ARROWS OF FREETHOUGHT. 

By G. W. Foote

Editor of "The Freethinker. "

LONDON:

H. A. KEMP, 28 STONECUTTER STREET, FARRINGDON STREET, E. C. 

1882. 

CONTENTS:

 PREFACE RELIGION AND PROGRESS. A DEFENCE OF THOMAS PAINE. THE GOSPEL OF FREETHOUGHT. FREETHOUGHT IN CURRENT LITERATURE. DEAN STANLEY'S LATEST. GOD AND THE QUEEN. CARDINAL NEWMAN ON INFIDELITY. SUNDAY TYRANNY. WHO ARE THE BLASPHEMERS? THE BIRTH OF CHRIST. THE REIGN OF CHRIST. THE PRIMATE ON MODERN INFIDELITY. BAITING A BISHOP. PROFESSOR FLINT ON ATHEISM. A HIDDEN GOD. GENERAL JOSHUA. GOING TO HELL. CHRISTMAS EVE IN HEAVEN. PROFESSOR BLACKIE ON ATHEISM. SALVATIONISM. A PIOUS SHOWMAN. 

PREFACE

I republish in this little volume a few of my numerous articlesthat have appeared in the _Secularist_, the _Liberal_, the _NationalReformer_, and the _Freethinker_, during the last five or six years. I have included nothing (I hope) of merely ephemeral interest. Everyarticle in this collection was at least written carefully, and with aneye to more than the exigencies of the moment. In disentombing themfrom the cemeteries of periodical literature, where so many of theircompanions lie buried, I trust I have not allowed parental love tooutrun discretion. 

I have not thought it necessary to indicate, in each case, the journalin which the reprinted articles were first published. 

Should anyone object to the freedom of my style, or the asperity ofmy criticism, I would ask him to remember that Christianity stillpersecutes to the full extent of its power, and that a Creed whichanswers argument with prosecution cannot expect tender treatment inreturn; and I would also ask him, in the words of Ruskin, "to considerhow much less harm is done in the world by ungraceful boldness than byuntimely fear. "

London, November 15th, 1882. 

RELIGION AND PROGRESS. 

 (November, 1882. )

The Archbishop of York is peculiarly qualified to speak on religionand progress. His form of thanksgiving to the God of Battles for our"victory" in Egypt marks him as a man of extraordinary intellect andcharacter, such as common people may admire without hoping to emulate;while his position, in Archbishop Tait's necessitated absence from thescene, makes him the active head of the English Church. Let us listen tothe great man. 

Archbishop Thomson recently addressed "a working-men's meeting" in theDrill Hall, Sheffield. It was densely crowded by six or seven thousandpeople, and this fact was cited by the Archbishop as a proof that theworking classes of England have not yet lost interest in the Christianfaith. But we should very much like to know how it was ascertainedthat all, or even the major portion, of the vast audience wereworking-men. It is easy enough to give any meeting a name. We often hearof a Conservative Working-men's banquet, with tickets at something likea guinea each, a duke at the top of the table and a row' of lordsdown each side. And our experience leads us to believe that nearly allreligious meetings of "working-men" are attended chiefly by the lowermiddle classes who go regularly to church or chapel every Sunday oftheir lives. 

Even, however, if the whole six or seven thousand were working-men, thefact would prove little; for Sheffield contains a population of threehundred thousand, and it was not difficult for the clergy who throngedthe platform to get up a big "ticket" meeting, at which a popularArchbishop was the principal speaker, and the eloquence was all to behad for nothing. 

The Archbishop's lecture, or sermon, or whatever it was, containednothing new, nor was any old idea presented in a new light. It wassimply a summary of the vulgar declamations against the "carnal mind"with which we are all so familiar. Progress, said his Grace, was of twokinds, intellectual and moral. Of the former sort we had plenty, butof the latter not so much. He repudiated the notion that moral progresswould naturally keep pace with intellectual progress, and he denied thatrighteousness could ever prevail without "some sanction from above. "This was the sum and substance of his discourse, and we have nodoubt that our readers have heard the same thing, in various forms oflanguage, some hundreds of times. 

Like the rest of his tribe, Archbishop Thomson went abroad for all hisfrightful warnings, and especially to France. He severely condemned theFrench "pride in progress, " which led to the Revolution. His Grace hascertainly a most original conception of history. Ordinary historianstell us that the Revolution was caused by hunger, bad government, andthe rigidity of old institutions that could not accommodate themselvesto new ideas. But whatever were the causes, look at the results. Comparethe state of France before the Revolution with its condition now. Thedespotic monarchy is gone; the luxurious and privileged aristocracy hasdisappeared; and the incredibly wealthy and tyrannous Church is reducedto humbleness and poverty. But the starving masses have become the mostprosperous on the face of the earth; the ignorant multitudes are welleducated; the platform and the press are free; a career is open to everycitizen; science, art, and literature have made immense strides; andalthough Paris, like every great capital, may still, as Mr. Arnold says, lack morality, there is no such flagrant vileness within her walls asthe corruptions of the _ancien régime_; no such impudent affronting ofthe decencies of life as made the _parc aux cerfs_ for ever infamous, and his Christian Majesty, Louis the Fifteenth, a worthy compeer ofTiberius; no such shameless wickedness as made the orgies of the Duke ofOrleans and the Abbé Dubois match the worst saturnalia of Nero. 

His Grace felt obliged to advert also to the Paris Commune, about whichhis information seems to be equal to his knowledge of the Revolution. Hehas the ignorance or audacity to declare that the Commune "destroyed acity and ravaged the land;" when, as a matter of fact, the struggle wasabsolutely confined to Paris, and the few buildings injured were inthe line of fire. This worthy prelate thinks destruction of buildingsa crime on the part of Communalists, but a virtue on the part of aChristian power; and while denouncing the partial wreck of Paris, heblesses the wholesale ruin of Alexandria. 

His Grace ventures also to call the leading men of the Commune "drunkendissolute villains. " The beaten party is always wicked, and perhapsDr. Thomson will remember that Jesus Christ himself was accused ofconsorting with publicans and sinners. Drunken dissolute villains donot risk their lives for an idea. The men of the Commune may have beenmistaken, but their motives were lofty; and Millière, falling dead onthe Church steps before the Versailles bullets, with the cry of _Vivel'Humanité_ on his lips, was as noble a hero as any crucified Galileanwho questioned why his God had forsaken him. 

That intellectual and moral progress naturally go together, theArchbishop calls "an absurd and insane doctrine, " and he couples withthese epithets the honored names of Buckle and Spencer. Now it willbe well to have a clear understanding on this point. Are intellectualcauses dominant or subordinate? Even so intensely religious a man asLamennais unhesitatingly answers that they are dominant. He affirms, inhis _Du Passé et de l'Avenir du, Peuple_, that "intellectual developmenthas produced all other developments, " and he adds:--

"It is represented that evil, as it appears in history, springs entirelyfrom the passions. This is quite false. The passions disturb theexisting order, whatever it may be, but they do not constitute it. Theyhave not that power. It is the necessary result of the received ideasand beliefs. Thus the passions show themselves the same in all epochs, and yet, in different epochs, the established order changes, andsometimes fundamentally. "

The truth is that the great moral conceptions are securely established, and the only possible improvement in them must come from the increasedfineness and subtlety of our mental powers. 

Civilisation and progress are, according to Archbishop Thomson, nothingbut "cobwebs and terms. " He besought the working men of Sheffield not togo for information to a big book written in some garret in London. His Grace, who lives in a palace at other people's expense, has a verynatural dislike of any man of genius who may live in a garret at hisown. What has the place in which a book is written to do with its value?"Don Quixote" and the "Pilgrim's Progress" were written in gaol; and forall Archbishop Thomson knows to the contrary every gospel and epistle ofthe New Testament may have been written in an attic or a cellar. 

The Archbishop seems to hate the very idea of Progress. What has itdone, he asks, to abolish drunkenness and gambling? To which we replyby asking what Christianity has done. Those vices are unmistakably here, and on the face of it any objection they may furnish against Progressmust equally apply to Christianity. Nay more; for Christianity has hadan unlimited opportunity to reform the world, while Progress has beenhindered at every turn by the insolent usurpation of its rival. 

Dr. Thomson admits that he cannot find a text in the Bible againstgambling, and assuredly he cannot find one in favor of teetotalism. Onthe contrary he will find plenty of texts which recommend the "wine thatcheereth the heart of God and man;" and he knows that his master, JesusChrist, once played the part of an amateur publican at a marriage feast, and turned a large quantity of water into wine in order to keep thespree going when it had once begun. 

We repeat that all the Archbishop's objections to Progress, based on themoral defects of men, apply with tenfold force against Religion, whichhas practically had the whole field to itself. And we assert that he isgrievously mistaken if he imagines that supernatural beliefs can ennobleknaves or give wisdom to fools. When he talks about "Christ's blood shedto purchase our souls, " and specifies the first message of his creedas "Come and be forgiven, " he is appealing to our basest motives, andturning the temple into a huckster's shop. Let him and all his tribelisten to these words of Ruskin's:--

"Your honesty is _not_ to be based either on religion or policy. Bothyour religion and policy must be based on _it_. Your honesty must bebased, as the sun is, in vacant heaven; poised, as the lights in thefirmament, which have rule over the day and over the night If you askwhy you are to be honest--you are, in the question itself, dishonored'Because you are a man, ' is the only answer; and therefore I said ina former letter that to make your children _capable of honesty_ isthe beginning of education. Make them men first and religious menafterwards, and all will be sound; but a knave's religion is always therottenest thing about him. --_Time and Tide_, p. 37. "

These are the words of a real spiritual teacher. Archbishop Thomson willnever get within a million miles of their meaning; nor will anybodybe deceived, by the unctuous "Oh that" with which he concludes hisdiscourse, like a mental rolling of the whites of his eyes. 

As we approach the end of his address, we begin to understand hisGrace's hatred of Progress. He complains that "intellectual progressnever makes a man conceive eternal hopes, never makes a man conceivethat he has an eternal friend in heaven, even the Son of God. " Quitetrue. Intellectual progress tends to bound our desires within the scopeof their realisation, and to dissipate the fictions of theology. It istherefore inimical to all professional soul-savers, who chatter aboutanother world with no understanding of this; and especially to thelofty teachers of religion who luxuriate in palaces, and fling jibes andsneers at the toiling soldiers of progress who face hunger, thirst anddeath. These rich disciples of the poor Nazarene are horrified whenthe scorn is retorted on them and their creed; and Archbishop Thomsonexpresses his "disgust" at our ridiculing his Bible and endeavoring tobring his "convictions" into "contempt. " It is, he says, "an offenceagainst the first principles of mutual sympathy and consideration. " Yetthis angry complainant describes other people's convictions as "absurdand insane. " All the sympathy and consideration is to be on one side!The less said about either the better. There can be no treaty or trucein a war of principles, and the soldiers of Progress will neither takequarter nor give it. Christianity must defend itself. It may try to killus with the poisoned arrows of persecution; but what defence can itmake against the rifleshot of common-sense, or how stand against theshattering artillery of science? Every such battle is decided in itscommencement, for every religion begins to succumb the very moment it isattacked. 

A DEFENCE OF THOMAS PAINE. 

 (February, 1879. )

Fling mud enough and some of it will stick. This noble maxim has beenthe favorite of traducers in all ages and climes. They know that theobject of their malignity cannot always be on the alert to cleansehimself from the filth they fling, especially if cast behind hisback; they know that lies, and especially slanderous lies, are hard toovertake, and when caught harder to strangle; and therefore they feelconfident as to the ultimate fate of their victim if they can onlypersevere long enough in their vile policy of defamation. For humannature being more prone to believe evil than good of others, itgenerally happens that the original traducers are at length joined by ahost of kindred spirits almost as eager and venomous as themselves, "thelong-neck'd geese of the world, who are ever hissing dispraise becausetheir natures are little;" while a multitude of others, not somuch malignant as foolish and given to scandal, lend their cowardlyassistance, and help to vilify characters far beyond the reach of theiremulation. And should such characters be those of men who championunpopular causes, there is no lie too black for belief concerning them, no accusation of secret theft or hateful meanness or loathsome lust, that will not readily gain credence. Mr. Tennyson speaks of--

 That fierce light which beats upon a throne, And blackens every blot

but what is that to the far fiercer and keener light which beats uponthe lives of the great heroes of progress? With all due deference tothe Poet Laureate, we conceive that kings and their kind have usuallyextended to them a charity which covers a multitude of their sins. Thelate king of Italy, for instance, was said to have had "the language ofa guardroom, the manners of a trooper, and the morals of a he-goat, " yetat his death how tenderly his faults were dealt with by the loyal press, and how strongly were all his merits brought into relief. Our own royalSardanapalus, George the Fourth, although Leigh Hunt had the courageto describe him aright and went to the gaol for so doing, was styled bySociety "the first gentleman in Europe. " Yet Mazzini, Vittor Emmanuel'sgreat contemporary, whose aims were high and noble as his life was pure, got little else than abuse from this same loyal press; and the Societywhich adored George the Fourth charged Shelley himself with unspeakablevices equalled only by the native turpitude of his soul. 

Perhaps no man has suffered more from calumny than Thomas Paine. Duringhis lifetime, indeed, his traducers scarcely ever dared to vent theirmalice in public, doubtless through fear of receiving a castigationfrom his vigorous and trenchant pen. But after his death they riotedin safety, and gave free play to the ingenuity of their malevolence. Gradually their libels became current; thousands of people who knewalmost nothing of his life and less of his writings were persuaded thatThomas Paine, "the Infidel, " was a monster of iniquity, in comparisonwith whom Judas appeared a saint, and the Devil himself nearly white;and this estimate finally became a tradition, which the editors ofillustrated religious papers and the writers of fraudulent "Death-BedScenes" did their best to perpetuate. In such hands the labor ofposthumous vilification might have remained without greatly troublingthose who feel an interest in Thomas Paine's honor through gratitudefor his work. The lowest scavengers of literature, who purvey religiousoffal to the dregs of orthodoxy, were better employed thus than in areverse way, since their praise is so very much more dishonorable andappalling than their blame. But when other literary workmen of loftierrepute descend to the level of these, and help them in their villainoustask, it becomes advisable that some one who honors the memory of theman thus aspersed should interpose, and attempt that vindication whichhe can no longer make for himself. 

In reviewing Mr. Edward Smith's "Life of Cobbett, " our principalliterary paper, the Athenæum, in its number for January 11th, went outof its way to defame Paine's character. This is what it said:--

"A more despicable man than Tom Paine cannot easily be found among theready writers of the eighteenth century. He sold himself to the highestbidder, and he could be bought at a very low price. He wrote well;sometimes he wrote as pointedly as Junius or Cobbett. Neither excelledhim in coining telling and mischievous phrases; neither surpassed him inpopularity-hunting. He had the art, which was almost equal to genius, ofgiving happy titles to his productions. When he denounced the BritishGovernment in the name of 'Common Sense' he found willing readers in therebellious American colonists, and a rich reward from their gratefulrepresentatives. When he wrote on behalf of the 'Rights of Man, ' and infurtherance of the 'Age of Reason, ' he convinced thousands by histitle-pages who were incapable of perceiving the inconclusiveness of hisarguments. His speculations have long since gone the way of all shams;and his charlatanism as a writer was not redeemed by his character as aman. Nothing could be worse than his private life; he was addicted tothe most degrading of vices. He was no hypocrite, however, and he cannotbe charged with showing that regard for appearances which constitutesthe homage paid by vice to virtue. Such a man was well qualified forearning notoriety by insulting Washington. Only a thorough-paced rascalcould have had the assurance to charge Washington with beingunprincipled and unpatriotic. Certainly Mr. Smith has either much tolearn, or else he has forgotten much, otherwise he could not venture tosuggest the erection of a monument 'recording the wisdom and politicalvirtues of Thomas Paine. '"

Now we have in this tirade all the old charges, with a new one whichthe critic has either furnished himself or derived from an obscuresource--namely, that Paine "sold himself to the highest bidder. " Let usexamine the last charge first. The critic curiously contradicts himself. Paine, he admits, could "sometimes write as pointedly as Junius orCobbett, " whose works sold enormously, and he had the art of devisinghappy titles for his productions; yet, although he sold himself to thehighest bidder, he could be bought at a very low price! The fact is, Paine was never bought at all. His was not a hireling pen. Whatever hewrote he put his name to, and he never parted with the copyright of anyof his works, lest the Government or some friend of despotism shouldprocure their suppression. He also published his writings at aridiculously low price, so low indeed that he lost by them instead ofgaining. Of his "Common Sense, " that fine pamphlet which stirred theAmerican colonists to battle against their oppressors, not less than ahundred thousand copies were sold; yet he found himself finally indebtedto his printer £29 12s. 1d. Fifteen years later the English Governmenttried through the publisher to get the copyright of the "Rights of Man;"but though a large sum was offered, Paine refused on principle to let itpass out of his own hands. The first part of this work was publishedat a price which precluded any chance of profit; the publication ofthe second part caused him to be tried and condemned for treason, thepenalty of the law being escaped only by flight. All publication of hisworks, whether political or religious, was afterwards illegal. Thousandsof copies were circulated surreptitiously, or openly by men like RichardCarlile, who spent nine years in prison for his sale of prohibitedbooks. But clearly Paine could derive no profit from this traffic inhis works, for he never set foot in England again. Thomas Paine wrotein order to spread his political and religious views, and for no otherpurpose. He was not a professional author, nor a professional critic, and never needed payment for his literary work. And assuredly he gotnone. Let the _Athenæum_ critic inform the world to whom Paine soldhimself, or who ever paid him a penny for his writings. Until he does sowe shall believe that the author of "Common Sense, " the "Rights of Man, "and the "Age of Reason, " was honest in saying: "In a great affair, wherethe good of mankind is at stake, I love to work for nothing; and sofully am I under the influence of this principle, that I should losethe spirit, the pride, and the pleasure of it, were I conscious that Ilooked for reward. "

Popularity-hunting, to use the critic's graceless phrase, was Paine'snext fault; but as, according to the same authority, he was guilty inthis respect only in the same sense as Junius was, the burden of hisiniquity cannot be very great. 

Addiction to the most degrading of vices, is a charge difficult toconfute until we know specifically what vice is meant. Paine has beenaccused of drunkenness; but by whom? Not by his intimate acquaintances, who would have detected his guilt, but by his enemies who were never inhis society, and therefore could know nothing of his habits. Cheetham, who first disseminated this accusation, was a notorious libeller, andwas more than once compelled to make a public apology for his lies;but he was a shameless creature, and actually in his "Life" of Paineresuscitated and amplified falsehoods for which he had tendered abjectapologies while his victim was alive. Even, however, if Paine hadyielded to the seductions of strong drink, he should be judged by thecustom of his own age, and not that of ours. 

Mr. Leslie Stephen does not rail against Boswell for his drinkingpowers; Burns is not outlawed for his devotion to John Barlycorn; Byronand Sheridan are not beyond pardon because they often went drunk to bed;and some of the greatest statesmen of last century and this, includingPitt and Fox, are not considered the basest of men because theyexercised that right which Major O'Gorman claims for all Irishmen--"todrink as much as they can carry. " But no such plea is necessary, forPaine was not addicted to drink, but remarkably abstemious. Mr. Fellows, with whom he lived for more than six months, said that he never saw himthe worse for drink. Dr. Manley said, "while I attended him he never wasinebriated. " Colonel Burr said, "he was decidedly temperate. " And evenMr. Jarvis, whom Cheetham cited as his authority for charging Paine withdrunkenness, authorised Mr. Vale, of New York, editor of the _Beacon_, to say that _Cheetham lied_. Amongst the public men who knew Painepersonally were Burke, Home Tooke, Priestley, Lord Edward Fitzgerald, Dr. Moore, Jefferson, Washington, Volney and Condorcet: but none ofthese ever hinted at his love of drink. The charge of drunkeness is aposthumous libel, circulated by a man who had publicly quarrelled withPaine, who had been obliged to apologise for former aspersions, and whoafter Paine's death was prosecuted and _condemned_ for libelling a ladywhom he had accused of undue familiarity with the principal object ofhis malice. 

Finding the charge of drunkenness unequivocally rebutted, Paine'straducers advance that of licentiousness. But this is equallyunsuccessful. The authority relied on is still Cheetham, who in turnborrowed from a no less disreputable source. A man named Carver hadquarrelled with Paine over money matters; in fact, he had been obligedwith a loan which he forgot to pay, and like all base natures he showedhis gratitude to his benefactor, when no more favors could be expected, by hating and maligning him. A scurrilous letter written by this fellowfell into the hands of Cheetham, who elaborated it in his "Life. " Itbroadly hinted that Madame Bonneville, the by no means youthful wife ofa Paris bookseller who had sheltered Paine when he was threatened withdanger in that city, was his paramour; for no other reason than thathe had in turn sheltered her when she repaired with her children toAmerica, after her home had been broken up by Buonaparte's persecutionof her husband. This lady prosecuted Cheetham for libel, and a jury ofAmerican citizens gave her a verdict and damages. 

Here the matter might rest, but we are inclined to urge anotherconsideration. No one of his many enemies ever accused Paine oflicentiousness in his virile manhood; and can we believe that he begana career of licentiousness in his old age, when, besides the infirmitiesnatural to his time of life, he suffered dreadful tortures from aninternal abscess brought on by his confinement in the reeking dungeons ofthe Luxembourg, which made life a terror and death a boon? Only lunaticsor worse would credit such a preposterous story. 

The _Athenoum_ critic alleges that Paine insulted Washington, and wastherefore a "thorough-paced rascal. " But he did nothing of the kind. Hevery properly remonstrated with Washington for coolly allowing him torot in a French dungeon for no crime except that he was a foreigner, when a word from the President of the United States, of which he wasa citizen, would have effected his release. Washington was aware ofPaine's miserable plight, yet he forgot the obligations of friendship;and notwithstanding frequent letters from Munro, the American ambassadorat Paris, he supinely suffered the man he had once delighted to honor tolanguish in wretchedness, filth, and disease. George Washington did muchfor American Independence, but Thomas Paine did perhaps more, for hiswritings animated the oppressed Colonists with an enthusiasm for libertywithout which the respectable generalship of Washington might havebeen exerted in vain. The first President of the United States was, asCarlyle grimly says, "no immeasurable man, " and we conceive that Painehad earned the right to criticise even him and his policy. 

