam did not leave waste and ruin in
their path, but that the Arabs, when they came to Europe, alone held
aloft the light of learning, and in the once famous schools of Spain,
taught 'philosophy, medicine, astronomy, and the golden art of song.'"
We cannot speak so well of the "holy wars" of Christianity.
In speaking of the men who wrote our Bible, Clodd says: "Nor is it easy
to find in what they have said truths which, in one form or another,
have not been stated by the writers of some of the sacred books into
which we have dipped."
I have quoted more fully than had been my intention simply to show the
egotistic ignorance of the Christian's claim to possess a religion or a
Bible which differs, in any material regard, from several others which
are older, and to indicate that moral ideas, precepts, and practices
are the property of no special people, but are the inevitable result
of continued life itself, and the evolution of civilizations however
different in outward form and expression. They are the necessary results
of human companionship and necessities, and not the fruits of any
religion or the "revelation" from on high to any people. As William
Kingdon Clifford, F. R. S., in his work on the "Scientific Basis of
Morals," very justly says:
"There is more than one moral sense, and what I feel to be right another
man may feel to be wrong.
"In just the same way our question about the best conscience will
resolve itself into a question about the purpose or function of the
conscience--why we have got it, and what it is good for.
"Now to my mind the simplest and clearest and most profound philosophy
that was ever written upon this subject is to be found in the 2d and 3d
chapters of Mr. Darwin's 'Descent of Man.' In these chapters it appears
that just as most physical characteristics of organisms have been
evolved and preserved because they were useful to the individual in the
struggle for existence against other individuals and other species, so
this particular feeling has been evolved and preserved because it is
useful to the tribe or community in the struggle for existence against
other tribes, and against the environment as a whole. The function of
conscience is the preservation of the tribe as a tribe. And we shall
rightly train our consciences if we learn to approve these actions which
tend to the advantage of the community.
"The virtue of purity, for example, attains in this way a fairly exact
definition: purity in a man is that course of conduct which makes him
to be a good husband and father, in a woman that which makes her to be a
good wife and mother, or which helps other people so to prepare and
keep themselves. It is easy to see how many false ideas and pernicious
precepts are swept away by even so simple a definition as that."
In urging the necessity of a more substantial basis of morals than one
built upon a theory of arbitrary dictation, he says: "The worship of a
deity who is represented as unfair or unfriendly to any portion of
the community is a wrong thing, however great may be the threats and
promises by which it is commended. And still worse, the reference of
right and wrong to his arbitrary will as a standard, the diversion of
the allegiance of the moral sense from the community to him, is the
most insidious and fatal of social diseases.... If I let myself believe
anything on insufficient evidence, there may be no great harm done by
the mere belief; it may be true after all, or I may never have occasion
to exhibit it in outward acts. _But I cannot help doing this great wrong
toward Man, that I make myself credulous_. The danger to society is not
merely that it should believe wrong things, though that is great enough;
but that it should become credulous, and lose the habit of testing
things and inquiring into them; for then it must sink back into
savagery.
"The harm which is done by credulity in a man is not confined to the
fostering of a credulous character in others, and consequent support
of false beliefs. Habitual want of care about what I believe leads to
habitual want of care in others about the truth of what is told to me.
Men speak the truth to one another when each reveres the truth in his
own mind and in the other's mind; but how shall my friend revere the
truth in my mind when I myself am careless about it, when I believe
things because I want to believe them, and because they are comforting
and pleasant? Will he not learn to cry, 'Peace,' to me, when there is no
peace? By such a course I shall surround myself with a thick atmosphere
of falsehood and fraud, and in that I must live. It may matter little
to me, in my cloud-castle of sweet illusions and darling lies; but it
matters much to Man that I have made my neighbors ready to deceive. The
credulous man is father to the liar....
"We all suffer severely enough from the maintenance and support of false
beliefs and the fatally wrong actions which they lead to; and the
evil born when one such belief is entertained is great and wide. But
a greater and wider evil arises when the _credulous character_ is
maintained and supported, when a habit of believing for unworthy reasons
is fostered and made permanent....
"The fact that believers have found joy and peace in believing gives
us the right to say that the doctrine is a comfortable doctrine, and
pleasant to the soul; but it does not give us the right to say that it
is true....
"And the question which our conscience is always asking about that which
we are tempted to believe is not, 'Is it comfortable and pleasant?' but,
'Is it true?'"
The sooner moral actions and the necessity of clean, helpful, and
charitable living are put upon a basis more solid and permanent than
theology the better will it be for civilization; and if this chapter
shall, by its light style, attract the attention of those who are too
busy, or are disinclined for any reason whatsoever, to collect from
more profound works the facts here given, I shall be satisfied with the
result, because I shall have done something toward the triumph of fact
over fiction.
We cannot repeat too often nor emphasize too strongly this one simple
fact, that we need all our energy and time to make _this_ world fit
to live in; to make _homes_ where mothers are happy and children are
glad--homes where fathers hasten when their work is done, and are
welcomed with a shout of joy.
The toilers who wend up the hillside,
The toilers below in the mill
Alike are the victims of priestcraft,
They "do but the _Master's_ will."
The _Master's_ will! ah the cunning,
The bitterly cruel device,
To wring from the lowly and burdened
Submission at any price!
Submission to tyrants in Russia--
Submission to tyrants in Rome;
The throne and the altar have ever
Combined to despoil the home,
But the home is the heaven to live for,
And Love is the God sublime
Who paints in tints of glory,
Upon the wings of Time
This legend, grand and simple,
And true as eternal Right--
"No Justice e'er came from Jury,
Whose verdict was based on might!"
As high above earth as is heaven;
As high as the stars above
The Church, the chapel, the altar;
Is the home whose God is Love.
*****