SCIENTIFIC BASIS FOR RELIGION.
A philosophical analysis of the human mind, viewed in connection with
the practical history of man from the early morning of his existence,
fully demonstrates it as an important truth, that individual happiness
and the moral welfare of society depend essentially upon the uniform
action and harmonious cooperation of all the mental faculties; and that,
on the other hand, their individually excessive and inharmonious action
constitutes the primary source of nearly all the crime, misery,
and discord of society. And it may be well to note here, as another
important preliminary truth, that the progressive development of the
science of mental philosophy has settled the division of the mental
faculties into the following classification: viz.,
1. The animal, which imparts energy and impulsive strength to the whole
character, mental and physical. 2. The social, which is the source of
family ties and the social and co-operative institutions of society.
3. The moral, which makes us regardful of the happiness and welfare of
other beings than ourselves. 4. The intellectual, which is the great
pilot-chamber or lighthouse of the whole mind; though it is but recently
that discoveries in mental philosophy have fully disclosed this as being
its natural and legitimate office. It has thus demonstrated it to be
the most important department of the mind. Its position in the
cerebrum--occupying, as it does, the superior frontal lobe of the
brain--might, however, have suggested this. Now this is no fanciful
delineation, no mere ideal mapping of the mind, but has been
demonstrated thousands of times, since the discoveries of Gall, to be
the true condition and classified analysis of the mental faculties. The
religious faculties constituting that department of the mind which often
controls our actions anil conduct toward others, and being situated at
the apex of the brain,--the point where the most intensified feelings
and impulses are supposed to concentrate their misdirection or abnormal
exercise, is consequently attended with more direful consequences
to society than that of any other portion of the mind. All history
demonstrates this as a tragical fact; for religion, more especially,
is always born blind. This being a tenable fact, and the religious
faculties being awakened to action at an early period of human
society,--before the intellectual chambers of the mind were lighted
up by the illuminating rays of science, or supplied by a philosophical
education and a thorough and untrammeled study of nature's laws,--their
natural intensity of feeling, thus uncurbed and unenlightened, drove
their honest but dark-minded possessors into the most senseless and
childish superstitions, the most absurd doctrines, the most relentless
intolerance of belief, and the most bloody and murderous persecutions;
thus proving that conscience unenlightened is a very unsafe and a very
dangerous moral and religions guide. The popular Christian proverb, that
"man can not be too religious," comprehends a very fatal error in moral
ethics: for the man who possesses more religion than intellect, or
more devotional piety than intellectual cultivation and philosophical
enlightenment, is sometimes a more dangerous man to society than the
highway robber or the midnight assassin; because, always finding many
accomplices to aid him in his direful deeds of bloody persecutions, and
frequently being able, also, to invoke the strong arm of the law,
his work of defamation and spoliation, if not of open persecution and
bloodshed, is wider spread than that of the burglar or the stealthy
assassin.
A review of history shows us: 1. That, up to the installation of the
era of science, which dates back less than three centuries ago, the
world--that is, the Christian world--was literally a vast prison-house
of chains, and a theater of butchery and blood,--the result of a
practical effort of men, devoutly pious, to "promote the glory of
God," and the establishment of a supposed-to-be-true religion. 2. The
perpetrators of those tragical deeds upon men and women were, many of
them, as religiously honest and conscientious "as ever breathed the
breath of life;" and they verily believed they were doing God service in
thus punishing and exterminating dissenters and heretics. The very fact
that some of these pious persecutors perished themselves at the
fiery stake in the conscientious and unflinching maintenance of their
principles, shouting "Hallelujah" while the burning fagots consumed
their bodies, leaves no possible ground for doubt that a deep religious
conviction had actuated them in the work of persecuting and punishing
the enemies of their religion, and in attempting to convert the world
to its "saving truth" by the sword. Much is said about "conscience," "the
internal monitor," "the still, small voice," &c., as a guide for man's
moral actions; but, if experience and history ever proved or can
prove any thing, they demonstrate most conclusively that conscience
unenlightened by the intellectual department of the mind, or a
conscience grown up amid the weeds of scientific ignorance, is as
dangerous a pilot upon the moral ocean as the helmsman of a ship,
in midnight darkness, surrounded by dangerous shoals and resistless
whirlpools. Conscience without science or philosophy is a lamp without
oil, which consequently, being without light, is more likely to lead
us astray than to guide us to the temple of truth. Science is the
pilot-lamp by which we discern our way on the pilgrim-voyage of life;
while religion is the feeling, the motive-power, which impels us onward.
Hence the latter should at all times be subservient to the former,
and should be checked and restrained from spontaneous development and
exercise until the former is duly installed upon the mental throne as
ruler of the moral empire. It is as dangerous to cultivate and stimulate
the religious feelings, until the fires of science or practical
philosophy have been kindled up in the intellectual chambers to furnish
the light necessary to guide them in their impulsive course, as it would
be to steam up the boilers of a boat when approaching a precipice in
the night, with the pilot asleep upon his hammock, and all the lights
extinguished in his chamber. Neither religion nor conscience possesses
primordially any light of its own. Both are born blind; and all
the light they ever possess is by reflection from the intellectual
light-house. Prolific, indeed, of the proof of this statement, are human
nature, human experience, and universal history. Let the policy, then,
be, in all cases, to cultivate science before religion. The intellectual
mind, we repeat, should be thoroughly cultivated and enlightened before
the religious feelings are called into action.
Query. Reader, what do you now think of Dr. Cheviot's statement, "The
Bible does not contain the _shadow of a shade of error from Genesis to
Revelation._"
CONCLUSION.--SEVERAL IMPORTANT POINTS.