Every person is of course free to hold what opinion he pleases ofPaine's writings. The _Athenoum_ critic thinks they have "gone the wayof all shams. " He is wrong in fact, for they circulate very extensivelystill. And he may also be wrong in his literary judgment. WilliamHazlitt, whose opinion on any subject connected with literature is atleast as valuable as an _Athenoum_ critic's, ranked Paine very high asa political writer, and affirmed of his "Rights of Man" that it was "apowerful and explicit reply to Burke. " But Hazlitt had read Paine, whichwe suspect many glib critics of to-day have not; for we well rememberhow puzzled some of them were to explain whence Shelley took the motto"We pity the Plumage, but Forget the Dying Bird" prefixed to his Addressto the People on the death of the Princess Charlotte. It was taken, asthey should have known, from one of the finest passages of the "Rightsof Man. " Critics, it is well known, sometimes write as Artemus Wardproposed to lecture on science, "with an imagination untrammeled by theleast knowledge of the subject. "

Let us close this vindication of Paine by citing the estimate of himformed by Walt Whitman, an authority not to be sneered at now evenby _Athenoum_ critics. In 1877 the Liberal League of Philadelphiacelebrated the 140th birthday of Thomas Paine, and a large audience wasgathered by the announcement that Whitman would speak. The greatpoet, according to the _Index_ report, after telling how he had becomeintimate with some of Paine's friends thirty-five years before, went onto say:--

"I dare not say how much of what our Union is owning and enjoyingto-day, its independence, its ardent belief in, and substantial practiceof, Radical human rights, and the severance of its Government from allecclesiastical and superstitious dominion--I dare not say how much ofall this is owing to Thomas Paine; but I am inclined to think a goodportion of it decidedly is. Of the foul and foolish fictions yet toldabout the circumstances of his decease, the absolute fact is that, ashe lived a good life after its kind, he died calmly, philosophically, asbecame him. He served the embryo Union with the most precious service, a service that every man, woman, and child in the thirty-eight Statesis to some extent receiving the benefit of to-day, and I for one herecheerfully and reverently throw one pebble on the cairn of his memory. "

We are content to let the reader decide between Whitman and the_Athenoum_ critic in their respective estimates of him who wrote, and aswe think acted up to it--"All the world is my country, and to do good myreligion. "

THE GOSPEL OF FREETHOUGHT. 

 (August, 1882. )

Christians are perpetually crying that we destroy and never build up. Nothing could be more false, for all negation has a positive side, andwe cannot deny error without affirming truth. But even if it were true, it would not lessen the value of our work. You must clear the groundbefore you can build, and plough before you sow. Splendor gives nostrength to an edifice whose foundations are treacherous, nor can aharvest be reaped from fields unprepared for the seed. 

Freethought is, in this respect, like a skilful physician, whosefunction it is to expel disease and leave the patient sound and well. Nosick man claims that the doctor shall supply him with something in placeof his malady. It is enough that the enemy of his health is driven out. He is then in a position to act for himself. He has legs to walk with, abrain to devise, and hands to execute his will. What more does he need?What more can he ask without declaring himself a weakling or a fool? Soit is with superstition, the deadliest disease of the mind. Free-thoughtcasts it out, with its blindness and its terrors, and leaves the mindclear and free. All nature is then before us to study and enjoy. Truth shines on us with celestial light, Goodness smiles on our bestendeavors, and Beauty thrills our senses and kindles our imaginationwith the subtle magic of her charms. 

What a boon it is to think freely, to let the intellect dart out inquest of truth at every point of the compass, to feel the delight ofthe chase and the gladness of capture! What a noble privilege to pourtreasures of knowledge into the crucible of the brain, and separate goldfrom the dross!

The Freethinker takes nothing on trust, if he can help it; he dissects, analyses, and proves everything. Does this make him a barren sceptic?Not so. What he discards he knows to be worthless, and he also knowsthe value of what he prizes. If one sweet vision turns out a mirage, howdoes it lessen our enjoyment at the true oasis, or shake our certitudeof water and shade under the palm trees by the well?

The masses of men do not think freely. They scarcely think at all out oftheir round of business. They are trained not to think. From the cradleto the grave orthodoxy has them in its clutches. Their religion issettled by priests, and their political and social institutions bycustom. They look askance at the man who dares to question what isestablished; not reflecting that all orthodoxies were once heterodox, that without innovation there could never have been any progress, andthat if inquisitive fellows had not gone prying about in forbiddenquarters ages ago, the world would still be peopled by savages dressedin nakedness, war-paint, and feathers. The mental stultification whichbegins in youth reaches ossification as men grow older. Lack of thoughtends in incapacity to think. 

Real Freethought is impossible without education. The mind cannotoperate without means or construct without materials. Theology opposeseducation: Freethought supports it. The poor as well as the rich shouldshare in its blessings. Education is a social capital which should besupplied to all. It enriches and expands. It not only furnishes themind, but strengthens its faculties. Knowledge is power. A race ofgiants could not level the Alps; but ordinary men, equipped withscience, bore through their base, and made easy channels for theintercourse of divided nations. 

Growth comes with use, and power with exercise. Education makes bothpossible. It puts the means of salvation at the service of all, and, prevents the faculties from moving about _in vacuo_, and finallystanding still from sheer hopelessness. The educated man has a wholemagazine of appliances at his command, and his intellect is trained inusing them, while the uneducated man has nothing but his strength, andhis training is limited to its use. 

Freethought demands education for all. It claims a mental inheritancefor every child born into the world. Superstition demands ignorance, stupidity, and degradation. Wherever the schoolmaster is busy, Freethought prospers; where he is not found, superstition reigns supremeand levels the people in the dust. 

Free speech and Freethought go together. If one is hampered the otherlanguishes. What is the use of thinking if I may not express my thought?We claim equal liberty for all. The priest shall say what he believesand so shall the sceptic. No law shall protect the one and disfranchisethe other. If any man disapproves what I say, he need not hear me asecond time. What more does he require? Let him listen to what he likes, and leave others to do the same. Let us have justice and fair play allround. 

Freethought is not only useful but laudable. It involves labor andtrouble. Ours is not a gospel for those who love the soft pillow offaith. The Freethinker does not let his ship rot away in harbor; hespreads his canvas and sails the seas of thought. What though tempestsbeat and billows roar? He is undaunted, and leaves the avoidance ofdanger to the sluggard and the slave. He will not pay their price forease and safety. Away he sails with Vigilance at the prow and Wisdom atthe helm. He not only traverses the ocean highways, but skirts unmappedcoasts and ventures on uncharted seas. He gathers spoils in every zone, and returns with a rich freight that compensates for all hazards. Someday or other, you say, he will be shipwrecked and lost. Perhaps. Allthings end somehow. But if he goes down he will die like a man and notlike a coward, and have for his requiem the psalm of the tempest and theanthem of the waves. 

Doubt is the beginning of wisdom. It means caution, independence, honesty and veracity. Faith means negligence, serfdom, insincerity anddeception. The man who never doubts never thinks. He is like a strawin the wind or a waif on the sea. He is one of the helpless, docile, unquestioning millions, who keep the world in a state of stagnation, and serve as a fulcrum for the lever of despotism. The stupidity of thepeople, says Whitman, is always inviting the insolence of power. 

Buckle has well said that scepticism is "the necessary antecedent ofall progress. " Without it we should still be groping in the night of theDark Ages. The very foundations of modern science and philosophy werelaid on ground which was wrested from the Church, and every stonewas cemented with the blood of martyrs. As the edifice arose thesharpshooters of faith attacked the builders at every point, and theystill continue their old practice, although their missiles can hardlyreach the towering heights where their enemies are now at work. 

Astronomy was opposed by the Church because it unsettled old notions ofthe earth being the centre of the universe, and the sun, moon, and starsmere lights stuck in the solid firmament, and worked to and fro likesliding panels. Did not the Bible say that General Joshua commanded thesun to stand still, and how could this have happened unless it movedround the earth? And was not the earth certainly flat, as millions offlats believed it to be? The Catholic Inquisition forced Galileo torecant, and Protestant Luther called Copernicus "an old fool. "

Chemistry was opposed as an impious prying into the secrets of God. Itwas put in the same class with sorcery and witchcraft, and punishedin the same way. The early chemists were considered as agents of theDevil, and their successors are still regarded as "uncanny" in the moreignorant parts of Christendom. Roger Bacon was persecuted by his brothermonks; his testing fire was thought to have come from the pit, and theexplosion of his gunpowder was the Devil vanishing in smoke and smell. Even at the end of last century, the clergy-led mob of Birmingham whowrecked Priestley's house and destroyed his apparatus, no doubt feltthat there was a close connexion between chemistry and infidelity. 

Physiology and Medicine were opposed on similar grounds. We were allfearfully and wonderfully made, and the less the mystery was looked intothe better. Disease was sent by God for his own wise ends, and to resistit was as bad as blasphemy. Every discovery and every reform was decriedas impious. Men now living can remember how the champions of faithdenounced the use of anaesthetics in painful labor as an interferencewith God's curse on the daughters of Eve. 

Geology was opposed because it discredited Moses, as though that famousold Jew had watched the deposit of every stratum of the earth's crust. It was even said that fossils had been put underground by God to puzzlethe wiseacres, and that the Devil had carried shells to the hilltops forthe purpose of deluding men to infidelity and perdition. Geologists wereanathematised from the pulpits and railed at by tub-thumpers. They wereobliged to feel their way and go slowly. Sir Charles Lyell had to keepback his strongest conclusions for at least a quarter of a century, andcould not say all he thought until his head was whitened by old age andhe looked into the face of Death. 

Biology was opposed tooth and nail as the worst of all infidelity. Itexposed Genesis and put Moses out of court. It destroyed all specialcreation, showed man's kinship with other forms of life, reduced Adamand Eve to myths, and exploded the doctrine of the Fall. Darwin was foryears treated as Antichrist, and Huxley as the great beast. All that isbeing changed, thanks to the sceptical spirit. Darwin's corpse is buriedin Westminster Abbey, but his ideas are undermining all the churches andcrumbling them into dust. 

The gospel of Freethought brands persecution as the worst crime againsthumanity. It stifles the spirit of progress and strangles its pioneers. It eliminates the brave, the adventurous and the aspiring, and leavesonly the timid, the sluggish and the grovelling. It removes the loftyand spares the low. It levels all the hills of thought and makes anintellectual flatness. It drenches all the paths of freedom with bloodand tears, and makes earth the vestibule of hell. 

Persecution is the right arm of priestcraft. The black militia oftheology are the sworn foes of Freethought. They represent it as the sinagainst the Holy Ghost, for which there is no forgiveness in this worldor the next. When they speak of the Holy Ghost they mean themselves. Freethought is a crime against _them_. It strips off the mystery thatinvests their craft, and shows them as they really are, a horde ofbandits who levy black mail on honest industry, and preach a despot inheaven in order to main-tain their own tyranny on earth. 

The gospel of Freethought would destroy all priesthoods. Every manshould be his own priest. If a professional soul-doctor gives you wrongadvice and leads you to ruin, he will not be damned for you He will seeyou so first. We must take all responsibility, and we should also takethe power. Instead of putting our thinking out, as we put our washing, let us do it at home. No man can do another's thinking for him. What isthought in the originator is only acquiescence in the man who takes itat secondhand. 

If we do our own thinking in religion we shall do it in everything else. We reject authority and act for ourselves. Spiritual and temporal powerare brought under the same rule. They must justify themselves or go. TheFreethinker is thus a politician and a social reformer. What a Christian_may_ be he _must_ be. Freethinkers are naturally Radicals. They arealmost to a man on the side of justice freedom and progress. The Toriesknow this, and hence they seek to suppress us by the violence of unjustlaw. They see that we are a growing danger to every kind of privilege, amenace to all the idle classes who live in luxury on the sweat and laborof others--the devouring drones who live on the working bees. 

The gospel of Freethought teaches us to distinguish between the knowableand the unknowable. We cannot fathom the infinite "mystery of theuniverse" with our finite plummet, nor see aught behind the veil ofdeath. Here is our appointed province:

 "This world which is the world Of all of us, and where in the end We find our happiness or not at all. "

Let us make the best of this world and take our chance of any other. Ifthere is a heaven, we dare say it will hold all honest men. If it willnot, those who go elsewhere will at least be in good company. 

Our salvation is here and now. It is certain and not contingent. We neednot die before we realise it. Ours is a gospel, and the only gospel, for this side of the grave. The promises of theology cannot be made goodtill after death; ours are all redeemable in this life. 

We ask men to acknowledge realities and dismiss fictions. When you havesifted all the learned sermons ever preached, you will find very littlegood grain. Theology deals with dreams and phantasies, and gives noguidance to practical men. The whole truth of life may be summed up ina few words. Happiness is the only good, suffering the only evil, andselfishness the only sin. And the whole duty of man may be expressedin one sentence, slightly altered from Voltaire--Learn what is true inorder to do what is right. If a man can tell you anything about thesematters, listen to him; if not, turn a deaf ear, and let him preach tothe wind. 

The only noble things in this world are great hearts and great brains, There is no virtue in a starveling piety which turns all beauty intougliness and shrivels up every natural affection. Let the heart beathigh with courage and enterprise, and throb with warm passion. Let thebrain be an active engine of thought, imagination and will. The gospelof sorrow has had its day, and the time has come for the gospel ofgladness. Let us live out our lives to the full, radiating joy on allin our own circle, and diffusing happiness through the grander circleof humanity, until at last we retire from the banquet of life, as othershave done before us, and sink in eternal repose. 

FREETHOUGHT IN CURRENT LITERATURE. 

 [A Paper read at the Annual Conference of the National Secular Society, in the Co-operative Hall, Bury, June 5th, 1881. ]

When I was invited to read a paper at this Conference, I thoughtthat, as editor of the Freethinker, I ought to say something aboutFreethonght. And as the deliberations of this Conference are mostly onpractical matters, it occurred to me that I had better select a subjectof less immediate though not of insignificant interest. So I resolved toaddress you on Freethonght in Current Literature. 

I have said that this subject, if not practical and urgent, is assuredlynot unimportant. The power of literature over men's minds cannot beestimated too highly. Science is a tremendous force, but its greatestinfluence is exercised over the human mind when it quits the merelypractical task of ministering to our material desires, and seeks tomould our moral and spiritual conceptions of our position and destinyin the universe. To do this it must address us through the medium ofliterature. Art also is a great force, more especially in countrieswhich have not been subjected, like ours, to the bondage of Puritanism. But art has hitherto appealed to a restricted circle, although thatcircle is rapidly widening in our own age. The greatest, most permanent, and most universal force is literature. Raphael and Michael Angelo havenot influenced the world so profoundly as Shakespeare and Dante; whileso many artistic achievements of antiquity are lost or half decayed, its literary masterpieces still survive with undiminished freshness andcharm; and while the most eminent works even of contemporary artistsare seen only occasionally by a few, the most eminent writings ofthe world's master minds may and do become a household possession tothousands who move in the humblest spheres of life. 

In these cosmopolitan days the Freethinker and Humanitarian naturallylooks beyond his own country into the great world, which is at presentdivided by national and other barriers, but which will in time becomethe home of one all-embracing family. And I confess that I was stronglytempted to trace the workings of the spirit of Freethought as far asI could in the general literature of Europe. But I soon recognised thenecessity of limiting myself to the manifestations of that subtle andpervasive spirit in the current literature of our English tongue. 

When the present century commenced Europe was stirred to the utterdepths by that great French Revolution which marked a new epoch in theworld's history. The revolutionary wave surged across the western world, and passed over England as well as other countries. Some thoughtthe huge eclipse of social order which accompanied it the herald ofapproaching night, and others thought it the dawn of a new day; but nonewere indifferent. There was an intense excitement of radical passionsand desires, a quickening of all the springs of life. This produced ablossoming of our literature such as had not been witnessed since thegreat Elizabethan age, and then, as before, Free-thought mixed withthe vital sap. Of the long array of post-revolutionary names I selectthree--Thomas Paine, who represented the keen and restless common-senseof Freethought; William Godwin, who represented its calmer philosophy;and Shelley, who represented its lofty hopes and soaring aspirations. Godwin has almost faded into a name; Paine's great work is nearly done, for a deeper and more scientific scepticism has possessed itself of thefield in which he labored; but Shelley has a message for generationsyet unborn. He emerges as the supreme figure destined to immortalityof fame. All great and noble and beautiful qualities cohere in him, the"poet of poets and purest of men. " And he is ours. Byron, with all hissplendid energy and terrible scorn, quailed before the supreme problemsof life; but Shelley faced them with a courage all the greater becauseit was unconscious, and casting aside all superstitious dreams andillusory hopes, yearned prophetically towards the Future, when freedom, truth and love shall supersede all other trinities, and realise here onearth that Paradise which theologians have only promised in a world tocome. 

A Shelley cultus has grown up during recent years, and many of our mostgifted writers reverently bow themselves before him. I have only tomention such names as Browning, Swinburne, and Rossetti to show theintellectual rank of his worshippers. Their number increases every year, and it is touching to witness the avidity with which they seize on allnew facts relating to him, whether the record of some episode in hislife, a reported conversation, or a scrap of writing from his hand. 

From the Shelley and Byron period to the fresh revolutionary outburstof 1848 there was a lull in England as well as elsewhere. Several greatpolitical reforms were achieved in the interval. A Reform Bill wascarried. Catholics and Jews were emancipated, and freedom and cheapnessof the press were won by the untameable courage of men like Carlile, Hetherington, Lovett, and Watson. But quietude reigned in the higherspheres of literature. The age was eminently respectable, and itacclaimed the highly respectable Wordsworth as, the prophet divinelyinspired to teach men how to rest and be thankful. 

But during that interval of apathy and respectability, Science wasslowly gathering strength and making conquests, in preparation for thetime when she might plant her feet firmly on the solid ground she hadwon, and challenge Theology to mortal combat. Geology and Biology, in especial, were getting themselves ready to overthrow the fables ofGenesis and destroy its doctrines of special creation. And one is gladto admit that they have completely succeeded at last. Professor Huxleydeclares that he is not acquainted with any man of science or properlyinstructed person who believes that Adam and Eve were the first parentsof mankind, or that we have all descended from the eight personswho superintended that wonderful floating menagerie which survived auniversal deluge less than five thousand years ago. And all the clergycan say in reply is that Professor Huxley is not endowed with thattheological faculty which enables them to perceive in the language ofScripture a meaning which is quite undiscernible to the eyes of commonsense. 

Another influence was at work during that interval. Mainly throughCarlyle, the treasures of German literature were opened up to Englishreaders. The greatest German writers, from Leasing, Göethe, and Schillerto Fichte, Richter, and Heine, were outrageous Freethinkers comparedwith our own respectable and orthodox writers, and their influence soonmade itself evident in the tolerance and courage with which Englishauthors began to treat the great problems of morality and religion. German scholarship, too, slowly crept among us. Its Biblical criticismshowed us the utter inadequacy of evidential works like Paley's, andmade us see that the Christian Scriptures would have to be viewed in avery different light and studied in a very different spirit. To estimatethe extent of this change, we have only to place Paley's "Evidences ofChristianity" beside such a work as "Supernatural Religion. " Thegulf between these works is enormous; and it is notable that the morescientific and rigorous is the criticism of the New Testament books, the more heterodox are the conclusions reached. Even Scotland has beeninvaded by this German influence, and it now affords us the laughablespectacle of a number of grave ministers pursuing as a damnable heretica man like Dr. Robertson Smith, whose only crime is having stated aboutthe Bible nothing new, but what every scholar in Europe knows to beadmitted and indisputable. These solemn ministers of the old creed aredetermined to keep the deluge of what they call "German infidelity" fromflooding the valleys and mounting the hillsides of Scotland; but theirheresy-hunts are just as efficacious against what they so piously dreadas Mrs. Partington's mop against the mighty onrush of Atlantic rollers. 

With the revolutionary movement of '48 came a fresh impulse from France. The great evangel of '89 had not perished; it was only in abeyance; andagain it burst upon Europe with its words of fire. We all know how theRepublic which was then established was soon suppressed in blood by thegang of adventurers presided over by Napoleon the Little. But the day ofretribution came, and the empire went the way of all tyrannies. On itsruins the Republic has been established anew, and now it reckons inits service and among its champions the best intellects and the noblestcharacters in France; while the masses of the people, taught by thebitter lessons of adversity, are also content to enjoy the benefits ofordered liberty and peaceful progress under its benign sway. 

Now French progress has always been a question of ideas no less than ofmaterial advantage. The great democratic leaders in France have nearlyall been avowed Freethinkers. They have separated themselves alikefrom "the blood on the hands of the king and the lie at the lips of thepriest, " being perfectly assured that outward freedom in politics isin the long run impossible without inward freedom of thought. Thechief statesman in France, M. Gambetta, has publicly declared himself adisciple of Voltaire, and neither at the marriages nor at the funeralsof his friends does he ever enter the doors of a church. He staysoutside and quietly allows those who desire it to go in and listen tothe mumbling of the priest. 

My purpose, however, being literary and not political, I must recurto my remark that a fresh impulse came to us from France after therevolution of '48. Lamartine at first exercised considerable influencehere, but gradually Victor Hugo's star ascended, and from the moment itreached the zenith until now, he has been accounted the supreme poet ofFrance, and the greatest contemporary evangelist of the ideas of '89. Heis a Freethinker as well as a Republican; and it was inevitable thatthe younger school of writers in England, who acknowledge him as a loftymaster, should drink from his inexhaustible spring the living waters ofDemocracy and Freethought. 

French influence on our very recent literature is evident in suchworks as Mr. John Morley's Studies on Voltaire, Rousseau, Diderot, and Condorcet; Mr. Christie's monumental Life of Etienne Dolet, theFreethought martyr; and Mr. Parton's new Life of Voltaire; all of whichdemand and will amply requite our attention. 

Such are the influences which have conspired to shape the literaryactivities of the generation in which we live. Now Freethought, like asubtle essence, penetrates everywhere. Every book betrays its presence, and even the periodical literature of our age is affected by it. TheArchbishop of Canterbury laments that Christian men cannot introducethe most respectable magazines into their homes without the risk ofpoisoning the minds of their families with heretical ideas. 

One of the signs that Freethought had begun to leaven the educatedclasses was the publication of the famous "Essays and Reviews. " Theheresy of that book was exceedingly small, but it roused a great stormin the religious world and led to more than one clerical prosecution. Another sign was the publication of Colenso's learned work on thePentateuch. This hard-working Colonial Bishop was denounced as a hereticby the idler home Bishops, and Ruskin has said that they would haveliked to burn Colenso alive, and make Ludgate Hill easier for theomnibuses with the cinders of him. An antagonist very different from theBishops was Mr. Matthew Arnold, who severely censured Colenso's wholemethod of criticism, as a handling of religious questions in anirreligious spirit. Mr. W. R. Greg admirably defended the Bishop, andthe controversy ended in a drawn battle. 

