"If we live thus tamely,--
To be thus jaded by a piece of scarlet,--
Farewell nobility."
NO ONE will deny that "the pope speaks to many people in many nations;
that he treats with empires and governments," and that "neither from
Canterbury nor from Constantinople such a voice goes forth."
How does the pope speak? What does he say?
He speaks against the liberty of man--against the progress of the human
race. He speaks to calumniate thinkers, and to warn the faithful
against the discoveries of science. He speaks for the destruction of
civilization.
Who listens? Do astronomers, geologists and scientists put the hand to
the ear fearing that an accent may be lost? Does France listen? Does
Italy hear? Is not the church weakest at its centre? Do those who
have raised Italy from the dead, and placed her again among the great
nations, pay attention? Does Great Britain care for this voice--this
moan, this groan--of the Middle Ages? Do the words of Leo XIII. impress
the intelligence of the Great Republic? Can anything be more absurd
than for the vicar of Christ to attack a demonstration of science with a
passage of Scripture, or a quotation from one of the "Fathers"?
Compare the popes with the kings and queens of England. Infinite wisdom
had but little to do with the selection of these monarchs, and yet they
were far better than any equal number of consecutive popes. This is
faint praise, even for kings and queens, but it shows that chance
succeeded in getting better rulers for England than "Infinite Wisdom"
did for the Church of Rome. Compare the popes with the presidents of the
Republic elected by the people. If Adams had murdered Washington, and
Jefferson had imprisoned Adams, and if Madison had cut out Jefferson's
tongue, and Monroe had assassinated Madison, and John Quincy Adams had
poisoned Monroe, and General Jackson had hung Adams and his Cabinet, we
might say that presidents had been as virtuous as popes. But if this
had happened, the verdict of the world would be that the people are not
capable of selecting their presidents.
But this voice from Rome is growing feebler day by day; so feeble that
the Cardinal admits that the vicar of God, and the supernatural church,
"are being tormented by Falck laws, by Mancini laws and by Crispi laws."
In other words, this representative of God, this substitute of Christ,
this church of divine origin, this supernatural institution--pervaded
by the Holy Ghost--are being "tormented" by three politicians. Is it
possible that this patriotic trinity is more powerful than the other?
It is claimed that if the Catholic Church "be only a human system, built
up by the intellect, will and energy of men, the adversaries must prove
it--that the burden is upon them."
As a general thing, institutions are natural. If this church is
supernatural, it is the one exception. The affirmative is with those who
claim that it is of divine origin. So far as we know, all governments
and all creeds are the work of man. No one believes that Rome was a
supernatural production, and yet its beginnings were as small as those
of the Catholic Church. Commencing in weakness, Rome grew, and
fought, and conquered, until it was believed that the sky bent above a
subjugated world. And yet all was natural. For every effect there was an
efficient cause.
The Catholic asserts that all other religions have been produced by
man--that Brahminism and Buddhism, the religion of Isis and Osiris, the
marvelous mythologies of Greece and Rome, were the work of the human
mind. From these religions Catholicism has borrowed. Long before
Catholicism was born, it was believed that women had borne children
whose fathers were gods. The Trinity was promulgated in Egypt centuries
before the birth of Moses. Celibacy was taught by the ancient Nazarenes
and Essenes, by the priests of Egypt and India, by mendicant monks, and
by the piously insane of many countries long before the apostles lived.
The Chinese tell us that "when there were but one man and one woman upon
the earth, the woman refused to sacrifice her virginity even to people
the globe; and the gods, honoring her purity, granted that she should
conceive beneath the gaze of her lover's eyes, and a virgin mother
became the parent of humanity."
The founders of many religions have insisted that it was the duty of man
to renounce the pleasures of sense, and millions before our era took the
vows of chastity, poverty and obedience, and most cheerfully lived upon
the labor of others.
The sacraments of baptism and confirmation are far older than the Church
of Rome. The Eucharist is pagan. Long before popes began to murder each
other, pagans ate cakes--the flesh of Ceres, and drank wine--the blood
of Bacchus. Holy water flowed in the Ganges and Nile, priests interceded
for the people, and anointed the dying.
It will not do to say that every successful religion that has taught
unnatural doctrines, unnatural practices, must of necessity have been
of divine origin. In most religions there has been a strange mingling
of the good and bad, of the merciful and cruel, of the loving and
malicious. Buddhism taught the universal brotherhood of man, insisted on
the development of the mind, and this religion was propagated not by
the sword, but by preaching, by persuasion, and by kindness--yet in
many things it was contrary to the human will, contrary to the human
passions, and contrary to good sense. Buddhism succeeded. Can we, for
this reason, say that it is a supernatural religion? Is the unnatural
the supernatural?
It is insisted that, while other churches have changed, the Catholic
Church alone has remained the same, and that this fact demonstrates its
divine origin.
Has the creed of Buddhism changed in three thousand years? Is
intellectual stagnation a demonstration of divine origin? When anything
refuses to grow, are we certain that the seed was planted by God? If the
Catholic Church is the same to-day that it has been for many centuries,
this proves that there has been no intellectual development. If men do
not differ upon religious subjects, it is because they do not think.
Differentiation is the law of growth, of progress. Every church must
gain or lose: it cannot remain the same; it must decay or grow. The fact
that the Catholic Church has not grown--that it has been petrified from
the first--does not establish divine origin; it simply establishes
the fact that it retards the progress of man. Everything in nature
changes--every atom is in motion--every star moves. Nations,
institutions and individuals have youth, manhood, old age, death. This
is and will be true of the Catholic Church. It was once weak--it grew
stronger--it reached its climax of power--it began to decay--it never
can rise again. It is confronted by the dawn of Science. In the presence
of the nineteenth century it cowers.