1. As this work was announced several years ago, it seems proper to
explain the causes of the long delay in its publication. Want of health
for completing it, and want of means for publishing it, furnish the true
explanation. But by the practical application of a remedy constituting a
new and extraordinary discovery in the healing art, the author's health
has so far improved as to enable him to resume the work, and re-write
nearly the whole of it in a few weeks time. The work advertised embraced
but forty pages. The present volume comprises nearly eleven times that
number of pages, and includes only two chapters of the original, except
the small portion which has been re-written.
2. While "The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors" was designed
principally to trace the doctrines, traditions, and miraculous events of
the Christian Bible to their primary pagan or Oriental origin, the main
object of "The Bible of Bibles" is to expose their logical absurdity,
and the evils resulting from their propagation and practical
application.
3. The objection is frequently raised in this work against placing the
Bible in the hands of children, and also in possession of the heathen.
This would, of course, keep it out of our common schools; and the author
rejoices in knowing, that, although the Bible was used as a regular
school-book in his youthful days, it has been banished as a text-book
from nearly every schoolroom throughout the country. This denotes
progress.
4. Christian professors regard it as a sufficient refutation of all
the arguments and facts designed to prove and demonstrate the immoral
influence of the Bible upon society, to assert that Christian countries
are superior in morals to those not in possession of their Bible. But
many facts cited in this work tend to prove, that, if the assumption
were correct, it could not with any show of reason or sense be
attributed to the influence of the Bible. It is clearly, if not
self-evidently, impossible that such moral or immoral lessons as are
derived from the history of such characters as the father and founder of
the Jewish nation (Abraham), who is represented as living up to all the
commands, all the statutes, and all the laws of God (see Gen. xxvi. 5),
while practicing the abominable crimes of treachery, deceit, falsehood,
incest or adultery, and polygamy, &c,--I say it is morally impossible
for such examples and such lessons to exert other than a demoralizing
influence upon society; or that of David, pronounced "the man after
God's own heart," while practicing a long catalogue of the most shocking
crimes (see chap. xxx). Such cases blasphemously represent God as
sanctioning the most atrocious crimes and the most revolting deeds,
which is a virtual licence to the whole human race to practice them. If
a book containing such lessons does not exert an immoral influence upon
society, then human language, when employed in writing Bibles, fails to
make its ordinary impression upon the mind. But we will here cite three
cogent and incontrovertible historical facts, which will settle the
matter at once and for ever, by proving the truth of our oft-repeated
proposition, that the Christian Bible, notwithstanding the apparent
improvement in morals of most Christian countries in modern times,
has, on the whole, tended to demoralize every nation where it has
been generally read, believed, and practiced. First, look at the moral
condition of the whole Christian world during the period known as "the
Dark Ages," and you will see the proof in overwhelming torrents. During
that long night of moral darkness and human depravity, which lasted
nearly a thousand years, all Christendom was reeking with moral
corruption, and practicing the most abominable crimes. Lying, deceit,
hypocrisy, moral treason, licentiousness, adultery, fornication,
fighting, and drunkenness were the order of the day among all classes,
including the clergy and the deacons, simply because the light of
science had not reached them, and the Bible was their sole guide
in morals and religion. This state of things continued until the
introduction of Greek literature dispelled the thick clouds of mental
darkness, and arrested the swift tide of moral corruption. Second, the
Greeks without our Bible were both morally and intellectually superior
to any Christian nation. Third, "the Dark Ages" were brought to a close
by the introduction of Greek learning and Greek morals into Christian
nations. This dates their first tendency to rise out of the sloughs of
heathen barbarism, and their first appearance of moral improvement. And
thus the proposition is proved and demonstrated by the facts of history
that the Bible continued to demoralize society till its influence was
arrested by the dawn of moral and physical science. In no nation has
there been any marked improvement in morals with the use of the Bible
alone.
5. It will doubtless be regarded as an extraordinary circumstance that
so many thousand biblical errors as are disclosed in this work should
have passed from age to age unnoticed by the millions of disciples of
the Christian faith, and more especially the startling fact that all the
cardinal doctrines of the Christian religion are founded in error.
But it should be borne in mind that it was regarded and taught as a
religious duty to suppress and conceal all such errors, and absolutely
wicked, sinful, and dangerous to admit the possibility that the Holy
Book can con-tain errors. And this negative policy alone was sufficient
to keep them concealed and out of sight.
6. It is stated in chapter thirty that none of 1st. Old Testament
writers teach the doctrine of immortality or the doctrine of future
rewards and punishments. The proof and a full elucidation of this
subject will be found in "The Biography of Satan."
7. It is stated in chapter fifty-five that all human language is more
or less ambiguous and uncertain, and in chapter fifty-two that skillful
linguists of this age can construct language whose meaning can not be
misunderstood; and hence God should have been able to do so when the
Bible was written. The first statement refers to language as ordinarily
used when the Bible was written, and especially the imperfect Hebrew of
the Bible. The last statement implies that with the modern improvements
language can be so employed as to leave no doubt of its meaning in any
case. Both statements, then, are correct.
8: The author, in abridging citations from history and the Bible, has
in some cases deviated from custom in using quotation-marks. This is
especially true of chapter twenty-two (on Bible contradictions).
9. It is believed that no errors of any importance can be found in this
work, unless some mistakes have been committed in making scriptural
references.
10. Each reader of this work is desired to examine carefully and
critically the author's exposition of "The Twelve Cardinal Doctrines of
the Christian Faith," and report to him his views of that exposition.
Those twelve leading doctrines are embraced in the twelve chapters
commencing at chapter 33 (on revelation) and ending at chapter 44 (on a
personal God).