But what has happened since? The same Matthew Arnold who censuredColenso has himself published two remarkable works on "Literature andDogma" and "God and the Bible, " written it is true on a different planfrom Colenso's, but containing a hundred times more heresy than theBishop crammed into all his big volumes. For Mr. Arnold deprecatesthe idea of a personal god, likens the Christian Trinity to three LordShaftesburys, and says that the Bible miracles must all be given upwithout reservation. All the positive religion he leaves us is thebelief in "An eternal not ourselves that makes for righteousness, " whichis about as nebulous a creed as ever was preached. Now Mr. Arnold is notan insignificant person. He is recognised as a past-master of Englishletters, a ripe scholar, a fine poet, and an exquisite critic. When sucha man carries destructive criticism to its utmost limits, we may wellcongratulate ourselves on a signal triumph of Freethought. And we mayalso find comfort in the fact that nobody thinks of flinging a stoneat Mr. Arnold for his heresy. By-and-by the censors of religion in thepress will cease to throw stones at the Freethought teachers among themasses of the people, who only put into homlier English and publish in acheaper form the sentiments and ideas which Mr. Arnold expresses for theeducated classes at a higher price and in a loftier style. 

During the winter a gap was made in the front rank of English literatureby the deaths of Carlyle and George Eliot. Neither of these greatwriters was orthodox. Carlyle was a Freethinker to the extent ofdiscarding Christian supernaturalism. Very early in his life he toldEdward Irving that he did not, nor was it likely he ever would, regardChristianity as he did. We all remember, too, his scornful references toHebrew Old Clothes, and his fierce diatribes against the clergy who, he said, went about with strange gear on their heads, and underneath itsuch a theory of the universe as he, for one, was thankful to have noconcern with. In the "Latter-Day Pamphlets" he likened Christianity toa great tree, sprung from the seed of Nazareth, and since fed by theopulences of fifty generations; which now is perishing at the root, andsways to and fro ever farther and farther from the perpendicular; andwhich in the end must come down, and leave to those who found shelterbeneath it and thought it infinite, a wholesome view of the uppereternal lights. And his contempt for controversial or dogmatic theologymay be gauged by his reply to one who asked him whether he was aPantheist. "No, " said Carlyle, "never was; nor a Pot-Theist either. "

George Eliot was notoriously a Freethinker. Early in her literary careershe translated Strauss and Feuerback into English, and through all hernovels there runs a profound Secular spirit. Among her friends shewas well known to be a Positivist; and though her creed held forth nopromise of personal life beyond the grave, she found inspiration andcomfort in the thought that Humanity would advance after she was gone, that though she died the race was practically immortal. Her mind wasthoroughly imbued with the scientific spirit, and her writings give someconception of the way in which the Evolution theory affected a mind, fortified by culture and abundant common sense against the crudities ofenthusiasm. The doctrine of Evolution did not fill her with despair;on the contrary, it justified and strengthened her ardent hopes for thefuture of mankind. 

Many other novelists betray a strong spirit of Freethought. 

It pervades all George Meredith's later writings, and is still moreconspicuous in Mrs. Lynn Linton's "True History of Joshua Davidson" andher powerful "Under which Lord?" the hero-husband of that story beingan Agnostic gentleman who founds a workmen's institute and deliversFreethought lectures in it. 

Almost all the young school of poets are Freethinkers. Browning, ourgreatest, and Tennyson, our most popular, belong to a generation thatis past. Mr. Swinburne is at the head of the new school, and he isa notorious heretic. He never sings more loftily, or with strongerpassion, or with finer thought, than when he arraigns and denouncespriestcraft and its superstitions before the bar of humanity and truth. 

The reception of Mr. Thomsons poems and essays affords another sign ofthe progress of Freethought. This gentleman for many years contributedto secular journals under the initials of "B. V. " He is a pronouncedAtheist, and makes no concealment of it in his poems. Yet, while a fewcritics have expressed horror at his heresy, the majority have treatedit as extremely natural in an educated thoughtful man, and confinedthemselves to the task of estimating the genius he has put into hiswork. 

I must now draw to a close. Freethought, I hold, is an omnipresentactive force in the English literature of to-day. It appears alike inthe greatest works of scholarship, in the writings of men of science, in the songs of poets, in the productions of novelists, in the mostrespectable magazines, and in the multitudinous daily press. It isurgent and aggressive, and tolerates no restraint. It indicates theprogress we have made towards that time when the mind of man shall playfreely on every subject, when no question shall be thought too sacredto be investigated, when reason shall be the sovereign arbiter of alldisputes, when priestly authority shall have perished, when every man'sthought shall decide his own belief, and his conscience determine theway in which he shall walk. 

DEAN STANLEY'S LATEST. 

 (August, 1880. )

At one of Charles Lamb's delightful Wednesday evenings Coleridge had, as usual, consumed more than his fair share of time in talking of some"regenerated" orthodoxy. Leigh Hunt, who was one of the listeners, manifested his surprise at the prodigality and intensity of the poet'sreligious expressions, and especially at his always speaking of Jesusas "our Savior. " Whereupon Lamb, slightly exhilarated by a glass ofgooseberry cordial, stammered out, "Ne--ne--never mind what Coleridgesays; he's full of fun. " This jocular and irreverent criticism isperhaps, after all, the most pertinent that can be passed on theutterances of this school of "regenerated orthodoxy. " Coleridge, who hadunbounded genius, and was intellectually capable of transforming Britishphilosophy, went on year after year maundering about his "sumject"and "omject, " mysteriously alluding to his great projected work onthe Logos, and assuring everybody that he knew a way of bringing allascertained truth within the dogmas of the Church of England. Hispupil, Maurice, wasted a noble intellect (as Mill says, few of hiscontemporaries had so much intellect to waste) in the endeavor todemonstrate that the Thirty-Nine Articles really anticipated all theextremest conclusions of modern thought; afflicting himself perpetually, as has been well said, with those "forty stripes save one. " And nowwe have Dean Stanley, certainly a much smaller man than Maurice, andinfinitely smaller than Coleridge, continuing the traditions of theschool, of which let us hope he will be the last teacher. What histheology precisely is no mortal can determine. He subscribes thedoctrines of the Church of England, but then he interprets them in anesoteric sense; that is, of course, in a Stanleyan sense; for when theletter of doctrine is left for its occult meaning every man "runs" aprivate interpretation of his own. The _Nineteenth Century_ for Augustcontains a characteristic specimen of his exegesis. It is entitled "TheCreed of the Early Christians, " but is really a sermon on the Trinity, which doubtless has been preached at Westminster. We shall examine itspeculiarities and try to reach its meaning; a task by no means easy, andone which we could pardon anyone for putting aside with Lamb's remark, "It's only his fun. "

Dean Stanley has a new theory of the Trinity, partly deduced from othermystics, and partly constructed on the plan of the negro who explainedthat his wooden doll was made "all by myself, out of my own head. " Godthe Father, in this as in other theories, comes first: not that he isolder or greater than the other persons, for they are all three coequaland coëternal; but because you must have a first for the sake ofenumeration, or else the most blessed Trinity would be like theIrishman's little pig who ran about so that there was no counting him. There is also another reason. God the Father corresponds to _Natural_Religion, which of course has priority in the religious developmentof mankind; coming before _Revealed_ Religion, to which God the Soncorresponds, and still more before _Spiritual_ Religion to whichcorresponds the Holy Ghost. 

"We look round the physical world; we see indications of order, design, and good will towards the living creatures which animate it. _Often, it is true, we cannot trace any such design_; but, whenever we can, theimpression upon us is the sense of a Single, Wise, Beneficent Mind, the same now that it was ages before the appearance of man--the same inother parts of the Universe as it is in our own. And in our own heartsand consciences we feel an instinct corresponding to this--a voice, afaculty, that seems to refer us to a higher power than ourselves, andto point to some Invisible Sovereign Will, like to that which we seeimpressed on the natural world. And further, the more we think of theSupreme, the more we try to imagine what his feelings are towardsus, the more our idea of him becomes fixed as in the one simple, all-embracing word that he is _Our Father_. "

The words we have italicised say that design cannot _always_ be tracedin nature. We should like to know where it can _ever_ be. Evolutionshows that the design argument puts the cart before the horse. NaturalSelection, as Dr. Schmidt appositely remarks, accounts for adaptation asa _result_ without requiring the supposition of design as a _cause_. Andif you cannot deduce God from the animate world, you are not likelyto deduce him from the inanimate. Dean Stanley himself quotes someremarkable words from Dr. Newman's _Apologia_--"The being of a god is ascertain to me as the certainty of my own existence. Yet when I lookout of myself into the world of men, I see a sight which fills me withunspeakable distress. _The world of men seems simply to give the lie tothat great truth_ of which my whole being is so full. If I looked intoa mirror and did not see my face, I should experience the same sort ofdifficulty that actually comes upon me when _I look into this livingbusy world and see no reflection of its Creator. _" How, asks the Dean, is this difficulty to be met? Oh, he replies, | we must turn to God theSon in the person of Jesus Christ, and his utterances will supplementand correct the uncertain sounds of nature; and then there is the HolyGhost to finally supply all omissions, and clear up all difficulties. Now to our mind this is simply intellectual thimble-rigging. Or ratherdoes it not suggest the three-card trick? One card is useless, two cardsare unsafe, but with three cards to shuffle you are almost sure towin. Dr. Newman gets his God through intuition; he maintains thatthe existence of God is a primary fact of consciousness, and entirelydeclines the impossible task of proving it from the phænomena of nature. Dean Stanley should do the same. It is not honest to employ an argumentand then shirk all the difficulties it raises by resorting to thetheological three-card trick, which confounds instead of satisfying thespectator, while emptying his mental pockets of the good cash of commonsense. 

The Dean's treatment of God the Son is amusing. He writes of JesusChrist as though he were a principle instead of a person. "TheMahometan, " he says, "_rightly_ objects to the introduction of thepaternal and filial relations into the idea of God, when they areinterpreted in the _gross and literal sense_. But in the moral spiritualsense it is true that the kindness, tenderness and wisdom we find inJesus Christ is the reflection of the same kindness, tenderness andwisdom which we recognise in the governance of the universe. " This maybe called mysticism, but we think it moonshine. Gross and literal sense, forsooth! Why, was not Jesus Christ a man, a most literal fact, "grossas a mountain, open, palpable?" Dean Stanley approves the Mahometan'sobjection, and yet he knows full well that it contravenes a fundamentaldogma of the Christian Church, and is accounted a most damnable heresy. Why this paltering with us in a double sense? To our mind downrightblatant orthodoxy, which is at least honest if not subtle, is preferableto this hybrid theology which attempts to reconcile contradictionsin order to show respect to truth while sticking to the flesh-pots oferror, and evades all difficulties by a patent and patently dishonestmethod of "interpretation. "

Quoting Goethe's "Wilhelm Meister, " Dean Stanley tells us that one greatbenefit traceable to God the Son is the recognition of "humility andpoverty, mockery and despising, wretchedness and suffering, as divine. "Well, if these things are divine, the sooner we all become devilish thebetter. Nobody thinks them divine when they happen to himself; on thecontrary, he cries out lustily against them. But it is a differentmatter when they happen to others. Then the good Christian considersthem divine. How easily, says a French wit, we bear other people'stroubles! Undistracted by personal care, pious souls contemplate withserene resignation the suffering of their neighbors, and acknowledge inthem the chastening hand of a Divine Father. 

God the Holy Ghost represents _Spiritual_ religion: the Fatherrepresents God in Nature, the Son represents God in History, and "theHoly Ghost represents to us God in our own hearts and spirits andconsciences. " Here be truths! An illustration is given. Theodore Parker, when a boy, took up a stone to throw at a tortoise in a pond, but felthimself restrained by something within him; and that something, as hismother told him, was the voice of God, or in other words the Holy Ghost. Now if the Holy Ghost is required to account for every kind impulse ofboys and men, there is required also an Unholy Ghost to account for allour unkind impulses. That is, a place in theology must be found forthe Devil. The equilateral triangle of theology must be turned into asquare, with Old Nick for the fourth side. But Dean Stanley does notlike the Devil; he deems him not quite respectable enough for politesociety. Let him, then, give up the Holy Ghost too, for the one is thecorrelative of the other. 

"It may be, " says the Dean, after interpreting the Trinity, "that theBiblical words in some respects fall short of this high signification. "What, God's own language inferior to that of the Dean of Westminster?Surely this is strange arrogance, unless after all "it's only his fun. "Perhaps that is how we should take it. Referring to some sacred picturesin the old churches of the East on Mount Athos, intended to representthe doctrine of the Trinity, the Dean says that standing on one side thespectator sees only Christ on the Cross, standing on the other he seesonly the Holy Dove, while standing in front he sees only the EternalFather. Very admirable, no doubt. But there is a more admirable picturedescribed by Mr. Herbert Spencer in his "Study of Sociology, " whichgraphically represents the doctrine of the Trinity in the guise of threepersons trying to stand in one pair of boots!

Goethe is cited as a Christian, a believer in the Trinity. Doubtless theDean forgets his bitter epigram to the effect that he found four thingstoo hard to put up with, and as hateful as poison and serpents; namely, tobacco, garlic, bugs, and the _Cross_. Heine also is pressed intoservice, and an excellent prose translation of one of his poems isgiven, wherein he celebrates the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of God. But DeanStanley has read his Heine to little purpose if he imagines that thisradiant and splendid soldier of progress meant by the Spirit of God thethird person of the Christian Trinity. Heine was no Christian, and thevery opposite of a theologian. We might translate passages of scathingirony on the ascetic creed of the Cross from the _De L'Allemagne_, butspace does not admit. A few of Heine's last words must do instead. ToAdolph Stahr he said: "For the man in good health Christianity is anunserviceable religion, with its resignation and one-sided precepts. For the sick man, however, I assure you it is a very good religion. "To Alfred Meissner: "When health is used up, money used up, _and soundhuman sense used up_, Christianity begins. " Once, while lying onhis mattress-grave, he said with a sigh: "If I could even get out oncrutches, do you know whither I would go? Straight to church. " And whenhis hearer looked incredulous, he added: "Most decidedly to church. _Where else should one go with crutches?_" Such exquisite and mordantirony is strange indeed in a defender of the holy and blessed Trinity. 

Dean Stanley's peroration runs thus:--"Wherever we are taught to knowand understand the real nature of the world in which our lot is cast, there is a testimony, however humble, to the name of the Father;wherever we are taught to know and admire the highest and best of humanexcellence, there is a testimony to the name of the Son: wherever thereis implanted in us a presence of freedom, purity and love, there is atestimony to the name of the Holy Ghost. " Very fine, no doubt; alsovery soporific. One is inclined to mutter a sleepy Amen. If thispassage means anything at all it implies that all who know truth, admireexcellence, and have any share in freedom and virtue, are testatorsto the names of Father, Son and Holy Ghost; so that many Atheists areTrinitarians without knowing it. "In Christianity, " says the Dean, "nothing is of real concern except that which makes us wiser and better. "That is precisely what the sceptic says, yet for that coroners rejecthis service on juries, and rowdy Christians try to keep him out ofParliament when he has a legal right to enter. But the Dean adds:"Everything which does make us wiser and better is the very thing whichChristianity intends. " That is, Christianity means just what you like tofind in it. How can a man of Dean Stanley's eminence and abilitywrite such dishonest trash? Must we charitably, though with a touch ofsarcasm, repeat Lamb's words of Coleridge--"Never mind; it's only hisfun?"

GOD AND THE QUEEN. 

 (March, 1882. )

The Queen is now safely lodged at Mentone. Although-the politicaloutlook is not very bright, there is pretty sure to be a good solidmajority to vote a dowry for Prince Leopold's bride; and so long asroyalty is safe it does not much matter what becomes of the people. Thatdreadful Bradlaugh is gagged; _he_ cannot open his mouth in the Houseof Commons against perpetual pensions or royal grants. The interests ofmonarchy are in no immediate peril, and so the Queen is off to Mentone. 

Now she is gone, and the loyal hubbub has subsided, it is just the timeto consider her late "providential escape" from the bullet which wasnever fired at her. 

What is the meaning of _providential?_ God does all or nothing. There isa special providence in the fall of a sparrow, as well as in the fall ofempires. In that case _everything_ is providential. But this is not theordinary view. When a railway accident occurs those who do not come togrief ascribe their preservation to Providence. Who then is responsiblefor the fate of those who perish? Centuries ago Christians would haveanswered, "the Devil. " Now they give no answer at all, but treat thequestion as frivolous or profane. 

Thomas Cooper, in his _Autobiography_, says that the perfecting touchwas given to his conversion by an interposition of God. During acollision, the carriage in which he sat was lifted clean on to anotherline of rails, and thus escaped the fate of the other carriages, whichwere broken to pieces. Pious Thomas recognised at once the fingerof God, and he there and then fell on his knees and offered up athanksgiving. He was too vain to carry his argument out to its logicalend. Why did the Lord protect him, and not his fellow-travellers? Was heof more importance than any of the others? And why, if it was right tothank God for saving Thomas Cooper, would it be wrong to curse him forsmashing all the rest?

This superstition of Providence is dying out. Common people aregradually being left to the laws of Nature. If a workhouse were tocatch on fire, no one would speak of those who escaped the flames asprovidentially saved. God does not look after the welfare of paupers;nor is it likely that he would pluck a charwoman's brat out of the fireif it tumbled in during her absence. Such interpositions are absurd. Butwith kings, queens, princes, princesses, and big nobs in general, thecase is different. God looks after the quality. He stretches forth hishand to save them from danger, from the pestilence that walketh by dayand the terror that walketh by night. And his worshippers take just thesame view of the "swells. " When the Queen came to London, a few weeksago, one of her mounted attendants was thrown and badly hurt; and thenext day one of the loyal Tory papers reported that her Majesty hadcompletely recovered from the accident to her outrider!

But if the Lord overlooks the great ones of the earth, why is he notimpartial? He did not turn aside Guiteau's bullet, nor did he answer theprayers of a whole nation on its knees. President Garfield was allowedto die after a long agony. Poor Mrs. Garfield believed up to the verylast minute that God would interpose and save her husband. But he neverdid. Why was he so indifferent in this case? Was it because Garfield wasa President instead of a King, the elected leader of free men instead ofthe hereditary ruler of political slaves? Informer Newdegate would sayso. In his opinion God Almighty hates Republicans. Yet the Bible clearlyshows that the Lord is opposed to monarchy. He gave his chosen people aking as a punishment, after plainly telling them what an evil they hadsought; and there is perhaps a covert irony in the story of Saul, theson of Kish, who went to seek his father's asses and found instead anation of subjects--two-legged asses, who begged him to mount them andride. 

Take another case. Why did God permit the Nihilists to assassinate thelate Czar of Russia? All their previous plots had failed. Why was thelast plot allowed to succeed? There is only one answer. God had nothingto do with any of them, and the last succeeded because it was betterdevised and more carefully executed. If God protected the Czar againsttheir former attempts, they were too many for him in the end; that is, they defeated Omnipotence--an absurdity too flagrant for any sane man tobelieve. 

Why should God care for princes more than for peasants, for queens morethan for washerwomen? There is no difference in their compositions;they are all made of the same flesh and blood. The very book theseloyal gushers call the Word of God declares that he is no respecter ofpersons. What are the distinctions of rank and wealth? Mere nothings. Look down from an altitude of a thousand feet, and an emperor and hissubjects shall appear equally small; and what are even a thousand feetin the infinite universe? Nay, strip them of all their fictions ofdress; reduce them to the same condition of featherless bipeds; andyou shall find the forms of strength or beauty, and the power of brain, impartially distributed by Nature, who is the truest democrat, whoraises her Shakespeares from the lowest strata of society, and laughs toscorn the pride of palaces and thrones. 

Providence is an absurdity, a superstitious relic of the ignorant past. Sensible men disbelieve it, and scientists laugh it to scorn. Ourvery moral sense revolts against it. Why should God help a few of hischildren and neglect all the others? Explosions happen in mines, andscores of honest industrious men, doing the rough work of the worldand winning bread for wife and child, are blown to atoms or hurled intoshapeless death. God does not help them, and tears moisten the dry breadof half-starved widows and orphans. Sailors on the mighty deep go downwith uplifted hands, or slowly gaze their life away on the mercilessheavens. The mother bends over her dying child, the first flower of herwedded love, the sweetest hope of her life. She is rigid with despair, and in her hot tearless eyes there dwells a dumb misery that would toucha heart of stone. But God does not help, the death-curtain falls, anddarkness reigns where all was light. 

Who has the audacity to say that the God who will not aid a mother inthe death-chamber shelters the Queen upon her throne? It is an insult toreason and a ghastly mockery of justice. The impartiality of Nature isbetter than the mercy of such a God. 

CARDINAL NEWMAN ON INFIDELITY. 

 (April, 1882. )

Cardinal Newman is perhaps the only Catholic in England worth listeningto. He has immured his intellect in the catacombs of the Romish Church, but he has not been able to quench it, and even there it radiates asplendor through the gloom. His saintly character is as indubitable asthe subtlety of his mind, and no vicissitude has impaired the charmof his style, which is pure and perfect as an exquisite and flawlessdiamond; serene and chaste in its usual mood, but scintillatinggloriously in the light of his imagination. 

On Sunday last Cardinal Newman preached a sermon at the Oratory inBirmingham on "Modern Infidelity. " Unfortunately we have not a fullreport, from which we might be able to extract some notable passages, but only a newspaper summary. Even this, however, shows some points ofinterest. 

Cardinal Newman told his hearers that "a great storm of infidelity andirreligion was at hand, " and that "some dreadful spiritual catastrophewas coming upon them. " We quite agree with the great preacher; butevery storm is not an evil, and every catastrophe is not a disaster. The revolutionary storm in France cleared the air of much pestilence. Itdissipated as by enchantment the horrible cloud of tyranny, persecutionand want, which had for centuries hovered over the land. And certainly, to go back a stage farther in history, the Reformation was not amisfortune, although it looked like a "spiritual catastrophe" to a greatmany amiable people. The truth is, Revolutions must occur in this world, both in thought and in action. They may happen slowly, so that we mayaccommodate ourselves to them; or rapidly, and so disturb and injurewhole generations. 

But come they must, and no power can hinder them; not even that oncemighty Church which has always striven to bind Humanity to the past withadamantine chains of dogma. In Cardinal Newman's own words, from perhapshis greatest and most characteristic book, --"here below to live is tochange, and to be perfect is to have changed often. "

We cannot say that Cardinal Newman indicates how humanity will sufferfrom the "coming storm of infidelity and irreligion. " He does, indeed, refer to the awful state of a people forsaken by God, but in our humbleopinion this is somewhat ludicrous. We can hardly understand how God canforsake his own creatures. Why all this pother if he really exists?In that case our scepticism cannot affect him, any more than a man'sblindness obscures the sun. And surely, if Omnipotence desired us allto believe the truth, the means are ready to hand. The God who said, Letthere be light, and there was light, could as easily say, Let all men beChristians, and they would be Christians. If God had spoken the universewould be convinced; and the fact that it is not convinced proves, eitherthat he does not exist, or that he purposely keeps silent, and desiresthat we should mind our own business. 

The only tangible evil Cardinal Newman ventures to indicate is the"indignity which at this moment has come over the Holy Father at Rome. "He declares, as to the Pope, that "there hardly seems a place in thewhole of Europe where he could put his foot. " The Catholics are carryingthis pretence of a captive Pope a trifle too far. His Holiness must havea tremendous foot if he cannot put it fairly down on the floor of theVatican. He and his Cardinals really wail over their loss of temporalpower. It would be wiser and nobler to reconcile themselves to theinevitable, and to end the nefarious diplomacy by which they arecontinually striving to recover what is for ever lost. The whole worldis aware of the scandalous misrule and the flagrant immorality which, under the government of the Papacy, made the Eternal City a byword anda reproach. Under the secular government, Rome has made wonderfulprogress. It has better streets, cleaner inhabitants, less fever andfilth, and a much smaller army of priests, beggars, and prostitutes. Catholics may rest assured that the bad old times will never return. They may, of course, promise a reformation of manners if the HolyFather's dominion is restored, but the world will not believe them. Reforming the Papacy, as Carlyle grimly said, is like tinkering a rustyold kettle. If you stop up the holes of it with temporary putty, it mayhang together for awhile; but "begin to hammer at it, solder it, to whatyou call mend and rectify it, --it will fall to shreds, as sure as rustis rust; go all into nameless dissolution, --and the fat in the fire willbe a thing worth looking at, poor Pope!"

As a sincere Christian (a very rare thing, by the way, in these days), Cardinal Newman is bound to lament the spread of infidelity. He is akeen observer, and his word may be taken for the fact. A stormy timeis undoubtedly coming. Old creeds and institutions will have to give anaccount of themselves, and nothing that cannot stand the test will live. But truth will not suffer. Criticise the multiplication table as much asyou please, and twice two will still be four. In the storm and stress ofcontroversy what is true and solid will survive; only the hollow shamsof authority and superstition will collapse. Humanity has nothing tofear, however the Churches may groan. 

SUNDAY TYRANNY. 

 (May, 1882. )

Last Sunday the myriads of Paris turned out to the Chantilly races. Thesun shone brilliantly, and all went merry as a marriage bell. Yet therewas no drunkenness or disorder; on the contrary, the multitude behavedwith such decorum, that one English correspondent said it would not haveappeared strange if a bishop had stepped forward in full canonicals togive them his benediction. 

Why cannot Englishmen enjoy their Sunday's leisure like the French?Because we are still under the bondage of Puritanism; because ourreligious dress is nothing but Hebrew Old Clothes; because we followMoses instead of Jesus; because we believe that man was made for theSabbath, instead of the Sabbath for man; because, in short, there arein England a lot of sour Christians who play the dog in the manger, andwill neither enjoy themselves on Sunday nor let anyone else. They oftenprate about liberty, but they understand it as the Yankee did, whodefined it as the right to do as he pleased and the right to makeeverybody else do so too. 

Let us all be unhappy on Sunday, is the burden of their song. Now, wehave no objection to their being miserable, if they desire it, on thator any other day. This is supposed to be a free country; you decide tobe wretched and you select your own time for the treat. But you haveno right to interfere with your neighbors. This, however, is what theChristians, with their customary "cheek, " will insist on doing. Theylike going to the church and the public-house on Sunday, and thoseestablishments are permitted to open; they have no wish to go elsewhere, and so they keep all other establishments closed. This is mereimpudence. Let them go where they choose, and allow the same freedom toother people. Those who advocate a free Sunday ask for no favor; theydemand justice. They do not propose to compel any Christian to enter amuseum, a library, or an art gallery; they simply claim the right to goin themselves. 

The denial of that right is a violation of liberty, which every free manis bound to resent. 

This country is said to be civilised. To a certain extent it is, but allour civilisation has been won against Christianity and its brutal laws. Our toiling masses, in factory, mine, shop, and counting-house, have oneday of leisure in the week. Rightly considered it is of infinite value. It is a splendid breathing-time. We cast off the storm and stress oflife, fling aside the fierce passion of gain, and let the spirit ofhumanity throb in our pulses and stream from our eyes. Our fellow manis no longer a rival, but a brother. His gain is not our loss. We enricheach other by the noble give-and-take of fellowship, and feel what itreally is to _live_. Yet our Christian legislature tries its utmostto spoil the boon. It cannot prevent us from visiting each other, orwalking as far as our legs will carry us; but almost everything else istabooed. Go to church, it says. Millions answer, We are sick of going;we have heard the same old story until it is unspeakably stale, and manyof the sermons have been so frequently repeated that we suspect theywere bought by the dozen. Then it says, Go to the public-house. But ahuge multitude answer, We don't want to go there either, except for aminute to quench our thirst; we have no wish for spirituous any morethan spiritual intoxication; we desire some other alternative thangospel or gin. Then our Christian legislature answers, You arediscontented fools. It crushes down their better aspirations, andcondemns them to a wearisome inactivity. 

Go through London, the metropolis of the world, as we call it, on aSunday. How utterly dreary it is! The shutters are all up before the gayshop-windows. You pace mile after mile of streets, with sombre houseson either hand as though tenanted by the dead. You stand in front of theBritish Museum, and it looks as if it had been closed since the date ofthe mummies inside. You yearn to walk through its galleries, to gaze onthe relics of antiquity, to inspect the memorials of the dead, to feelthe subtle links that bind together the past and the present and makeone great family of countless generations of men. But you must wanderaway disappointed and dejected. You repair to the National Gallery. You long to behold the masterpieces of art, to have your imaginationquickened and thrilled by the glories of form and color, to look oncemore on some favorite picture which touches your nature to its finestissues. But again you are foiled. You desire to visit a library, fullof books you cannot buy, and there commune with the great minds who haveleft their thoughts to posterity. But you are frustrated again. You arecheated out of your natural right, and treated less like a man than adog. 

This Christian legislature has much to answer for. Drunkenness is ourgreat national vice. And how is it to be overcome? Preaching will not doit. Give Englishmen a chance, furnish them with counter attractions, andthey will abjure intoxication like their continental neighbors. Elevatetheir tastes, and they will feel superior to the vulgar temptation ofdrink. Every other method has been tried and has failed; this is theonly method that promises success. 

Fortunately the Sunday question is growing. Christian tyranny isevidently doomed. Mr. Howard's motion for the opening of publicmuseums and art galleries, although defeated, received the support ofeighty-five members of Parliament. That minority will increase againnext year, and in time it will become a majority. Mr. Broadhurst, forsome peculiar reason, voted against it, but we imagine he will some dayrepent of his action. The working-classes are fools if they listen tothe idle talk about Sunday labor, with which the Tories and bigots tryto bamboozle them. The opening of public institutions on Sunday wouldnot necessitate a hundredth part of the labor already employed inkeeping open places of worship, and driving rich people to and fro. Allthe nonsense about the thin end of the wedge is simply dust thrown intotheir eyes. The very people who vote against Sunday freedom under apretence of opposing Sunday labor, keep their own servants at work andvisit the "Zoo" in the afternoon, where they doubtless chuckle overthe credulity of the lower orders. Christian tyranny unites with Toryoppression to debase and enslave the people. It is time that both wereimperiously stopped. The upper classes wish to keep us ignorant, andparsons naturally want everybody else's shutters up when they open shop. We ought to see through the swindle. Let us check their impudence, laughat their hypocrisy, and rescue our Sunday from their hands. 

WHO ARE THE BLASPHEMERS?

 (June, 1882. )

Atheists are often charged with blasphemy, but it is a crime they cannotcommit. God is to them merely a word, expressing all sorts of ideas, andnot a person. It is, properly speaking, a general term, which includesall that there is in common among the various deities of the world. Theidea of the supernatural embodies itself in a thousand ways. Truth isalways simple and the same, but error is infinitely diverse. Jupiter, Jehovah and Mumbo-Jumbo are alike creations of human fancy, the productsof ignorance and wonder. Which is _the_ God is not yet settled. When thesects have decided this point, the question may take a fresh turn; butuntil then _god_ must be considered as a generic term, like _tree orhorse or men_; with just this difference, however, that while the wordstree, horse and man express the general qualities of visible objects, the word god expresses only the imagined qualities of something thatnobody has ever seen. 

When the Atheist examines, denounces, or satirises the gods, he is notdealing with persons but with ideas. He is incapable of insulting God, for he does not admit the existence of any such being. 

Ideas of god may be good or bad, beautiful or ugly; and according as hefinds them the Atheist treats them. If we lived in Turkey we should dealwith the god of the Koran, but as we live in England we deal with thegod of the Bible. We speak of that god as a being, just for conveniencesake, and not from conviction. At bottom, we admit nothing but the massof contradictory notions between Genesis and Revelation. We attack not aperson but a belief, not a being but an idea, not a fact but a fancy. 

Lord Brougham long ago pointed out, in his "Life of Voltaire, " thatthe great French heretic was not guilty of blasphemy, as his enemiesalleged; since he had no belief in the actual existence of the god hedissected, analysed and laughed at. Mr. Ruskin very eloquently defendsByron from the same charge. In "Cain, " and elsewhere, the great poetdoes not impeach God; he merely impeaches the orthodox creed. We may sumup the whole matter briefly. No man satirises the god he believes in, and no man believes in the god he satirises. 

We shall not, therefore, be deterred by the cry of "blasphemy, " which isexactly what the Jewish priests shouted against Jesus Christ. Ifthere is a God, he cannot be half so stupid and malignant as the Bibledeclares. In destroying the counterfeit we do not harm the reality. Andas it is better, in the words of Plutarch, to have no notion of the godsthan to have notions which dishonor them, we are satisfied that the Lord(if he exist) will never burn us in hell for denying a few lies told inhis name. 

The real blasphemers are those who believe in God and blacken hischaracter; who credit him with less knowledge than a child, and lessintelligence than an idiot; who make him quibble, deceive, and lie; whorepresent him as indecent, cruel, and revengeful; who give him the heartof a savage and the brain of a fool. These are the blasphemers. 

When the priest steps between husband and wife, with the name of God onhis lips, he blasphemes. When, in the name of God, he resists educationand science, he blasphemes. When, in the name of God, he opposes freedomof thought and liberty of conscience, he blasphemes. When, in the nameof God, he robs, tortures, and kills those who differ from him, heblasphemes. When, in the name of God, he opposes the equal rights ofall, he blasphemes. When, in the name of God, he preaches content to thepoor and oppressed, flatters the rich and powerful, and makes religioustyranny the handmaiden of political privilege, he blasphemes. Andwhen he takes the Bible in his hand, and says it was written by theinspiration of God, he blasphemes almost beyond forgiveness. 

Who are the blasphemers? Not we who preach freedom and progress for allmen; but those who try to bind the world with chains of dogma, andto burden it, in God's name, with all the foul superstitions of itsignorant past. 

THE BIRTH OF CHRIST. 

 (December, 1880. )

"The time draws near, the birth of Christ, " as Tennyson sings in "InMemoriam, " and the pious followers of the Nazarene will celebrate itwith wonted orgies of pleasure. The Incarnation will be pondered tothe accompaniment of roast beef, and the Atonement will play lambentlyaround the solid richness of plum-pudding. And thus will be illustratedthe biological truth that the stomach is the basis of everything, including religion. 

But while Christians comport themselves thus in presence of thesubtlest mysteries of faith, the Sceptic cannot be without his peculiarreflections. He, of course, knows that the festal observance of thisseason is far more ancient than Christianity; but he naturally wondershow people, who imagine it to be a unique feature of their sublimelyspiritual creed, remain contented with its extremely sensual character. They profess to believe that the fate of the whole human race wasdecided by the advent of the Man of Sorrows; yet they commemorate thatevent by an unhealthy consumption of the meat which perisheth, and awild indulgence in the frivolous pleasures of that carnal mind which isat enmity with God. Astonished at such conduct, the Sceptic muses onthe inconsistency of mankind. He may also once more consider thecircumstances of the birth of Christ and its relation to the history ofthe modern world. 

Jesus, called the Christ, is popularly supposed to have been of the seedof David, from which it was promised that the Messiah should come. Itis, however, perfectly clear that he was in no-wise related to the manafter God's own heart His putative father, Joseph, admittedly had noshare in bringing him into the world; for he disdained the assistance ofa father, although he was unable to dispense with that of a mother. ButJoseph, and not Mary, according to the genealogies of Matthew and Luke, was the distant blood relation of David; and therefore Jesus was not ofthe seed of the royal house, but a bastard slip grafted on the ancientfamily-tree by the Holy Ghost. It is a great pity that newspapercorrespondents did not exist in those days. Had Joseph been skilfully"interviewed, " it is highly probable that the world would have beeninitiated into his domestic secrets, and enlightened as to the paternityof Mary's eldest son. The Holy Ghost is rather too shadowy a personageto be the father of a lusty boy, and no young lady would be credited inthis age if she ascribed to him the authorship of a child born out ofwedlock. Most assuredly no magistrate would make an order against himfor its maintenance. Even a father of the Spiritualist persuasion, who believed in what is grandly called "the materialisation of spiritforms, " would probably be more than dubious if his daughter were topresent him with a grandson whose father lived on the other side ofdeath and resided in a mansion not made with hands. It is, we repeat, tobe for ever regretted that poor Joseph has not left his version of theaffair. The Immaculate Conception might perhaps have been cleared up, and theology relieved of a half-obscene mystery, which has unfortunatelyperverted not a few minds. 

The birth of Jesus was announced to "wise men from the East" by theappearance of a singular star. Is not this a relic of astrology? Welldoes Byron sing--

 "Ye stars! which are the poetry of heaven, If in your bright beams we would read the fate Of men and empires, 'tis to be forgiven, That in our aspirations to be great Our destinies o'erleap their mortal state, And claim a kindred with you; for ye are A beauty and a mystery, and create In us such love and reverence from afar That fortune, fame, power, life, Have named themselves a star. "

But this star was the most wonderful on record. It "went before"the wise men, and "_stood over_ where the young child was. " Such anabsurdity could be related and credited only by people who conceivedof the sky as a solid vault, not far distant, wherein all the heavenlybodies were stuck. The present writer once asked an exceedingly ignorantand simple man where he thought he would alight if he dropped from thecomet then in the sky. "Oh, " said he, naming the open space nearesthis own residence, "somewhere about Finsbury Circus. " That man'sastronomical notions were very imperfect, but they were quite as goodas those of the person who seriously wrote, and of the persons whoseriously believe, this fairy tale of the star which heralded the birthof Christ. 

Luke's version of the episode differs widely from Matthew's. He makesno reference to "wise men from the East, " but simply says that certain"shepherds" of the same country, who kept watch over their flock bynight, were visited by "the angel of the Lord, " and told that they wouldfind the Savior, Christ the Lord, just born at Bethlehem, the City ofDavid, "wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. " Luke doesnot, as is generally supposed, represent Mary as confined in a stablebecause Joseph was too poor to pay for decent accommodation, but because"there was no room for them in the inn. " It is perfectly consistent withall the Gospel references to Joseph's status to assume that he carriedon a flourishing business, and Jesus himself in later years mightdoubtless have earned a good living in the concern if he had notdeliberately preferred to lead the life of a mendicant preacher. This, however, is by the way. Our point is that Luke says nothing about the"star" or the "wise men from the East, " who had an important interviewwith Herod himself; while Matthew says nothing about the "manger" orthe shepherds and their angelic visitors. Surely these discrepancies onpoints so important, and as to which there could be little mistake, areenough to throw discredit on the whole story. 

It is further noticeable that Luke is absolutely silent about Herod'smassacre of the innocents. What can we think of his reticence on such asubject? Had the massacre occurred, it would have been widely known, andthe memory of so horrible a deed would have been vivid for generations. Matthew, or whoever wrote the Gospel which bears his name, is open tosuspicion. His mind was distorted by an intense belief in prophecy, asubject which, as old Bishop South said, either finds a man cracked orleaves him so. After narrating the story of Herod's massacre, he adds:"Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy, the prophet, saying, " etc. Now, he makes similar reference to prophecy no less thanfive times in the first two chapters, and in each case we find that the"prophetical" utterance referred to has not the faintest connexion withthe incident related. 

Besides, a man who writes history with one eye on his own period, andthe other on a period centuries anterior is not likely to be veracious, however earnestly he may intend to. There is an early tradition, whichis as strong as any statement about the history of the Primitive Church, that Matthew's Gospel was originally written in Hebrew; and it hasbeen supposed that the writer gratuitously threw in these references toJeremy and others, in order to please the Jews, who were extremely fondof prophecy. But this supposition is equally fatal to his credibility asan historian. In any case, the Evangelists differ so widely on mattersof such interest and importance that we are constrained to discredittheir story. It is evidently, as scholarship reveals, a fairy tale, which slowly gathered round the memory of Jesus after his death. Someof its elements were creations of his disciples' fancy, but others wereborrowed from the mythology of more ancient creeds. 

Yet this fairy tale is accepted by hundreds of millions of menas veritable history. It is incorporated into the foundation ofChristianity, and every year at this season its incidents are joyouslycommemorated. How slowly the world of intelligence moves! But let us notdespair. Science and scholarship have already done much to sap belief inthis supernatural religion, and we may trust them to do still more. Theywill ultimately destroy its authority by refuting its pretensions, andcompel it to take its place among the general multitude of historicfaiths. 

If Jesus was the Christ, the Messiah, the Deliverer, why is theworld still so full of sin and misery? The Redeemer has come, saythe Christians. Yes, we reply, but when will come the redemption?Apostrophising Jesus in his lines "Before a Crucifix, " Mr. Swinburnereminds him that "the nineteenth wave of the ages rolls now uswardsince thy birth began, " and then inquires:--

 "Hast thou fed full men's starved-out souls, Or are there less oppressions done In this wide world under the sun?"

Only a negative answer can be given. Christ has in no wise redeemed theworld. He was no god of power, but a weak fallible man like ourselves;and his cry of despair on the cross might now be repeated with tenfoldforce. The older myth of Prometheus is truer and more inspiring than themyth of Christ. If there be gods, they have never yielded man aught oftheir grace. All his possessions have been cunningly, patiently, andvalorously extorted from the powers that be, even as Prometheus filchedthe fire from heaven. In that realm of mythology, whereto all religionswill eventually be consigned, Jesus will dwindle beneath Prometheus. Oneis feminine, and typifies resigned submission to a supernatural will;the other is masculine, and typifies that insurgent audacity of heartand head, which has wrested a kingdom of science from the vast empire ofnescience, and strewed the world with the wrecks of theological power. 

THE REIGN OF CHRIST. 

 (January, 1880. )

Christmas and Easter are fruitful in panegyrics on Jesus and thereligion which fraudulently bears his name. On these occasions, not onlythe religious but even the secular newspapers give the rein to theirrhetoric and imagination, and indulge in much fervid eloquence on thebirth or the crucifixion of the Nazarene. Time-honored platitudesare brought out from their resting-places and dexterously moved to awell-known tune; and fallacies which have been refuted _ad nauseam_are paraded afresh as though their logical purity were still beyondsuspicion. Papers that differ on all other occasions and on all othersubjects concur then, and "when they do agree their unanimity iswonderful. " While the more sober and orthodox discourse in tonesbefitting their dignity and repute, the more profane riotously join inthe chorus; and not to be behind the rest, the notoriously misbelievingGreatest Circulator orders from the profanest member of its staff "arousing article on the Crucifixion, " or on the birth of Jesus, asthe case may be. All this, however, is of small account, except as anindication of the slavery of our "independent" journals to Bumble andhis prejudices, before whom they are obliged to masquerade when heordains a celebration of his social or religious rites. But here andthere a more serious voice is heard through the din, with an accent ofearnest veracity, and not that of an actor playing a part. Such a voicemay be worth listening to, and certainly no other can be. Let us hearthe Rev. J. Baldwin Brown on "The Reign of Christ. " He is, I believe, honorably distinguished among Dissenters; his sermons often bear marksof originality; and the goodness of his heart, whatever may be thoughtof the strength of his head, is sufficiently attested by his emphaticrevolt against the doctrine of Eternal Torture in Hell. 

Before criticising Mr. Brown's sermon in detail I cannot helpremarking that it is far too rhetorical and far too empty of argument. Sentimentality is the bane of religion in our day; subservience topopularity degrades the pulpit as it degrades the press. If we desire tofind the language of reason in theology, we must seek it in the writingsof such men as Newman, who contemplate the ignorant and passionatemultitude with mingled pity and disdain. The "advanced" school oftheologians, from Dean Stanley to the humblest reconciler of reason andfaith, are sentimentalists almost to a man; the reason being, I take it, that although their emotional tendencies are very admirable, they lackthe intellectual consistency and rigor which impel others to standon definite first principles, as a sure basis of operation and animpregnable citadel against attack. Mr. Brown belongs to this "advanced"school, and has a liberal share of its failings. He is full of eloquentpassages that lead to nothing, and he excites expectations which areseldom if ever satisfied. He faces stupendous obstacles raised by reasonagainst his creed, and just as we look to see him valiantly surmountthem, we find that he veils them from base to summit with a dense cloudof words, out of which his voice is heard asking us to believe him onthe other side. Yet of all men professional students of the Bible shouldbe freest from such a fault, seeing what a magnificent masterpiece it isof terse and vigorous simplicity. Mr. Brown and his "advanced" friendswould do well to ponder that quaint and pregnant aphorism of old BishopAndrewes--"_Waste words addle questions_. " When I first read it Iwas thrown into convulsions of laughter, and even now it tickles myrisibility; but despite its irresistible quaint-ness I cannot but regardit as one of the wisest and pithiest sentences in our literature. Dr. Newman has splendidly amplified it in a passage of his "UniversitySermons, " which I gratuitously present to Mr. Brown and every readerwho can make use of it:--"Half the controversies in the world are verbalones; and could they be brought to a plain issue, they would be broughtto a prompt termination. Parties engaged in them would then perceive, either that in substance they agreed together, or that their differencewas one of first principles. This is the great object to be aimed atin the present age, though confessedly a very arduous one. We need notdispute, we need not prove, --we need but define. At all events, let us, if we can, do this first of all; and then see who are left for us todispute with, and what is left for us to prove. "

Mr. Brown's sermon on "The Reign of Christ" is preached from a verseof St. Paul's first Epistle to Timothy, wherein Jesus is styled "Theblessed and only Potentate. " From this "inspired" statement he derivesinfinite consolation. This, he admits, is far from being the best ofall possible worlds, for it is full of strife and cruelty, the wail ofanguish and the clamor of frenzy; but as Christ is "the blessed and onlyPotentate, " moral order will finally be evolved from the chaos and goodbe triumphant over evil. Now the question arises: Who made the chaos andwho is responsible for the evil? Not Christ, of course: Mr. Brownwill not allow that. Is it the Devil then? Oh no! To say that would beblasphemy against God. He admits, however, that the notion has largelyprevailed, and has even been formulated into religious creeds, "that amalignant spirit, a spirit who loves cursing as God loves blessing, hasa large and independent share in the government of the world. " But, headds, "in Christendom men dare not say that they believe it, with thethrone of the crucified and risen Christ revealed in the Apocalypse totheir gaze. " Ordinary people will rub their eyes in sheer amazement atthis cool assertion. Is it not plain that Christians in all ages havebelieved in the power and subtlety of the Devil as God's sleeplessantagonist? Have they not held, and do they not still hold, that hecaused the Fall of Adam and Eve, and thus introduced original sin, whichwas certain to infect the whole human race ever afterwards until theend of time? Was not John Milton a Christian, and did he not in his"Paradise Lost" develope all the phases of that portentous competitionbetween the celestial and infernal powers for the virtual possession ofthis world and lordship over the destinies of our race? If we acceptMr. Brown's statements we shall have to reverse history and belie theevidence of our senses. 

But who is responsible for the moral chaos and the existence of evil?That is the question. If to say _Christ_ is absurd, and to say the_Devil_ blasphemy, what alternative is left? The usual answer is: Man'sfreewill. Christ as "the blessed and only Potentate" leaves us libertyof action, and our own evil passions cause all the misery of ourlives. But who gave us our evil passions? To this question no answeris vouchsafed, and so we are left exactly at the point from which westarted. Yet Mr. Brown has a very decided opinion as to the part these"evil passions" play in the history cf mankind. He refers to them as"the Devil's brood of lust and lies, and wrongs and hates, and murderouspassion and insolent power, which through all the ages of earth's sadhistory have made it liker hell than heaven. " No Atheist could usestronger language. Mr. Brown even believes that our "insurgent lustsand passions" are predetermining causes of heresy, so that in respectboth to faith and to works they achieve our damnation. How then did wecome by them? The Evolutionist frankly answers the question without fearof blasphemy on the one hand or of moral despair on the other. Mr. Brownis bound to give _his_ answer after raising the question so vividly. But he will not. He urges that it "presents points of tremendousdifficulty, " although "we shall unravel the mystery, we shall solve theproblems in God's good time. " Thus the solution of the problem is to bepostponed until we are dead, when it will no longer interest us. However convenient this may be for the teachers of mystery, it is mostunsatisfactory to rationalists. Mr. Brown must also be reminded thatthe "tremendous difficulties" he alludes to are all of his own creation. There is no difficulty about any fact except in relation to some theory. It is Mr. Brown's theory of the universe which creates the difficulties. It does not account for all the facts of existence--nay, it is logicallycontravened by the most conspicuous and persistent of them. Instead ofmodifying or transforming his theory into accordance with the facts, herushes off with it into the cloud-land of faith. There let him remainas he has a perfect right to. Our objection is neither to reason nor tofaith, but to a mischievous playing fast and loose with both. 

Mr. Brown opines that Christ will reign until all his enemies are underhis feet. And who are these enemies? Not the souls of men, says Mr. Brown, for Christ "loves them with an infinite tenderness. " Thisinfinite tenderness is clearly not allied to infinite power or theworld's anguish would long since have been appeased and extinguished, or never have been permitted to exist at all. The real enemies of Christare not the souls of men, but "the hates and passions which tormentthem. " Oh those hates and passions! They are the dialectical balls withwhich Mr. Brown goes through his performance in that circle of _petitioprincipii_ so hated by all logicians, the middle sphere of intellectstoo light for the solid earth of fact and too gross for the aerialheaven of imagination. 

It will be a fitting conclusion to present to Mr. Brown a veryserious matter which he has overlooked. Christ, "the blessed and onlyPotentate, " came on earth and originated the universal religion nearlytwo thousand years ago. Up to the present time three-fourths of theworld's inhabitants are outside its pale, and more than half of themhave never heard it preached. Amongst the quarter which nominallyprofesses Christianity disbelief is spreading more rapidly than themissionaries succeed in converting the heathen; so that the reign ofChrist is being restricted instead of increased. To ask us, despitethis, to believe that he is God, and possessed of infinite power, is toask us to believe a marvel compared with which the wildest fables arecredible, and the most extravagant miracles but as dust in the balance. 

THE PRIMATE ON MODERN INFIDELITY. 

 (September, 1880. )

A bishop once twitted a curate with preaching indifferent orthodoxy. "Well, " answered the latter, "I don't see how you can expect me to be asorthodox as yourself. I believe at the rate of a hundred a year, and youat the rate of ten thousand. " In the spirit of this anecdote we shouldexpect an archbishop to be as orthodox as the frailty of human naturewill allow. A man who faithfully believes at the rate of fifteenthousand a year should be able to swallow most things and stick atvery little. And there can be no doubt that the canny Scotchman who hasclimbed or wriggled up to the Archbishopric of Canterbury is preparedto go any lengths his salary may require. We suspect that he regards thedoctrines of the Church very much as did that irreverent youth mentionedby Sidney Smith, who, on being asked to sign the Thirty-nine Articles, replied "Oh yes, forty if you like. " The clean linen of his theology isimmaculately pure. Never has he fallen under a suspicion of entertainingdangerous or questionable opinions, and he has in a remarkable degreethat faculty praised by Saint Paul of being all things to all men, orat least as many men as make a lumping majority. What else could beexpected from a Scotchman who has mounted to the spiritual Primacy ofEngland?

His Grace has recently been visiting the clergy and churchwardens ofhis diocese and delivering what are called Charges to them. The third ofthese was on the momentous subject of Modern Infidelity, which seems tohave greatly exercised his mind. This horrid influence is found tobe very prevalent, much to the disconcertion of his Grace, who feltconstrained to begin his Charge with expressions of despondency, andonly recovered his spirits towards the end, where he confidently relieson the gracious promise of Christ never to forsake his darling church. Some of the admissions he makes are worth recording--

"I can, " he says, "have no doubt that the aspect of Christian societyin the present day is somewhat troubled, that the Church of Christ andthe faith of Christ are passing through a great trial in all regionsof the civilised world, and not least among ourselves. There are darkclouds on the horizon already breaking, which may speedily burst intoa violent storm. . . . It is well to note in history how these twoevils--superstition and infidelity--act and react in strengthening eachother. Still, I cannot doubt that the most [? more] formidable ofthe two for us at present is infidelity. . . . It is indeed a frightfulthought that numbers of our intelligent mechanics seem to be alienatedfrom all religious ordinances, that our Secularist halls are wellfilled, that there is an active propagandism at work for shaking beliefin all creeds. "

These facts are of course patent, but it is something to get anArchbishop to acknowledge them, His Grace also finds "from above, in theregions of literature and art, efforts to degrade mankind by denying ourhigh original:" the high original being, we presume, a certain simplepair called Adam and Eve, who damned themselves and nearly the wholeof their posterity by eating an apple six thousand years ago. Thedegradation of a denial of this theory is hardly perceptible tountheological eyes. Most candid minds would prefer to believe in Darwinrather than in Moses even if the latter had, which he has not, a singleleg to stand on. For the theory of our Simian origin at least involvesprogression in the past and perhaps salvation in the future of ourrace, while the "high original" theory involved our retrogression andperdition. His grace wonders how these persons can "confine their hopesand aspirations to a life which is so irresistibly hastening to itsspeedy conclusion. " But surely he is aware that they do so for the verysimple reason that they know nothing of any other life to hope aboutor aspire to. One bird in the hand is worth twenty in the bush when thebush itself remains obstinately invisible, and if properly cooked isworth all the dishes in the world filled only with expectations. Hisgrace likewise refers to the unequal distribution of worldly goods, to the poverty and misery which exist "notwithstanding all attempts toregenerate society by specious schemes of socialistic reorganisation. "It is, of course, very natural that an archbishop in the enjoyment of avast income should stigmatise these "specious schemes" for distributingmore equitably the good things of this world; but the words "blessed beye poor" go ill to the tune of fifteen thousand a year, and there is agrim irony in the fact that palaces are tenanted by men who professto represent and preach the gospel of him who had not where to lay hishead. Modern Christianity has been called a civilised heathenism; withno less justice it might be called an organised hypocrisy. 

After a dolorous complaint as to the magazines "lying everywhere for theuse of our sons and daughters, " in which the doctrines both of naturaland of revealed religion are assailed, the Archbishop proceeds to dealwith the first great form of infidelity, namely Agnosticism. Witha feeble attempt at wit he remarks that the name itself implies aconfession of ignorance, which he marvels to find unaccompanied by"the logical result of a philosophical humility. " A fair account of theAgnostic position is then given, after which it is severely observedthat "the better feelings of man contradict these sophisms. " In proofof this, his Grace cites the fact that in Paris, the "stronghold ofAtheistical philosophy, " the number of burials that take place withoutreligious rites is "a scarcely appreciable percentage. " We suspect theaccuracy of this statement, but having no statistics on the subject byus, we are not prepared to dispute it. We will assume its truth; butthe important question then arises--What kind of persons are those whodispense with the rites of religion? Notoriously they are men ofthe highest intellect and character, whose quality far outweighs thequantity of the other side. They are the leaders of action and thought, and what they think and do to-day will be thought and done by the massesto-morrow. When a man like Gambetta, occupying such a high position andwielding such immense influence, invariably declines to enter a church, whether he attends the marriage or the funeral of his friends, weare entitled to say that his example on our side is infinitely moreimportant than the practice of millions who are creatures of habitand for the most part blind followers of tradition. The Archbishop'sargument tells against his own position, and the fact he cites, whenclosely examined, proves more for our side than he thought it proved forhis own. 

Atheism is disrelished by his Grace even more than Agnosticism. Hisfavorite epithet for it is "dogmatic. " "Surely, " he cries, "the boastedenlightenment of this century will never tolerate the gross ignoranceand arrogant self-conceit which presumes to dogmatise as to thingsconfessedly beyond its ken. " Quite so; but that is what the theologiansare perpetually doing. To use Matthew Arnold's happy expression, theytalk familiarly about God as though he were a man living in the nextstreet. The Atheist and the Agnostic confess their inability to fathomthe universe and profess doubts as to the ability of others. Yet theyare called dogmatic, arrogant, and self-conceited. On the other hand, the theologians claim the power of seeing _through_ nature up tonature's God. Yet they, forsooth, must be accounted modest, humble, andretiring. 

 "O wad some pow'r the giftie gie us To see oursels as ithers see us!"

These abominable Atheists are by no means scarce, for, says his Grace, "practical Atheists we have everywhere, if Atheism be the denial ofGod. " Just so; that is precisely what we "infidels" have been saying foryears. Christianity is utterly alien to the life of modern society, and in flagrant contradiction to the spirit of our secular progress. Itstands outside all the institutions of our material civilisation. Itschurches still echo the old strains of music and the old dogmatic tonesfrom the pulpit, but the worshippers themselves feel the anomaly of itsdoctrines and rites when they return to their secular avocations. TheSunday does nothing but break the continuity of their lives, steepingthem in sentiments and ideas which have no relation to their experienceduring the rest of the week. The profession of Christendom is one thing, its practice is another. God is simply acknowledged with the lipson Sunday, and on every other day profoundly disregarded in all thepursuits of life whether of business or of pleasure. Even in ournational legislature, although the practice of prayer is still retained, any man would be sneered at as a fool who made the least appeal to thesanctions of theology. An allusion to the Sermon on the Mount wouldprovoke a smile, and a citation of one of the Thirty-nine Articles beinstantly ruled as irrelevant. Nothing from the top to the bottom ofour political and social life is done with any reference to thosetheological doctrines which the nation professes to believe, and to themaintenance of which it devotes annually so many millions of its wealth. 

In order to pose any member of the two great divisions of "infidelity, "the Archbishop advises his clergy to ask the following rather comicalquestions:--

"Do you believe nothing which is not capable of being tested by theordinary rules which govern experience in things natural? How then doyou know that you yourself exist? How do you know that the perceptionsof your senses are not mere delusions, and that there is anythingoutside you answering to what your mind conceives? Have you a mind? andif you have not, what is it that enables you to think and reason, andfear, and hope? Are these conditions of your being the mere resultsof your material organism, like the headache which springs fromindigestion, or the high spirits engendered by too much wine? Areyou something better than a vegetable highly cultivated, or thanyour brothers of the lower animals? and, if so, what is it thatdifferentiates your superiority? Why do things outside you obey yourwill? Who gave you a will? and, if so, what is it? I think you mustallow that intellect is a thing almost divine, if there be anythingdivine; and I think also you must allow that it is not a thing to bepropagated as we propagate well-made and high-bred cattle. Whence cameAlexander the Great? Whence Charlemagne? And whence the First Napoleon?Was it through a mere process of spontaneous generation that they sprangup to alter by their genius and overwhelming will the destinies of theworld? Whence came Homer, Shakespeare, Bacon? Whence came all thegreat historians? Whence came Plato and all the bright lights of divinephilosophy, of divinity, of poetry? Their influence, after all, you mustallow to be quite as wide and enduring as any produced by the mastersof those positive material sciences which you worship. Do you think thatall these great minds--for they are minds, and their work was not theproduct of a merely highly organised material frame--were the outcomeof some system of material generation, which your so-called science cansubject to rule, and teach men how to produce by growth, as they growvegetables?"

The Archbishop is not a very skilful physician. His prescription showsthat he has not diagnosed the disease. These strange questions mightstrike the infidel "all of a heap, " as the expressive vernacular hasit, but although they might dumbfounder him, they would assuredlynot convince. If the Archbishop of Canterbury were not so exalted apersonage we should venture to remark that to ask a man how he knowsthat he exists betrays a marvellous depth of ignorance or folly. Ultimate facts of consciousness are not subjects of proof or disproof;they are their own warranty and cannot be transcended. There is, besides, something extraordinary in an archbishop of the church towhich Berkeley belonged supposing that extreme idealism follows only therejection of deity. Whether the senses are after all delusory does notmatter to the Atheist a straw; they are real enough to him, theymake his world in which he lives and moves, and it is of nopractical consequence whether they mirror an outer world or not. Whatdifferentiates you from the lower animals? asks his Grace. The answer issimple--a higher development of nervous structure. Who gave you a will?is just as sensible a question as Who gave you a nose? We have everyreason to believe that both can be accounted for on natural groundswithout introducing a supernatural donor. The question whetherAlexander, Napoleon, Homer, Bacon and Shakespeare came through a processof spontaneous generation is excruciatingly ludicrous. That processcould only produce the very lowest form of organism, and not awonderfully complex being like man who is the product of an incalculableevolution. But the Archbishop did not perhaps intend this; it may bethat in his haste to silence the "infidel" he stumbled over his ownmeaning. Lastly, there is a remarkable naïveté in the aside of the finalquestion--"for they are minds. " He should have added "you know, " andthen the episode would have been delightfully complete. The assumptionof the whole point at issue in an innocent parenthesis is perhaps to beexpected from a pulpiteer, but it is not likely that the "infidel"will be caught by such a simple stratagem. All these questions are soirrelevant and absurd that we doubt whether his Grace would have thecourage to put one of them to any sceptic across a table, or indeed fromany place in the world except the pulpit, which is beyond all risk ofattack, and whence a man may ask any number of questions without theleast fear of hearing one of them answered. 

The invitation given by his grace, to "descend to the harder groundof strictest logical argumentation, " is very appropriate. Whetherthe movement be ascending or descending, there is undoubtedly a vastdistance between logical argumentation and anything he has yet advanced. But even on the "harder" ground the Archbishop treads no more firmly. He demands to know how the original protoplasm became endowed with life, and if that question cannot be answered he calls upon us to admithis theory of divine agency, as though that made the subject moreintelligible. Supernatural hypotheses are but refuges of ignorance. Earl Beaconsfield, in his impish way, once remarked that where knowledgeended religion began, and the Archbishop of Canterbury seems to sharethat opinion. His Grace also avers that "no one has ever yet been ableto refute the argument necessitating a great First Cause. " It is veryeasy to assert this, but rather difficult to maintain it. One assertionis as good as another, and we shall therefore content ourselves withsaying that in our opinion the argument for a great First Cause was (tomention only one name) completely demolished by John Stuart Mill, whoshowed it to be based on a total misconception of the nature of causeand effect, which apply only to phænomenal changes and not to theapparently unchangeable matter and force of which the universe iscomposed. 

But the overwhelming last argument is that "man has something in himwhich speaks of God, of something above this fleeting world, andrules of right and wrong have their foundation elsewhere than in man'sopinion. . . . That there is an immutable, eternal distinction betweenright and wrong--that there is a God who is on the side of right. " Againwe must complain of unbounded assertion. Every point of this rhetoricalflourish is disputed by "infidels" who are not likely to yield toanything short of proof. If God is on the side of right he is singularlyincapable of maintaining it; for, in this world at least, according tosome penetrating minds, the devil has hitherto had it pretty much hisown way, and good men have had to struggle very hard to make things evenas equitable as we find them. But after all, says his Grace, the supremedefence of the Church against the assaults of infidelity is Christhimself. Weak in argument, the clergy must throw themselves behind hisshield and trust in him. Before his brightness "the mists which risefrom a gross materialistic Atheism evaporate, and are scattered like theclouds of night before the dawn. " It is useless to oppose reason to suchpreaching as this. We shall therefore simply retort the Archbishop'sepithets. Gross and materialistic are just the terms to describe areligion which traffics in blood and declares that without the sheddingof it there is no remission of sin; whose ascetic doctrines malign ourpurest affections and defile the sweetest fountains of our spiritualhealth; whose heaven is nothing but an exaggerated jeweller's shop, andits hell a den of torture in which God punishes his children for theconsequences of his own ignorance, incapacity or crime. 

BAITING A BISHOP. 

 (February, 1880. )

Bishops should speak as men having authority, and not as the Scribesand Pharisees. Even the smallest of them should be a great man. An archbishop, with fifteen thousand a year, ought to possess atranscendent intellect, almost beyond comprehension; while the worstpaid of all the reverend fathers of the Church, with less than a fifthof that salary, ought to possess no common powers of mind. The Bishopof Carlisle is not rich as bishops go, but he enjoys a yearly incomeof £4, 500, besides the patronage of forty-nine livings. Now this quiteequals the salary of the Prime Minister of the greatest empire in theworld, and the Bishop of Carlisle should therefore be a truly great man. We regret however, to say that he is very much the reverse, if we mayjudge from a newspaper report which has reached us of his lectureon "Man's Place in Nature, " recently delivered before the KeswickScientific and Literary Society. Newspaper reports, we know, are oftenmisleading in consequence of their summary character; neverthelesstwo columns of small type must give some idea of a discourse, howeverabstruse or profound; here and there, if such occured, a fine thought ora shrewd observation would shine through the densest veil. Yet, unlessour vision be exceptionally obtuse, nothing of the kind is apparent inthis report of the Bishop's lecture. Being, as his lordship confessed, the development of "a sermon delivered to the men at the RoyalAgricultural Society's Show last summer, " the lecture was perhaps, likethe sermon, adapted to the bucolic mind, and thus does meagre justice tothe genius of its author. His lordship, however, chose to read it beforea society with some pretentions to culture, and therefore such a pleacannot avail. As the case stands, we are constrained to accusethe bishop of having delivered a lecture on a question of supremeimportance, which would do little credit to the president of a YoungMen's Christian Association; and when we reflect that a parson occupiedthe chair at the meeting, and that the vote of thanks to the episcopallecturer was moved by a canon, who coupled with it some highlycomplimentary remarks, we are obliged to think the Church more short ofbrains than even we had previously believed, and that Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin has already been written on its temple walls by the finger ofdoom. 

Very early in his lecture the Bishop observed that "the Scriptures arebuilt on the hypothesis of the supreme and unique position of man. "Well, there is nothing novel in this statement. What we want is someproof of the hypothesis. His lordship's way of supplying this need is, to say the least, peculiar. After saying that "he would rather trust thepoet as an exponent of man than he would a student of natural history, "he proceeds to quote from Shakespeare, Pope and Plato, and ends thatpart of his argument with a rhetorical flourish, as though he had thusreally settled the whole case of Darwin _versus_ Moses. Our reverenceof great poets is probably as deep and sincere as the Bishop's, butwe never thought of treating them as scientific authorities, or aswitnesses to events that happened hundreds of thousands of years beforetheir birth. Poets deal with subjective facts of consciousness, or withobjective facts as related to these. The dry light of the intellect, radiated from the cloudless sun of truth, is not their proper element, but belongs exclusively to the man of science. They move in a softerelement suffused with emotion, whose varied clouds are by the sun ofimagination touched to all forms of beauty and splendor. The scientificman's description of a lion, for instance, would be very different froma poet's; because the one would describe the lion as it is in itself, and the other as it affects us, a living whole, through our organs ofsight and sound. Both are true, because each is faithful to its purposeand expresses a fact; yet neither can stand for the other, becausethey express different facts and are faithful to different purposes. Shakespeare poetically speaks of "the ruddy drops that visit this sadheart, " but the scientific truth of the circulation of the blood hadto await its Harvey. In like manner, it was not Milton but Newtonwho expounded the Cosmos; the great poet, like Dante before him, wovepre-existent cosmical ideas into the texture of his sublime epic, whilethe great scientist wove all the truth of them into the texture of hissublime theory. Let each receive his meed of reverent praise, but do notlet us appeal to Newton on poetry or to Milton on physics. And when aBishop of Carlisle, or other diocese, complains that "the views advancedby scientific men tend painfully to degrade the views of poets andphilosophers, " let us reply that in almost every case the great truthsof science have been found to transcend infinitely the marvels oftheology, and that the magnificence of song persists through allfluctuations of knowledge, because its real cause lies less in thesubject than in the native grandeur of the poet's mind. 

Man's place in nature is, indeed, a great question, and it can besettled only by a wide appeal to past and present facts. And thosefacts, besides being objective realities, must be treated in a purelyscientific, and not in a poetic or didactic spirit. Let the poet singthe beauty of a consummate flower; and, if such things are required, let the moralist preach its lessons. But neither should arrogate theprerogative of the botanist, whose special function it is to inform usof its genesis and development, and its true relations to other formsof vegetable life. So with man. The poet may celebrate his passions andaspirations, his joys and sorrows, his laughter and tears, and ever bodyforth anew the shapes of things unseen; the moralist may employ everyfact of his life to illustrate its laws or to enforce its duties; butthey must leave it to the biologist to explain his position in theanimal economy, and the stages by which it has been reached. With regardto that, Darwin is authoritative, while Moses is not even entitled to ahearing. 

Although the Bishop is very ready to quote from the poets, he is notalways ready to use them fairly. For instance, he cites the splendid andfamous passage in "Hamlet:"--"What a piece of work is man! How noble inreason! How infinite in faculties! in form and moving, how express andadmirable! in action, how like an angel! in apprehension, how likea god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals!" There hislordship stops, and then exclaims, "Shakespeare knew nothing of theevolution of man from inferior forms. " But why did he not continuethe quotation? Hamlet goes on to say, "And yet, what to me is this_quintessence of dust?_" How now, your lordship? We have you on the hip!"Quintessence of dust" comes perilously near to evolution. Does notyour lordship remember, too, Hamlet's pursuing the dust of Cæsar to theignominious bunghole? And have you never reflected how the prescientmind of Shakespeare created an entirely new and wonderful figurein literature, the half-human, half-bestial Caliban, with his godSetebos--a truly marvellous resuscitation of primitive man, that in ourday has inspired Mr. Browning's "Caliban on Setebos, " which containsthe entire essence of all that Tylor and other investigators in the samefield have since written on the subject of Animism? It seems that theLord Bishop of Carlisle reads even the poets to small purpose. 

Haughtily waving the biologists aside, his lordship proceeds to remarkthat "man's superiority is not the same that a dog would claim over alobster, or an eagle over a worm;" the difference between man andother animals being "not one of degree, but of kind. " Such a statement, without the least evidence being adduced to support it, places theBishop almost outside the pale of civil discussion. When will theselordly ecclesiastics learn that the time for dogmatic assertion is past, and that the intellectual temper of the present age can be satisfiedonly by proof? We defy the Bishop of Carlisle to indicate a singlephase of man's nature which has no parallel in the lower animals. Man'sphysical structure is notoriously akin to theirs, and even his braindoes not imply a distinction of kind, for every convolution of the brainof man is reproduced in the brain of the higher apes. His lordship drawsa distinction between instinct and reason, which is purely fanciful andevinces great ignorance of the subject. That, however, is a question wehave at present no room to discuss; nor, indeed, is there any necessityto do so, since his lordship presently admits that the lower animalsshare our "reason" to some extent, just as to a much larger extent weshare their "instinct, " and thus evacuates the logical fortress he tooksuch pains to construct. 

Quitting that ground, which proves too slippery for his feet, the Bishopgoes on to notice the moral and aesthetic difference between man and thelower animals. No animal, says his lordship, shows "anything approachingto a love of art. " Now we are quite aware that no animal except man everpainted a picture or chiselled a statue, for these things involve a veryhigh development of the artistic faculty. But the appreciation ofform and color, which is the foundation of all fine art, is certainlymanifested by the lower animals, and by some fathem to an extremedegree. If his lordship doubts this, let him study the ways of animalsfor himself; or, if he cannot do that, let him read the chapters in Mr. Darwin's "Descent of Man" on sexual selection among birds. If he retainsany doubt after that, we must conclude that his head is too hard or toosoft to be influenced, in either of which cases he is much to be pitied. 

His lordship thinks that the moral sense is entirely absent in the loweranimals. This, however, is absurdly untrue; so much so, indeed, thatwe shall not trouble to refute it _Good_ and _noble_, he avers, areepithets inapplicable to animals, even to the horse or dog. What vaincreatures men are to talk thus! Does his lordship remember Byron'sepitaph on his Newfoundland dog, and the very uncomplimentarydistinction drawn therein between dogs and men? Look at that bigpet with the lordly yet tender eye! How he submits to the boisterouscaresses of children, because he knows their weakness and shares theirspirit of play! Let their elders do the same, and he will at once showresentment. See him peril his life ungrudgingly for those he loves, oreven for comparative strangers! And shall we deny him the epithet of_noble or good?_ Whatever theologians may say, the sound heart of commonmen and women will answer _No!_

Lastly, we are told that "the religious sentiment is characteristicallyand supremely human. " But here again we must complain of his lordship'smental confusion. The religious sentiment is not a simple but a highlycomplex emotion. Resolve it into its elemental feelings, and it will befound that all these are possessed in some degree by lower animals. Thefeeling of a dog who bays the moon is probably very similar to that ofthe savage who cowers and moans beneath an eclipse; and if the savagehas superstitious ideas as well as awesome feelings, it is only becausehe possesses a higher development of thought and imagination. 

Canon Battersby, who moved the vote of thanks to the Bishop, ridiculedthe biologists, and likened them to Topsy who accounted for herexistence by saying "Specs I growed. " Just so. That is precisely how weall did come into existence. Growth and not making is the law for man aswell as for every other form of life. Moses stands for manufacture andDarwin stands for growth. And if the great biologist finds himself inthe company of Topsy, he will not mind. Perhaps, indeed, as he is saidto enjoy a joke and to be able to crack one, might he jocularly observeto "tremendous personages" like the Bishop of Carlisle, that this is notthe first instance of truths being hidden from the "wise" and revealedunto babes. 

PROFESSOR FLINT ON ATHEISM. 

 (January, 1877. )

Professor Flint delivered last week the first of the present year'scourse of Baird lectures to a numerous audience in Blythswood Church, Glasgow, taking for his subject "The Theories opposed to Theism. "Anti-Theism, he said, is more general now than Atheism, and includesall systems opposed to Theism. Atheism he defined as "the system whichteaches that there is no God, and that it is impossible for man to knowthat there is a God. " At least this is how Professor Flint is reportedin the newspapers, although we hope he was not guilty of so idiotic ajumble. 

Where are the Atheists who say there is no God? What are their names?Having mingled much with thoroughgoing sceptics, and read many volumesof heretical literature, we can confidently defy Professor Flint toproduce the names of half a dozen dogmatic Atheists, and we will givehim the whole world's literature to select from. Does he think that thebrains of an Atheist are addled? If not, why does he make the Atheistfirst affirm that there is _no_ God, and then affirm the impossibilityof man's ever knowing whether there is a God or not? How could a manwho holds his judgment in suspense, or who thinks the universal mysteryinsoluble to us, dogmatise upon the question of God's existence? IfProfessor Flint will carefully and candidly study sceptical literature, he will find that the dogmatic Atheist is as rare a the phoenix, andthat those who consider the extant evidences of Theism inadequate, donot go on to affirm an universal negative, but content themselves withexpressing their ignorance of Nature's _why_. For the most part theyendorse Thomas Cooper's words, "I do not say there _is_ no God, butthis I say, _I know not_" Of course this modesty of affirmation may seemimpiously immodest to one who has been trained and steeped in Theism solong that the infinite universe has become quite explicable to him; butto the sceptic it seems more wise and modest to confess one's ignorance, than to make false pretensions of knowledge. 

Professor Flint "characterised the objections which Atheism urgesagainst the existence of God as extremely feeble. " Against the existenceof _what_ God? There be Gods many and Lords many; which of the longtheological list is to be selected as _the_ God? A God, like everythingelse from the heights to the depths, can be known only by hisattributes; and what the Atheist does is not to argue against theexistence of _any_ God, which would be sheer lunacy, but to take theattributes affirmed by Theism as composing its Deity and inquire whetherthey are compatible with each other and with the facts of life. Findingthat they are not, the Atheist simply sets Theism aside as not proven, and goes on his way without further afflicting himself with suchabstruse questions. 

The Atheist must be a very dreary creature, thinks Professor Flint. Butwhy? Does he know any Atheists, and has he found them one half as drearyas Scotch Calvinists? It may seem hard to the immoderately selfish thatsome Infinite Spirit is not looking after their little interests, butit is assuredly a thousandfold harder to think that this Infinite Spirithas a yawning hell ready to engulph the vast majority of the world'smiserable sinners. If the Atheist has no heaven, he has also no hell, which is a most merciful relief. Far better were universal annihilationthan that even the meanest life should writhe for ever in hell, gnawedby the worm which never dieth, and burnt in the fire which is neverquenched. 

Even Nature, thinks Professor Flint, cannot be contemplated by theAtheist as the Theist contemplates it; for while the latter views itas God's vesture wherewith he hides from us his intolerable glory, thelatter views it as the mere embodiment of force, senseless, aimless, pitiless, an enormous mechanism grinding on of itself from age toage, but towards no God and for no good. Here we must observe that thelecturer trespasses beyond the truth. The Atheist does not affirm thatNature drives on to no God and no good; he simply says he knows notwhither she is driving. And how many Theists are there who think of Godin the presence of Nature, who see God's smile in the sunshine, or hearhis wrath in the storm? Very few, we opine, in this practical scepticalage. To the Atheist as to the Theist, indeed to all blessed with vision, Nature is an ever new wonder of majesty and beauty! Sun, moon, andstars, earth, air, and sky, endure while the generations of men passand perish; but every new generation is warmed, lighted, nurtured andgladdened by them with most sovereign and perfect impartiality. Theloveliness and infinite majesty of Nature speak to all men, of allages, climes and creeds. Not in her inanimate beauty do we find fatalobjections to the doctrine of a wise and bountiful power which overrulesher, but rather in the multiplied horrors, woes, and pangs ofsentient life. When all actual and recorded misery is effaced, when nointolerable grief corrodes and no immedicable despair poisons life, whenthe tears of anguish are assuaged, when crime and vice are unknown andunremembered, and evil lusts are consumed in the fire of holiness; then, and then only, could we admit that a wise and righteous omnipotencerules the universal destinies. Until then we cannot recognise thefatherhood of God, but must find shelter and comfort in the moreefficacious doctrine of the brotherhood of Man. 

Professor Flint concluded his lecture, according to the newspaperreport, thus:--"History bears witness that the declension of religionhas ever been the decline of nations, because it has ever brought thedecay of their moral life; and people have achieved noble things onlywhen strongly animated by religious faith. " All this is very poorstuff indeed to come from a learned professor. What nation has declinedbecause of a relapse from religious belief? Surely not Assyria, Egypt, Greece, or Carthage? In the case of Rome, the decline of the empire wascoincident with the rise of Christianity and the decline of Paganism;but the Roman Empire fell abroad mainly from political, and not fromreligious causes, as every student of history well knows. Christianity, that is the religion of the Bible, has been dying for nearly threecenturies; and during that period, instead of witnessing a generaldegradation of mankind we have witnessed a marvellous elevation. Thecivilisation of to-day, compared with that which existed before SecularScience began her great battle with a tyrannous and obscurantist Church, is as a summer morn to a star-lit winter night. 

Again, it is not true that men have achieved noble things only whenstrongly animated by religious faith; unless by "religious faith" bemeant some vital idea or fervent enthusiasm. The three hundred Spartanswho met certain death at Thermopylae died for a religious idea, but notfor a theological idea, which is a very different thing. They perishedto preserve the integrity of the state to which they belonged. Thegreatest Athenians were certainly not religious in Professor Flint'ssense of the word, and the grand old Roman patriots had scarcely ascintillation of such a religious faith as he speaks of. Their religionwas simply patriotism, but it was quite as operant and effective asChristian piety has ever been. Was it religious faith or patriotismwhich banded Frenchmen together in defiance of all Europe, and madethem march to death as a bridegroom hastens to his bride? And in ourown history have not our greatest achievers of noble things been veryindifferent to theological dogmas? Nay, in all ages, have not thenoblest laborers for human welfare been impelled by an urgent enthusiasmof humanity rather than by any supernatural faith? Professor Flint mayrest assured that even though all "the old faiths ruin and rend, " thehuman heart will still burn, and virtue and beauty still gladden theearth, although divorced from the creeds which held them in the thraldomof an enforced marriage. 

A HIDDEN GOD. 

 (October, 1879. )

The _Christian World_ is distinguished among religious journals by acertain breadth and vigor. On all social and political subjects it isremarkably advanced and outspoken, and its treatment of theologicalquestions is far more liberal and intelligent than sceptics wouldexpect. Of late years it has opened its columns to correspondence onmany topics, some of a watery character, like the reality of Noah'sflood, and others of a burning kind, like the doctrine of eternalpunishment, on all of which great freedom of expression has beenallowed. The editor himself, who is, we suspect, far more sceptical thanmost of his readers, has had his say on the question of Hell, and it isto be inferred from his somewhat guarded utterance that he has littlebelief in any such place. This, however, we state with considerablehesitation, for the majority of Christians still regard the doctrine ofeverlasting torture as indubitable and sacred, and we have no desire tolower him in the estimation of the Christian world in which he labors, or to cast a doubt on the orthodoxy of his creed. But the editorwill not take it amiss if we insist that his paper is liberal in itsChristianity, and unusually tolerant of unbelief. 

Yet, while entitled to praise on his ground, the _Christian World_deserves something else than praise on another. It has recentlypublished a series of articles for the purpose of stimulating faith andallaying doubt. If undertaken by a competent writer, able and willingto face the mighty difference between Christianity and the scientificspirit of our age, such a series of articles might be well worthreading. We might then admire if we could not agree, and derive benefitfrom friendly contact with an antagonist mind. But the writer selectedfor the task appears to possess neither of these qualifications. Insteadof thinking he gushes; instead of reason he supplies us with unlimitedsentiment. We expect to tread solid ground, or at least to find it notperilously soft; and lo! the soil is moist, and now and then we findourselves up to the knees in unctuous mud. How difficult it is nowadaysto discover a really argumentative Christian! The eminent favorites oforthodoxy write sentimental romances and call them "Lives of Christ, "and preach sermons with no conceivable relation to the human intellect;while the apologists of faith imitate the tactics of the cuttle-fish, and when pursued cast out their opaque fluid of sentimentalityto conceal their position. They mostly dabble in the shallows ofscepticism, never daring to venture in the deeps; and what they takepride in as flashes of spiritual light resembles neither the royalgleaming of the sun nor the milder radiance of the moon, but rather thephosphorescence of corruption. 

In the last article of the series referred to, entitled "Thou art a Godthat Hidest Thyself, " there is an abundance of fictitious emotion andspurious rhetoric. From beginning to end there is a painful strain thatnever relaxes, reminding us of singers who pitch their voices too highand have to render all the upper notes in falsetto. An attempt is madeto employ poetical imagery, but it ludicrously fails. The heaven of theBook of Revelation, with its gold and silver and precious stones, is nothing but a magnified jeweller's shop, and a study of it hasinfluenced the style of later writers. At present Christian gushershave descended still lower, dealing not even in gold and jewels, but inBrummagem and paste. The word _gem_ is greatly in vogue. Talmage uses itabout twenty times in every lecture, Parker delights in it, and it oftenfigures on the pages of serious books. In the article before us it ismade to do frequent service. A promise of redemption is represented asshining gem-like on the brow of Revelation, Elims _gem_ the dark bosomof the universal desert, and the morning gleams on the _dew-gemmed_earth. Perhaps a good recipe for this kind of composition would be anhour's gloat on the flaming window of a jeweller's shop in the West End. 

But let us deal with the purport and purpose of the article. It aims atshowing that God hides himself, and why he does so. The fact which it isattempted to explain none will deny. Moses ascended Mount Sinai to seeGod and converse with him, Abraham and God walked and talked together, and according to St. Paul the Almighty is not far from any one of us. But the modern mind is not prone to believe these things. The empire ofreason has been enlarged at the expense of faith, whose provinces haveone after another been annexed until only a small territory is left her, and that she finds it difficult to keep. Coincidently, God has becomeless and less a reality and more and more a dream. The reign of lawis perceived everywhere, and all classes of phenomena may be explainedwithout recourse to supernatural power. When Napoleon objected toLaplace that divine design was omitted from his mechanical theory of theuniverse, the French philosopher characteristically replied: "I had noneed of that hypothesis. " And the same disposition prevails in otherdepartments of science. Darwin, for instance, undertakes to explain theorigin and development of man, physical, intellectual and moral, withoutassuming any cause other than those which obtain wherever life exists. God is being slowly but surely driven from the domain of intermediatecauses, and transformed into an ultimate cause, a mere figment of theimagination. He is being banished from nature into that poetical regioninhabited by the gods of Polytheism, to keep company there with Jupiterand Apollo and Neptune and Juno and Venus, and all the rest of thatglorious Pantheon. He no longer rules the actual life and struggle ofthe world, but lives at peace with his old rivals in--

 "The lucid interspace of world and world, Where never creeps a cloud or moves a wind, Nor ever falls the least white star of snow, Nor ever lowest roll of thunder moans; Nor sound of human sorrow mounts, to mar Their sacred everlasting calm. " *

 * Tennyson: "Lucretius. "

The essence of all this is admitted by the writer in the _ChristianWorld_; he admits the facts, but denies the inference. They show usone of God's ways of hiding himself. Order prevails, but it is theexpression of God's will, and not a mere result of the working ofmaterial forces. He operates by method, not by caprice, and hence theunchanging stability of things. While doing nothing in particular, hedoes everything in general. And this idea must be extended to humanhistory. God endows man with powers, and allows him freedom to employthem as he will. But, strangely enough, God has a way of "ruling ourfreedom, " and always there is "a restraining and restoring hand. "How man's will can be free and yet overruled passes our merely carnalunderstanding, although it may be intelligible enough to minds steepedin the mysteries of theology. According to this writer, God's governmentof mankind is a "constitutional kingdom. " Quite so. It was oncearbitrary and despotic; now it is far milder and less exacting, havingdwindled into the "constitutional" stage, wherein the King _reigns_ butdoes not _govern_. Will the law of human growth and divine decay stophere? We think not. As the despotism has changed to a constitutionalmonarchy, so that will change to a republic, and the empty throne bepreserved among other curious relics of the past. 

God also hides himself in history. Although unapparent on the surface ofevents, his spirit is potent within them. "What, " the writer asks, "ishistory--with all its dark passages of horror, its stormy revolutions, its ceaseless conflict, its tears, its groans, its blood--but thechronicle of an ever-widening realm of light, of order, of intelligence, wisdom, truth, and charity?" But if we admit the progress, we need notexplain it as the work of God. Bunsen wrote a book on "God in History, "which a profane wag said should have been called "Bunsen in History;"yet his attempt to justify the ways of God to men was not verysuccessful. It is simply a mockery to ask us to believe that the slowprogress of humanity must be attributed to omniscient omnipotence. AGod who can evolve virtue and happiness only out of infinite evil andmisery, and elevate us only through the agency of perpetual blood andtears, is scarcely a being to be loved and worshipped, unless we assumethat his power and wisdom are exceedingly limited. Are we to supposethat God has woven himself a garment of violence, evil, and deceit, inorder that we might not see too clearly his righteousness, goodness, andtruth?

It must further be observed that Christian Theists cannot be permittedto ascribe all the good in the world to God, and all the evil to man, orelse leave it absolutely unexplained. In the name of humanity we protestagainst this indignity to our race. Let God be responsible for good andevil both, or for neither; and if man is to consider himself chargeablewith all the world's wrong, he should at least be allowed credit for allthe compensating good. 

The theory of evolution is being patronised by Theists rather toofulsomely. Not long ago they treated it with obloquy and contempt, butnow they endeavor to use it as an argument for their faith, and in doingso they distort language as only theological controversialists can. Changing "survival of the _fittest_" into "survival of the _best_, " theytransform a physical fact into a moral law; and thus, as they think, take a new north-west passage to the old harbor of "whatever is isright. " But while-evolution may be construed as progress, which somewould contest, it cannot be construed as the invariable survival ofthe best; nor, if it were, could the process by which this result isachieved be justified. For evolution works through a universal strugglefor existence, in which the life and well-being of some can be securedonly through the suffering and final extinction of others; and evenin its higher stages, cunning and unscrupulous strength frequentlyovercomes humane wisdom fettered by weakness. "Nature, red in tooth andclaw, with ravin shrieks against the creed" of the Theist. If God isworking through evolution, we must admit that he has marvellously hiddenhimself, and agree with the poet that he _does_ "move in a mysteriousway his wonders to perform. "

The writer in the _Christian World_ borrows an image from the pulingscepticism of "In Memoriam, " which describes man as

 "An infant crying in the night, And with no language but a cry. "

This image of the infant is put to strange use. The writer says thatGod is necessarily hidden from us because we can grasp "his inscrutablenature and methods" only as "an infant can grasp the thought and purposeof a man. " Similes are dangerous things. When it is demanded that theyshall run upon all fours, they often turn against their masters. Thisone does so. The infant grows into a man in due course, and then he cannot only grasp the thought and purpose of his father, but also, it maybe, comprehend still greater things. Will the infant mind of man, whenit reaches maturity, be thus related to God's? If not, the analogy isfallacious. Man is quite mature enough already, and has been so forthousands of years, to understand something of God's thought and purposeif he had only chosen to reveal them. This, however, if there be aGod, he has not condescended to do. An appeal to the various pretendedrevelations of the world serves to convince us that all are the words offallible men. Their very discord discredits them. As D'Holbach said, if God had spoken, the universe would surely be convinced, and the sameconviction would fill every breast. 

The reason given for God's hiding himself is very curious. "If, " saysthe writer, "the way of God were not in large measure hidden, it wouldmean that we could survey all things from the height and the depth ofGod. " Truly an awful contemplation! May it not be that God is hiddenfrom us because there is none to be revealed, that "all the oracles aredumb or cheat because they have no secret to express"?

But, says the writer in the _Christian World_, there is one revelationof God that can never be gainsaid; "while the Cross stands as earth'smost sacred symbol, there can be no utter hiding of his love. " This, however, we venture to dispute. That Cross which was laid upon the backof Jesus poor mankind has been compelled to carry ever since, with noSimon to ease it of the load. Jesus was crucified on Calvary, and in hisname man has suffered centuries of crucifixion. The immolation ofJesus can be no revelation of God's love. If the Nazarene was God, hiscrucifixion involves a complicated arrangement for murder; the Jewswho demanded his death were divinely instigated, and Judas Iscariot waspre-ordained to betray his master; in which case his treachery was anecessary element of the drama, entitling him not to vituperation butto gratitude, even perhaps to the monument which Benjamin Disraelisuggested as his proper reward. Looking also at the history ofChristianity, and seeing how the Cross has sheltered oppressors of mindand body, sanctioned immeasurable shedding of blood, and frightenedpeoples from freedom, while even now it symbolises all that isreactionary and accursed in Europe, we are constrained to say that thelove _it_ reveals is as noxious as the vilest hate. 

GENERAL JOSHUA. 

 (April, 1882. )

Mountebank Talmage has just preached a funeral sermon on General Joshua. It is rather behind date, as the old warrior has been dead above threethousand years. But better late than never. Talmage tells us many thingsabout Joshua which are not in the Bible, and some sceptics will say thathis panegyric is a sheer invention. They may, however, be mistaken. Theoracle of the Brooklyn Jabbernacle is known to be inspired. God holdsconverse with him, and he is thus enabled to supply us with fresh factsabout Jehovah's fighting-cock from the lost books of Jasher and the Warsof the Lord. 

Joshua, says Talmage, was a magnificent fighter. We say, he was amagnificent butcher. Jehovah did the fighting. 

He was the virtual commander of the Jewish hosts; he won all theirvictories; and Joshua only did the slaughter. He excelled in that lineof business. He delighted in the dying groans of women and children, andloved to dabble his feet and hands in the warm blood of the slain. No "Chamber of Horrors" contains the effigy of any wretch half sobloodthirsty and cruel. 

According to Talmage, Joshua "always fought on the right side. " Warsof conquest are never right. Thieving other people's lands is anabominable crime. The Jews had absolutely no claim to the territorythey took possession of, and which they manured with the blood of itsrightful owners. We know they said that God told them to requisitionthat fine little landed estate of Canaan. Half the thieves in historyhave said the same thing. We don't believe them. God never told any manto rob his neighbor, and whoever says so lies. The thief's statementdoes not suffice. Let him produce better evidence. A rascal who stealsand murders cannot be believed on his oath, and 'tis more likely that heis a liar than that God is a scoundrel. 

Talmage celebrates "five great victories" of Joshua. He omits two mightyachievements. General Joshua circumcised a million and a half Jews in asingle day. His greatest battle never equalled that wonderful feat. Theamputations were done at the rate of over a thousand a minute. Samson'sjaw-bone was nothing to Joshua's knife. This surprising old Jew was asgreat in oratory as in surgery. On one occasion he addressed an audienceof three millions, and everyone heard him. His voice must have reachedtwo or three miles. No wonder the walls of Jericho fell down when Joshuajoined in the shout. We dare say the Jews wore ear-preservers to guardtheir tympanums against the dreadful artillery of his speech. 

Joshua's first victory, says Tahnage, was conquering the spring freshetof Jordan. As a matter of fact, Jehovah transacted that little affair. See, says Talmage, "one mile ahead go two priests carrying a _glitteringbox_ four feet long and two feet wide. It is the Ark of the Covenant. "He forgets to add that the Jew God was supposed to be inside it. Jack inthe box is nothing to God in a box. What would have happened if the Arkhad been buried with Jehovah safely fastened in? Would his godshiphave mouldered to dust? In that case he would never have seduced acarpenter's wife, and there would have been no God the Son as the fruitof his adultery. 

Talmage credits General Joshua with the capture of Jericho. The Biblesays that Jehovah overcame it. Seven priests went blowing rams' hornsround the city for seven days. On the seventh day they went round itseven times. It must have been tiresome work, for Jericho was a largecity several miles in circumference. But priests are always good"Walkers. " After the last blowing of horns all the Jews shouted "DownJericho, down Jericho!" This is Talmage's inspired account. The Biblestates nothing of the kind. Just as the Islamites cry "Allah, Il Allah, "it is probable that the Jews cried "Jahveh, Jahveh. " But Talmage and theBible both agree that when their shout rent the air the walls of Jerichofell flat--as flat as the fools who believe it. 

Then, says Talmage, "the huzza of the victorious Israelites and thegroan of the conquered Canaanites commingle!" Ah, that groan! Its soundstill curses the Bible God. Men, women and children, were murdered. The very cattle, sheep and asses, were killed with the sword. Only onewoman's house was spared, and she was a harlot. 

It is as if the German army took Paris, and killed every inhabitantexcept Cora Pearl. This is inspired war, and Talmage glories in it. Hewould consider it an honor to be bottle-washer to such a pious heroas General Joshua. When Ai was taken, all its people were slaughtered, without any regard to age or sex. Talmage grins with delight, and cries"Bravo, Joshua!" The King of Ai was reserved for sport. They hung him ona tree and enjoyed the fun. Talmage approves this too. Everything Joshuadid was right. Talmage is ready to stake his own poor little soul onthat. 

Joshua's victory over the five kings calls forth a burst of supernaturaleloquence. Talmage pictures the "catapults of the sky pouring a volleyof hailstones" on the flying Amorites, and words almost fail him todescribe the glorious miracle of the lengthening of the day in orderthat Jehovah's prize-fighters might go on killing. One passage is almostsublime. It is only one step off. "What, " asks Talmage, "is the matterwith Joshua? Has he fallen in an apoplectic fit? No. He is in prayer. "Our profanity would not have gone to that length. But we take Talmage'sword for it that prayer and apoplexy are very much alike. 

The _five_ kings were decapitated. "Ah, " says Talmage, "I want fivemore kings beheaded to-day, King Alcohol, King Fraud, King Lust, KingSuperstition, and King Infidelity. " Soft, you priestly calumniator!What right have you to associate Infidelity with fraud and lust? ThatFreethought, which you call "infidelity, " is more faithful to truth andjustice than your creed has ever been. And it will not be disposed ofso easily as you think. You will never behead us, but we shall strangleyou. We are crushing the life out of your wretched faith, and yourspasmodic sermons are only the groans of its despair. 

Talmage's boldest step on the line which separates the ludicrous fromthe sublime occurs in his peroration. He makes General Joshua conquerDeath by lying down and giving up the ghost, and then asks for aheadstone and a foot-stone for the holy corpse. "I imagine, " he says, "that for the head it shall be the sun that stood still upon Gibeon, andfor the foot the moon that stood still in the valley of Ajalon. " Thisis about the finest piece of Yankee buncombe extant. If the sun and moonkeep watch over General Joshua's grave, what are we to do? When we getto the New Jerusalem we shall want neither of these luminaries, for theglory of the Lord will shine upon us. But until then we cannot dispensewith them, and we decidedly object to their being retained as perpetualmourners over Joshua's grave. If, however, one of them must do service, we humbly beg that it may be the moon. Let the sun illumine us by day, so that we may see to transact our affairs. And if ever we should longto behold "pale Dians beams" again, we might take Talmage as our guideto the unknown grave of General Joshua, and while they played softlyover the miraculous two yards of turf we should see his fittingepitaph--Moonshine. 

GOING TO HELL. 

 (June, 1882. )

Editing a Freethought paper is a dreadful business. It brings one intocontact with many half-baked people who have little patent recipesfor hastening the millennium; with ambitious versifiers who think ita disgrace to journalism that their productions are not instantlyinserted; with discontented ladies and gentlemen who fancy that aheterodox paper is the proper vehicle for every species of complaint;and with a multitude of other bores too numerous to mention and toovarious to classify. But the worst of all are the anonymous bores, who send their insults, advice, or warnings, through the post forthe benefit of the Queen's revenue. We generally pitch their puerilemissives into the waste-paper basket; but occasionally we find onediverting enough to be introduced to our readers. A few days ago wereceived the following lugubrious epistle, ostensibly from a parson inWorcestershire, as the envelope bore the postmark of Tything. 

"The fool hath said in his heart 'there is no God'--I have seen oneof your blasphemous papers; and I say solemnly, as a clergyman of theChurch of England, that I believe you are doing the work of the Devil, and are on the road to hell, and will spend eternity with the Devil, unless God, in his mercy, lead you, by the Holy Spirit, to _repentance_. Nothing is impossible, with him. A Dean in the Church of England says, 'Be wise, and laugh not through a speck of time, and then wail throughan immeasurable eternity. ' Except you change your views you will mostcertainly hear Christ say, at the Judgment Day, 'Depart ye cursed intoeverlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his angels. ' (Matt, xxv. )"

This is a tolerably warm, though not very elegant effusion, and it isreally a pity that so grave a counsellor should conceal his name; for ifit should lead to our conversion, we should not know whom to thank forhaving turned us out of the primrose path to the everlasting bonfire. Our mentor assures us that with God nothing is impossible. We are sorryto learn this; for we must conclude that he does not take sufficienttrouble with parsons to endow them with the courage of theirconvictions, or to make them observe the common decencies of epistolaryintercourse. 

This anonymous parson, who acts like an Irish "Moonlighter, " and maskshis identity while venting his spleen, presumes to anticipate the Dayof Judgment, and tells exactly what Jesus Christ will say to us on thatoccasion. We are obliged to him for the information, but we wonder howhe obtained it. The twenty-fifth of Matthew, to which he refers us, contains not a word about unbelievers. It simply states that certainpersons, who have treated the Son of Man very shabbily in his distress, shall be sent to keep company with Old Nick and his imps. Now, we havenever shown the Son of Man any incivility, much less any inhumanity, andwe therefore repudiate this odious insinuation. Whenever Jesus Christsends us a message that he is sick, we will pay him a visit; if heis hungry, we will find him a dinner; if he is thirsty, we will standwhatever he likes to drink; if he is naked, we will hunt him up a cleanshirt and an old suit; and if he is in prison, we will, according as heis innocent or guilty, try to procure his release, or leave him to serveout his term. We should be much surprised if any parson in the threekingdoms would do any more Some of them, we believe, would see himcondemned (new version) before they would lift a finger or spendsixpence to-help him. 

We are charged with doing the work of the Devil. This is indeed news. Wenever knew the Devil required any assistance. He was always veryactive and enterprising, and quite able to manage his own business. And although his rival, Jehovah, is so dotingly senile as to yield upeverything to his mistress and her son, no one has ever whispered theleast hint of the Devil's decline into the same abject position. But ifhis Satanic Majesty needed our aid we should not be loth to give it, forafter carefully reading the Bible many times from beginning to end, wehave come to the conclusion that he is about the only gentleman in it. 

We are "on the road to hell. " Well, if we must _go_ somewhere, that isjust the place we should choose. The temperature is high, and it wouldno doubt at first be incommodious. But, as old Sir Thomas Browne says, afflictions induce callosities, and in time we should get used toanything. 

When once we grew accustomed to the heat, how thankful we should beat having escaped the dreary insipidity of heaven, with its perpetualpsalms, its dolorous trumpets, its gruesome elders, and its elderlybeasts! How thankful at having missed an eternity with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, and all the many blackguards and scoundrels of the Bible!How thankful at having joined for ever the society of Rabelais, Bruno, Spinoza, Voltaire, Thomas Paine, John Stuart Mill, and all the greatpoets, sages and wits, who possess so much of that carnal wisdom whichis at enmity with the pious folly of babes and sucklings!

On the whole, we think it best to keep on our present course. Let thebigots rave and the parsons wail. They are deeply _interested_ in thedoctrine of heaven and hell beyond the grave. We believe in heavenand hell on this side of it; a hell of ignorance, crime, and misery; aheaven of wisdom, virtue, and happiness. Our duty is to promote the oneand combat the other. If there be a just God, the fulfilment of thatduty will suffice; if God be unjust, all honest men will be in the sameboat, and have the courage to despise and defy him. 

CHRISTMAS EVE IN HEAVEN. 

 (December, 1881. )

Christmas Eve had come and almost gone. It was drawing nigh midnight, and I sat solitary in my room, immersed in memory, dreaming of old daysand their buried secrets. The fire, before which I mused, was burningclear without flame, and its intense glow, which alone lighted myapartment, cast a red tint on the furniture and walls. Outside thestreets were muffled deep with snow, in which no footstep was audible. All was quiet as death, silent as the grave, save for the faint murmurof my own breathing. Time and space seemed annihilated beyond those fournarrow walls, and I was as a coffined living centre of an else lifelessinfinity. 

My reverie was rudely broken by the staggering step of a fellow-lodger, whose devotion to Bacchus was the one symptom of reverence in hisnature. He reeled up stair after stair, and as he passed my door helurched against it so violently that I feared he would come through. Buthe slowly recovered himself after some profane mutterings, reeled up thenext flight of stairs, and finally deposited his well-soaked clay on thebed in his own room immediately over mine. 

After this interruption my thoughts changed most fancifully. Why Iknow not, but I began to brood on the strange statement of Saint Paulconcerning the man who was lifted up into the seventh heaven, and therebeheld things not lawful to reveal. While pondering this story I waspresently aware of an astonishing change. The walls of my room slowlyexpanded, growing ever thinner and thinner, until they became thefilmiest transparent veil which at last dissolved utterly away. Then(whether in the spirit or the flesh I know not) I was hurried alongthrough space, past galaxy after galaxy of suns and stars, separatesystems yet all mysteriously related. 

Swifter than light we travelled, I and my unseen guide, through theinfinite ocean of ether, until our flight was arrested by a densermedium, which I recognised as an atmosphere like that of our earth. Ihad scarcely recovered from this new surprise when (marvel of marvels!)I found myself before a huge gate of wondrous art and dazzling splendor. At a word from my still unseen guide it swung open, and I was urgedwithin. Beneath my feet was a solid pavement of gold. Gorgeous mansions, interspersed with palaces, rose around me, and above them all toweredthe airy pinnacles of a matchless temple, whose points quivered inthe rich light like tongues of golden fire. The walls glittered withcountless rubies, diamonds, pearls, amethysts, emeralds, and otherprecious stones; and lovely presences, arrayed in shining garments, moved noiselessly from place to place. "Where am I?" I ejaculated, half faint with wonder. And my hitherto unseen guide, who now revealedhimself, softly answered, "In Heaven. "

Thereupon my whole frame was agitated with inward laughter. I in Heaven, whose fiery doom had been prophesied so often by the saints on earth! I, the sceptic, the blasphemer, the scoffer at all things sacred, who hadlaughed at the legends and dogmas of Christianism as though they wereincredible and effete as the myths of Olympus! And I thought to myself, "Better I had gone straight to Hell, for here in the New Jerusalem theywill no doubt punish me worse than there. " But my angelic guide, whoread my thought, smiled benignly and said, "Fear not, no harm shallhappen to you. I have exacted a promise of safety for you, and hereno promise can be broken. " "But why, " I asked, "have you brought mehither, and how did you obtain my guarantee of safety?" And my guideanswered, "It is our privilege each year to demand one favor which maynot be refused; I requested that I might bring you here; but I did notmention your name, and if you do nothing outrageous you will not benoticed, for no one here meddles with another's business, and our rulersare too much occupied with foreign affairs to trouble about our domesticconcerns. " "Yet, " I rejoined, "I shall surely be detected, for I wearno heavenly robe. " Then my guide produced one from a little packet, and having donned it, I felt safe from the fate of him who was expelledbecause he had not on a wedding-garment at the marriage feast. 

As we moved along, I inquired of my guide why he took such interest inme; and he replied, looking sadly, "I was a sceptic on earth centuriesago, but I stood alone, and at last on my death-bed, weakened bysickness, I again embraced the creed of my youth and died in theChristian faith. Hence my presence in Heaven. But gladly would Irenounce Paradise even for Hell, for those figures so lovely withoutare not all lovely within, and I would rather consort with the choicerspirits who abide with Satan and hold high revel of heart and head inhis court. Yet wishes are fruitless; as the tree falls it lies, and mylot is cast for ever. " Whereupon I laid my hand in his, being speechlesswith grief!

We soon approached the magnificent temple, and entering it we mixedwith the mighty crowd of angels who were witnessing the rites of worshipperformed by the elders and beasts before the great white throne. Allhappened exactly as Saint John describes. The angels rent the air withtheir acclamations, after the inner circle had concluded, and then thethrone was deserted by its occupants. 

My dear guide then led me through some narrow passages until we emergedinto a spacious hall, at one end of which hung a curtain. Advancingtowards this with silent tread, we were able to look through a slightaperture, where the curtain fell away from the pillar, into the roombeyond. It was small and cosy, and a fire burned in the grate, beforewhich sat poor dear God the Father in a big arm-chair. Divested of hisgodly paraphernalia, he looked old and thin, though an evil fire stillgleamed from his cavernous eyes. On a table beside him stood somephials, one of which had seemingly just been used. God the Son stoodnear, looking much younger and fresher, but time was beginning to tellon him also. The Ghost flitted about in the form of a dove, now perchingon the Father's shoulder and now on the head of the Son. 

Presently the massive bony frame of the Father was convulsed with a fitof coughing; Jesus promptly applied a restorative from the phial, andafter a terrible struggle the cough was subdued. During this scenethe Dove fluttered violently from wall to wall. When the patient wasthoroughly restored the following conversation ensued:--

Jesus. --Are you well now, my Father?

Jehovah. --Yes, yes, well enough. Alack, how my strength wanes! Whereis the pith that filled these arms when I fought for my chosen people?Where the fiery vigor that filled my veins when I courted your mother?

(Here the Dove fluttered and looked queer. )

Jesus. --Ah, sire, do not speak thus. You will regain your old strength. 

Jehovah. --Nay, nay, and you know it. You do not even wish me to recover, for in my weakness you exercise sovereign power and rule as you please. 

Jesus. --O sire, sire!

Jehovah. --Come now, none of these demure looks. We know each othertoo well. Practise before the saints if you like, but don't waste youracting on me. 

Jesus. --My dear Father, pray curb your temper. That is the very thingthe people on earth so much complain of. 

Jehovah. --My dearly beloved Son, in whom I am not at all well pleased, desist from this hypocrisy. Your temper is as bad as mine. You've shedblood enough in your time, and need not rail at me. 

Jesus. --Ah, sire, only the blood of heretics. 

Jehovah. --Heretics, forsooth! They were very worthy people for the mostpart, and their only crime was that they neglected you. But why shouldwe wrangle? We stand or fall together, and I am falling. Satan drawsmost souls from earth to his place, including all the best workers andthinkers, who are needed to sustain our drooping power; and we receivenothing but the refuse; weak, slavish, flabby souls, hardly worth savingor damning; gushing preachers, pious editors, crazy enthusiasts, andhalf-baked old ladies of both sexes. Why didn't you preach a differentGospel while you were about it? You had the chance once and let it slip:we shall never have another. 

Jesus. --My dear Father, I am reforming my Gospel to make it suit thealtered taste of the times. 

Jehovah. --Stuff and nonsense! It can't be done; thinking people seethrough it; the divine is immutable. The only remedy is to start afresh. Could I beget a new son all might be rectified; but I cannot, I am tooold. Our dominion is melting away like that of all our predecessors. You cannot outlast me, for I am the fountain of your life; and all themultitude of "immortal" angels who throng our court, live only while Iuphold them, and with me they will vanish into eternal limbo. 

Here followed another fit of coughing worse than before. Jesus resortedagain to the phial, but the cordial seemed powerless against this sharpattack. Just then the Dove fluttered against the curtain, and my guidehurried me swiftly away. 

In a corridor of the temple we met Michael and Raphael. The latterscrutinised me so closely that my blood ran cold; but just when mydread was deepest his countenance cleared, and he turned towards hiscompanion. Walking behind the great archangels we were able to heartheir conversation. Raphael had just returned from a visit to the earth, and he was reporting to Michael a most alarming defection from theChristian faith. People, he said, were leaving in shoals, and unlessfresh miracles were worked he trembled for the prospects of the dynasty. But what most alarmed him was the spread of profanity. While in Englandhe had seen copies of a blasphemous paper which horrified the elect byridiculing the Bible in what a bishop had justly called "a heartless andcruel way. " "But, my dear Michael, " continued Raphael, "that is notall, nor even the worst. This scurrilous paper, which would be quicklysuppressed if we retained our old influence, actually caricatures oursupreme Lord and his heavenly host in woodcuts, and thousands of peopleenjoy this wicked profanity. I dare say our turn will soon come, andwe shall be held up to ridicule like the rest. " "Impossible!" criedMichael; "Surely there is some mistake. What is the name of thisabominable print?" With a grave look, Raphael replied: "No, Michael, there is no mistake. The name of this imp of blasphemy is--I hesitate tosay it--the Free----------" *

 * Was it the _Freethinker?_

But at this moment my guide again hurried me along. We reached thesplendid gate once more, which slowly opened and let us through. Againwe flew through the billowy ether, sweeping past system after systemwith intoxicating speed, until at last, dazed and almost unconscious, Iregained this earthly shore. Then I sank into a stupor. When I awokethe fire had burnt down to the last cinder, all was dark and cold, andI shivered as I tried to stretch my half-cramped limbs. Was it all adream? Who can say? Whether in the spirit or the flesh I know not, saidSaint Paul, and I am compelled to echo his words. Sceptics may shrugtheir shoulders, smile, or laugh; but "there are more things in heavenand earth than are dreamt of in _their_ philosophy. "

PROFESSOR BLACKIE ON ATHEISM. 

 (January, 1879. )

Professor Blackie is a man with whom we cannot be angry, howevergreatly his utterances are calculated to arouse that feeling. He isso impulsive, frank, and essentially good-natured, that even his mostprovoking words call forth rather a smile of compassion than a frown ofresentment. Those who know his character and position will yield him thewidest allowance. His fiery nature prompts him to energetic speech onall occasions. But when his temper has been fretted, as it frequentlyis, by the boisterous whims of his Greek students in that mostboisterous of universities, it is not surprising if his expressionsbecome splenetic even to rashness. The ingenuous Professor is quiteimpartial in his denunciations. He strikes out right and left againstvarious objects of his dislike. Everything he dissents from receives oneand the same kind of treatment, so that no opinion he assails has anyspecial reason to complain; and every blow he deals is accompaniedwith such a jolly smile, sometimes verging into a hearty laugh, that noopponent can well refuse to shake hands with him when all is over. 

This temper, however, is somewhat inconsistent with the scientificpurpose indicated in the title of Professor Blackie's book. A zoologistwho had such a particular and unconquerable aversion to one species ofanimals that the bare mention of its name made his gorge rise, wouldnaturally give us a very inadequate and unsatisfactory account of it. So, in this case, instead of getting a true natural history of Atheism, which would be of immense service to every thinker, we get only anemphatic statement of the authors' hatred of it under different aspects. Atheism is styled "a hollow absurdity, " "that culmination of allspeculative absurdities, " "a disease of the speculative faculty, " "amonstrous disease of the reasoning faculty, " and so on. 

The chapter on "Its Specific Varieties and General Root" issignificantly headed with that hackneyed declaration of the Psalmist, "The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God, " as thoughimpertinence were better from a Jew than from a Christian, or morerespectable for being three thousand years old. Perhaps ProfessorBlackie has never heard of the sceptical critic who exonerated thePsalmist on the ground that he was speaking jocosely, and really meantthat the man who said _in his heart_ only "There is no God, " withoutsaying so _openly_, was the fool. But this interpretation is as profaneas the other is impertinent; and in fact does a great injustice to theAtheist, who has never been accustomed to say "There is no God, " anassertion which involves the arrogance of infinite knowledge, sincenothing less than that is requisite to prove an universal negative: butsimply "I know not of such an existence, " which is a modest statementintellectually and morally, and quite unlike the presumption of certaintheologians who, as Mr. Arnold says, speak familiarly of God as thoughhe were a man living in the next street. 

For his own sake Professor Blackie should a little curb his proneness tothe use of uncomplimentary epithets. He does himself injustice when hecondescends to describe David Hume's theory of causation as "wretchedcavil. " Carlyle is more just to this great representative of anantagonistic school of thought. He exempts him from the sweepingcondemnation of his contemporaries in Scottish prose literature, andadmits that he was "too rich a man to borrow" from France or elsewhere. And surely Hume was no less honest than rich in thought. Jest andcaptiousness were entirely foreign to his mind. Wincing under hisinexorable logic, the ontologist may try to console himself with thethought that the great sceptic was playing with arguments like amere dialectician of wondrous skill; but in reality Hume was quite inearnest, and always meant what he said. We may also observe that it isProfessor Blackie and not Darwin who suffers from the asking of suchquestions as these:--"What monkey ever wrote an epic poem, or composed atragedy or a comedy, or even a sonnet? What monkey professed his beliefin any thirty-nine articles, or well-compacted Calvinistic confession, or gave in his adhesion to any Church, established or disestablished?"If Mr. Darwin heard these questions he might answer with a good humoredsmile, "My dear sir, you quite mistake my theories, and your questionstravesty them. I would further observe that while the composition ofpoems would unquestionably be creditable to monkeys, I, who have someregard for them as relatives, however distant, am heartily glad theyhave never done any of the other things you mention, which I deem anegative proof that their reason, though limited, is fortunately sane. "

Professor Blackie's opening chapter on "Presumptions" fully justifiesits title. The general consent of mankind in favor of Theism is assumedto have established its validity, and to have put Atheists altogetherout of court; and a long list of illustrious Theists, from Solomon toHegel, is contrasted with a meagre catalogue of Atheists, comprisingonly the names of David Hume, Jeremy Bentham, and John Stuart Mill. *Confucius and Buddha are classed apart, as lying "outside of our WesternEuropean Culture altogether, " but with a promise that "in so far as theyseem to have taught a morality without religion, or a religion withoutGod, we shall say a word or two about them by-and-by. " So far as Buddhais concerned this promise is kept; but in relation to Confucius it isbroken. Probably the Chinese sage was found too tough and embarrassinga subject, and so it was thought expedient to ignore him for the moretractable prophet of India, whose doctrine of Transmigration mightwith a little sophistry be made to resemble the Christian doctrine ofImmortality, and his Nirvana the Kingdom of Heaven. 

 * Professor Blackie is singularly silent as to James Mill, the father of the celebrated Utilitarian philosopher, far more robust in intellect and character than his son. He is the dominant figure of Mill's "Autobiography, " and has about him a more august air than his son ever wore. 

What does the general consent of mankind prove in regard to beliefslike Theism? Simply nothing. Professor Blackie himself sees that on somesubjects it is worthless, particularly when special knowledge or specialfaculty is required. But there are questions, he contends, which publicopinion rightly decides, even though opposed to the conclusions ofsubtle thinkers. "Perhaps, " he says, "we shall hit the mark here ifwe say broadly that, as nature is always right, the general and normalsentiment of the majority must always be right, in so far as it isrooted in the universal and abiding instincts of humanity; and publicopinion, as the opinion of the majority, will be right also in allmatters which belong to the general conduct of life among all classes, and with respect to which the mind of the majority has been allowed aperfectly free, natural, and healthy exercise. " Now, in the first place, we must reiterate our opinion that the general consent of mankind on asubject like Theism proves absolutely nothing. It is perfectly valid onquestions of ordinary taste and feeling, but loses all logical efficacyin relation to questions which cannot be determined by a direct appealto experience. And undeniably Theism is one of those questions, unlesswe admit with the transcendentalist what is contrary to evident fact, that men have an intuitive perception of God. In the next place, theminor premise of this argument is assumed. There is no general consentof mankind in favor of Theism, but only a very extensive consent. Mr. Gladstone, not long since, in the _Nineteenth Century_, went so far asto claim the general consent of mankind in favor of Christianity, bysimply excluding all heathen nations from a right to be heard. ProfessorBlackie does not go to this length, but his logical process is nodifferent. Lastly, our author's concluding proviso vitiates his wholecase; for if there be one question on which "the mind of the majority"has _not_ been allowed a "perfectly free, natural, and healthyexercise, " it is that of the existence of God. We are all prepossessedhi its favor by early training, custom, and authority. Our minds havenever been permitted to play freely upon it. A century ago Atheistsstood in danger of death; only recently have penal and invidiousstatutes against them been cancelled or mitigated; and even now bigotryagainst honest disbelief in Theism is so strong that a man often incursgreater odium in publicly avowing it than in constantly violatingall the decalogue save the commandment against murder. Murderers andthieves, though punished here, are either forgotten or compassionatedafter death; but not even the grave effectually shields the Atheist fromthe malignity of pious zeal. Fortunately, however, a wise and humanetolerance is growing in the world, and extending towards the mostflagrant heresies. Perhaps we shall ultimately admit with sage oldFelltham, that "we fill the world with cruel brawls in the obstinatedefence of that whereof we might with more honor confess ourselves tobe ignorant, " and that "it is no shame for man not to know that which isnot in his possibility. "

The causes of Atheism are, according to Professor Blackie, verynumerous. He finds seven or eight distinct ones. The lowest class ofAtheists are "Atheists of imbecility, " persons of stunted intellect, incapable of comprehending the idea of God. These, however, he will notwaste his time with, nor will we. He then passes to the second class ofreprobates, whose Atheism springs not from defect of intellect, but frommoral disorder, and who delight to conceive the universe as resemblingtheir own chaos. These we shall dismiss, with a passing remark that ifmoral disorder naturally induces Atheism, some very eminent Christianshave been marvellous hypocrites. Lack of reverence is the next causeof Atheism, and is indeed its "natural soil. " But as Professor Blackiethinks this may be "congenital, like a lack of taste for music, or anincapacity of understanding a mathematical problem, " we are obliged toconsider this third class of Atheists as hopeless as the first. Havingadmitted that their malady may be congenital, our author inflictsupon these unfortunates a great deal of superfluous abuse, apparentlyforgetting that they are less to blame than their omnipotent maker. The fourth cause of Atheism is pride or self-will. But this seems veryerratic in its operations, since the only two instances cited--namely, Napoleon the Great and Napoleon the Little, were certainly Theists. Next comes democracy, between which and irreverence there is a naturalconnexion, and from which, "as from a hotbed, Atheism in its rankeststage naturally shoots up. " Professor Blackie, as may be surmised, tilts madly against this horrible foe. But it will not thus be subdued. Democracy is here and daily extending itself, overwhelming slowly butsurely all impediments to its supremacy. If Theism is incompatible withit, then the days of Theism are numbered. Professor Blackie's peculiarNatural History of atheism is more likely to please the opposite ranksthan his own, who may naturally cry out, with a sense of being sold, "call you that backing of your friends?"

Pride of intellect is the next cause of Atheism. Don Juan sells himselfto perdition for a liberal share of pleasure, but Faust hankers onlyafter forbidden knowledge. This is of various kinds; but "of all kinds, that which has long had the most evil reputation of begetting Atheismis Physical Science. " Again does the fervid Professor set lance in rest, and dash against this new foe to Theism, much as Don Quixote charged thefamous windmill. But science, like the windmill, is too big and strongto suffer from such assaults. The "father of this sort of nonsense, " inmodern times was David Hume, who, we are elegantly informed, was "a veryclever fellow, a very agreeable, gentlemanly fellow too. " His "nonsenseabout causation" is to be traced to a want of reverence in hischaracter. Indeed, it seems that all persons who adhere to a philosophyalien to Professor Blackie's have something radically wrong with them. Let this Edinburgh Professor rail as he may, David Hume's theory ofcausation will suffer no harm, and his contrast of human architecture, which is mechanism, with natural architecture, which is growth, willstill form an insuperable obstacle to that "natural theology" which, as Garth Wilkinson says with grim humor, seeks to elicit, or rather"construct, " "a scientific abstraction answering to the concrete figureof the Vulcan of the Greeks--that is to say a universal Smith"!

Eventually Professor Blackie gets so sick of philosophers, that heturns from them to poets, who may more safely be trusted "in matters ofhealthy human sentiment. " But here fresh difficulties arise. Although"a poet is naturally a religious animal, " we find that the greatestof Roman poets Lucretius, was an Atheist, while even "some of our mostbrilliant notorieties in the modern world of song are not the mostnotable for piety. " But our versatile Professor easily accounts for thisby assuming that there "may be an idolatry of the imaginative, as wellas of the knowing faculty. " Never did natural historian so jauntilyprovide for every fact contravening his theories. Professor Blackie willnever understand Atheism, or write profitably upon it, while he pursuesthis course. Let him restrain his discursive propensities, and dealscientifically with this one fact, which explodes his whole theory ofAtheism. The supreme glory of our modern poetry is Shelley, and ifever a man combined splendor of imagination with keen intelligence andsaintly character it was he. Raphael incarnate he seems, yet he standsoutside all the creeds, and to his prophetic vision, in the sunlight ofthe world's great age begun anew, the--

 Faiths and empires gleam Like wrecks of a dissolving dream. 

In his treatment of Buddhism Professor Blackie is candid and impartial, until he comes to consider its Atheistic character. Then his reasonseems almost entirely to forsake him. After saying that "what Buddhapreached was a gospel of pure human ethics, divorced not only fromBrahma and the Brahminic Trinity, but even from the existence of God;"and describing Buddha himself as "a rare, exceptional, and altogethertranscendental incarnation of moral perfection;" he first tries toshow that _Nirvana_ is the same as the Christian _eternal life_, andtransmigration of souls a faithful counterpart of the Christian doctrineof future reward and punishment. Feeling, perhaps, how miserably hehas failed in this attempt, he turns with exasperation on Buddhism, and affirms that it "can in no wise be looked upon as anything but anabnormal manifestation of the religious life of man. " We believe thatProfessor Blackie himself must have already perceived the futility andabsurdity of this. 

The last chapter of Professor Blackie's book is entitled "The Atheismof Reaction. " In it he strikes characteristically at the five pointsof Calvinism, at Original Guilt, Eternal Punishment, Creation outof Nothing, and Special Providence; which he charges with largelycontributing to the spread of Atheism. While welcoming these assaultson superstition, we are constrained to observe that the Christian dogmaswhich Professor Blackie impugns and denounces are not specific causesof Atheism. Again he is on the wrong scent. The revolt against Theism atthe present time is indeed mainly moral, but the preparation for ithas been an intellectual one. Modern Science has demonstrated, for allpractical purposes, the inexorable reign of law. The God of miracles, answering prayer and intimately related to his children of men, is anidea exploded and henceforth impossible. The only idea of God at allpossible, is that of a supreme universal intelligence, governing natureby fixed laws, and apparently quite heedless whether their operationbrings us joy or pain. This idea is intellectually permissible, but itis beyond all proof, and can be entertained only as a speculation. Now, the development of knowledge which makes this the only permissibleidea of God, also changes Immortality from a religious certitude to anunverifiable supposition. The rectification of the evils of this lifecannot, therefore, be reasonably expected in another; so that manstands alone, fighting a terrible battle, with no aid save from his ownstrength and skill. To believe that Omnipotence is the passive spectatorof this fearful strife, is for many minds altogether too hard. Theyprefer to believe that the woes and pangs of sentient life were notdesigned; that madness, anguish, and despair, result from the interplayof unconscious forces. They thus set Theism aside, and unable torecognise the fatherhood of God, they cling more closely to thebrotherhood of Man. 

SALVATIONISM. 

 (April, 1882. )

There is no new thing under the sun, said the wise king Many asurprising novelty is only an old thing in a new dress. And thisis especially true in respect to religion. Ever since the feast ofPentecost, when the Apostles all jabbered like madmen, Christianity hasbeen marked by periodical fits of insanity. It would occupy too muchspace to enumerate these outbursts, which have occurred in every partof Christendom, but we may mention a few that have happened in our owncountry. During the Commonwealth, some of the numerous sects went to themost ludicrous extremes; preaching rousing sermons, praying through thenose, assuming Biblical names, and prophesying the immediate reign ofthe saints. There was a reaction against the excesses of Puritanismafter the death of Cromwell; and until the time of Whitfield and Wesleyreligion continued to be a sober and respectable influence, chieflyuseful to the sovereign and the magistrate. But these two powerfulpreachers rekindled the fire of religious enthusiasm in the hearts ofthe common people, and Methodism was founded among those whom the Churchhad scarcely touched. Not many years ago the Hallelujah Band spreaditself far and wide, and then went out like a straw fire. And now wehave Salvationism, doing just the same kind of work, and employing justthe same kind of means. Will this new movement die away like so manyothers? It is difficult to say. Salvationism may be only a flash inthe pan; but, on the other hand, it may provide the only sort ofChristianity possible in an age of science and freethought. The educatedclasses and the intelligent artisans will more and more desert theChristian creed, and there will probably be left nothing but the dregsand the scum, for whom Salvationism is exactly suited. Christianitybegan among the poor, ignorant, and depraved; and it may possibly endits existence among the very same classes. 

In all these movements we see a striking illustration of what thebiologists call the law of Atavism. There is a constant tendency toreturn to the primitive type. We can form some idea of what earlyChristianity was by reading the Acts of the Apostles. The true believerswent about preaching in season and out of season; they cried and prayedwith a loud voice; they caused tumult in the streets, and gave plentyof trouble to the civil authorities. All this is true of Salvationismto-day; and we have no doubt that the early Church, under the guidanceof Peter, was just a counterpart of the Salvation Army under "General"Booth--to the Jews, or men of the world, a stumbling-block, and to theGreeks, or educated thinkers, a folly. 

Early Christians were "full of the Holy Ghost, " that is of wildenthusiasm. Scoffers said they were drunk, and they acted like madmen. Leap across seventeen centuries, and we shall find Methodists actingin the same way. Wesley states in his Journal (1739) of his hearers atWapping, that "some were torn with a kind of convulsive motion in everypart of their bodies, and that so violently that often four or fivepersons could not hold one of them. " And Lecky tells us, in his "Historyof the Eighteenth Century, " that "religious madness, which from thenature of its hallucinations, is usually the most miserable of allthe forms of insanity, was in this, as in many later revivals, ofno unfrequent occurrence. " Now Salvationism produces the very sameeffects. It drives many people mad; and it is a common thing for menand women at its meetings to shout, dance, jump, and finally fall onthe floor in a pious ecstacy. While they are in this condition, theHoly Ghost is entering them and the Devil is being driven out. Poorcreatures! They take us back in thought to the days of demoniacalpossession, and the strange old world that saw the devil-plagued swineof Gadara drowned in the sea. 

The free and easy mingling of the sexes at these pious assemblies, isanother noticeable feature. Love-feasts were a flagrant scandal in theearly Church, and women who returned from them virtuous must have beenmiracles of chastity. Methodism was not quite so bad, but it toleratedsome very strange pranks. The Rev. Richard Polwhele, in his "Anecdotesof Methodism" (a very rare book), says that "At St. Agnes, the Societystay up the whole night, when girls of twelve and fourteen years of age, run about the streets, calling out that they are possessed. " He goeson to relate that at Probus "the preacher at a late hour of the night, after all but the higher classes left the room, would order the candlesto be put out, and the saints fall down and kneel on their naked knees;when he would go round and thrust his hand under every knee to feel ifit were bare. " Salvationism does not at present go to this length, butit has still time enough to imitate all the freaks of its predecessor. There was an All-Night meeting in Whitechapel a few months ago, whichthreatened to develope into a thoroughgoing love-feast. The light wasrather dim, voices grew low, cheeks came perilously near, and hands metcaressingly. Of course it was nothing but the love of God that movedthem, yet it looked like something else; and the uninitiated spectatorof "the mystery of godliness" found it easy to understand how Americancamp-meetings tend to increase the population, and why a Magistrate inthe South-west of England observed that one result of revivals in hisdistrict was a number of fatherless weans. 

In one respect Salvationism excels all previous revivals. It isunparalleled in its vulgarity. The imbecile coarseness of its languagemakes one ashamed of human nature. Had it existed in Swift's time, hemight have added a fresh clause to his terrible indictment of mankind. Its metaphors are borrowed from the slaughter-house, its songs arefrequently coarser than those of the lowest music-hall, and the generalstyle of its preaching is worthy of a congregation of drunken pugilists. The very names assumed by its officers are enough to turn one's stomach. Christianity has fallen low indeed when its champions boast such titlesas the "Hallelujah Fishmonger, " the "Blood-washed Miner, " the "DevilDodger, " the "Devil Walloper, " and "Gipsy Sal. "

The constitution of the Salvation Army is a pure despotism. GeneralBooth commands it absolutely. There is a Council of War, consisting ofhis own family. All the funds flow into his exchequer, and he spendsthem as he likes. No questions are allowed, no accounts are rendered, and everything is under his unqualified control. The "General" may be aperfectly honest man, but we are quite sure that none but pious lunaticswould trust him with such irresponsible power. 

We understand that the officials are all paid, and some of themextremely well. They lead a very pleasant life, full of agreeableexcitement; they wear uniform, and are dubbed captain, major, or someother title. Add to all this, that they suppose themselves (when honest)to be particular favorites of God; and it will be easy to understandhow so many of them prefer a career of singing and praying to earningan honest living by hard work, The Hallelujah lads and lasses could not, for the most part, get decent wages in any other occupation. All theyrequire for this work is a good stomach and good lungs; and if they canonly boast of having been the greatest drunkard in the district, theworst thief, or the most brutal character, they are on the high road tofortune, and may count on living in clover for the rest of their sojournin this vale of tears. 

A PIOUS SHOWMAN. 

 (October, 1882. )

We all remember how that clever showman, Barnum, managed to fan theJumbo fever. When the enterprising Yankee writes his true autobiographywe shall doubtless find some extraordinary revelations. Yet Barnum, after all, makes no pretence of morality or religion. He merely goes infor making a handsome fortune out of the curiosity and credulity of thepublic. If he were questioned as to his principles, he would probablyreply like Artemus Ward--"Princerpuls? I've nare a one. I'm in the showbizniz. "

General Booth is quite as much a showman as Barnum, but he is a piousshowman. He is a perfect master of the vulgar art of attracting fools. Every day brings a fresh change in his "Walk up, Walk up. " Tambourinegirls, hallelujah lasses, converted clowns and fiddlers, sham Italianorgan grinders, bands in which every man plays his own tune, officers inuniform, Davidic dances, and music-hall tunes, are all served up witha plentiful supply of blood and fire. The "General" evidently means tostick at nothing that will draw; and we quite believe that if a pairof Ezekiel's cherubim were available, he would worry God Almighty intosending them down for exhibition at the City Road show. 

Booth's latest dodge is to say the least peculiar. Most fathers wouldshrink from trafficking in a son's marriage, but Booth is above suchnice scruples. The worst deeds are sanctified by love of God, andreligion condones every indecency. 

Mr. Bramwell Booth, whom the General has singled out as his apostolicsuccessor, and heir to all the Army's property, got married last week;and the pious showman actually exhibited the bridegroom and bride to thepublic at a shilling a head. About three hundred pounds were taken atthe doors, and a big collection was made inside. Booth's anxiety for thecash was very strongly illustrated. Commissioner Bailton, who has hada very eccentric career, was enjoying his long deferred opportunity ofmaking a speech, when many of the crowd began to press towards the door. "Stop, " cried Booth, "don't go yet, there's going to be a collection. "But the audience melted faster than ever. Whereupon Booth jumped upagain, stopped poor Railton unceremoniously, and shouted "Hold on, we'llmake the collection now. " This little manouvre was quite in keepingwith the showman's instruction to his subalterns, to have plenty of goodstrong collecting boxes and pass them round often. 

Booth's facetious remarks during his son's marriage according to theArmy forms were well adapted to tickle the ears of his groundlings. Thewhole thing was a roaring farce, and well sustained the reputation ofthe show. There was also the usual spice of blasphemy. Before BramwellBooth marched on to the platform a board was held up bearing theinscription "Behold the bridegroom cometh. " These mountebanks have noreverence even for what they call sacred. They make everything dance totheir tune. They prostitute "God's Word, " caricature Jesus Christ, andburlesque all the watchwords and symbols of their creed. 

One of Booth's remarks after the splicing was finished is full ofsuggestion. He said that his enemies might cavil, but he had found outa road to fortune in this world and the next. Well, the Lord only knowshow he will fare in the next world, but in this world the pious showmanhas certainly gained a big success. He can neither write nor preach, andas for singing, a half a dozen notes from his brazen throat would emptythe place as easily as a cry of "Fire. " But he is a dexterous manager;he knows how to work the oracle; he understands catering for the mob; inshort, he is a very clever showman, who deals in religion just as othershowmen deal in wild animals, giants, dwarfs, two-headed sheep, fatwomen, and Siamese twins. 

Fortune has brought to our hands a copy of a private circular issuedby "Commissioner" Railton, soliciting wedding presents for Mr. BramwellBooth. With the exception of Reuben May's begging letters, it is thefinest cadging document we ever saw. Booth was evidently ashamed tosign it himself, so it bears the name of Railton. But the pious showmancannot disown the responsibility for it. He will not allow the officersof the Army to marry without his sanction; he forbids them to acceptany private present; he keeps a sharp eye on every detail of theorganisation. Surely, then, he will not have the face to say thathe knew nothing of Railton's circular. He has face enough for almostanything, but hardly for this. There is one damning fact which he cannotshirk. Bailton asks that all contributions shall be made "payable toWilliam Booth, as usual. "

Bailton spreads the butter pretty freely on Booth and his family. Hesays that their devotion to the Army has "loaded them with care, andoften made them suffer weakness and pain. " As to Mr. Bramwell Booth, in particular, we are informed that he has worked so hard behind thescenes, as Chief of the Staff, that many of his hairs are grey attwenty-seven. Poor Bramwell! The Army should present him with a dozenbottles of hair restorer. Perhaps his young wife will renew his ravenhead by imitating the lady in the fable, and pulling out all the greyhairs. 

In order to compensate this noble family in some degree for theirmarvellous devotion to the great cause, Bailton proposes that weddingpresents _in the shape of cash_ should be made to Mr. Bramwell Booth onthe day of his marriage. Whatever money is received will go, not to theyoung gentleman personally, but to reducing the Army debt of £11, 000. But as the Army property is all in Booth's hands, and Mr. Bramwell ishis _heir_ and successor, it is obvious that any reduction of the debtwill be so much clear gain to the firm. 

The General evidently saw that the case was a delicate one; so Bailtonsends out a private circular, which he excuses on the ground that"any public appeal would not be at all agreeable to Mr. Bramwell's ownfeelings. " Of course not. But we dare say the wedding presents willbe agreeable enough. As this is a strong point with the firm, Bailtonrepeats it later on. "I do not wish, " he says, "to make any publicannouncement of this. " The reason of this secrecy is doubtless the sameas that which prompts the General to exclude reporters and interlopersfrom his all-night meetings. Only the initiated are allowed in, and theyof course may be safely trusted. 

With the circular Bailton sent out envelopes in which the pious dupeswere to forward their contributions; and printed slips, headed "WeddingPresents to Mr. Bramwell Booth, " on which they were asked to specifythe amount of their gift and the sin from which the Salvation Army hadrescued them. This printed slip contains a list of sins, which would docredit to a Jesuit confessor. Booth has we think missed his vocation. Hemight have achieved real distinction in the army of Ignatius Loyola. 

The circular is a wonderful mixture of piety and business. Nearly everysentence contains a little of both. The cash will not only gladden thehearts of the Booths, but "make the devil tremble, " and "give earth andhell another shock. " This last bit of extravagance is rather puzzling. That hell should receive another shock is very proper, but why is thereto be an earthquake at the same time?

We have said enough to show the true character of this cadging trick. It throws a strong light on the business methods of this pious showman. Booth is playing a very astute game. By reducing the Army to militarydiscipline, and constituting himself its General, he retains an absolutecommand over its resources, and is able to crush out all opposition andsilence all criticism. He wields a more than Papal despotism. All thehigher posts are held by members of his own family. His eldest son isappointed as his successor. The property thus remains in the family, andthe Booth dynasty is established on a solid foundation. Such an impudentimposture would scarcely be credible if it were not patent that there isstill amongst us a vast multitude of two-legged sheep, who are readyto follow any plausible shepherd, and to yield up their fleeces to hisshears.