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practice Christianity: but whilst they practice something else, what has religion to do with those who have denied the faith, and are worse than infidels ?-(1 Tim. 5—8.)

All these objections therefore lie not against Christians, but against hypocrites: and when bad sovereigns shew the worthlessness of good ones, hypocrites will disprove Christianity.

Let the writer find in the gospel, a command or excuse for the practices he condemns, and till then, find fault with professors; but be silent at least, about the gospel ;-till it is proved guilty.

What is it to me, though Judas was a thief, am I therefore also to betray Christ because Judas did?

Only one short paragraph, denying responsibility for belief, touches upon any real objection to the Bible; and that paragraph is merely assertion, whilst the subject requires fair, full, and honest investigation.

But this metaphysical question, is soon abandoned for vituperation and falsehood: after vilifying believers, the writer vilifies the Bible, to prepare for such a precious saying as this" WE HATE THE BIBLE," we have a "contempt for the professors of religion." Now it happens that all lying priests who aspire to power, wealth, and lordship, like free-thinkers, also "hate the Bible." Every one who knows anything of the Bible, knows it condemns priestcraft; priests put Christ to death; and have often put his followers to death: and all who know anything of liberty, know that in the rampant ages of priestly rule, the Bible was carefully hidden: : men were murdered for translating it: and still in the face of these facts, the Free-thinker utters the following:-"This Bible, because it served the turn of the priests in the barbarous ages [priests, who carefully suppressed it!] because it allied itself with power [another falsehood] which in the middle ages, meant the strongest and most unscrupulous free-booter, who, the people were taught by the same book [WHERE?] to consider, were imbued with a divine right [a priestly invention again, as well as free-thinking libel] to trample on mankind; and to be sacrificed or slaughtered according to the will and pleasure of this priest-made sacred thief, is still endeavoured, by persuasions of all kinds, by threats, by force of law, to be thrust down our throats whether we will or no."

When the writer of this sentence can shew us what the Bible has to do, either with such practices, or such priests; when he can find threats in Christianity on the subject, then he will state them, referring to chapter and verse: and meanwhile, he rests under the imputation of uttering some wild, if not wicked, because false assertions.

It is the easiest and simplest thing in the world, to read the history, precepts, and general doctrines of the Redeemer; and if he or his recognized Apostles, were the allies of a blood-thirsty despotism, this can be shewn out of the New Testament. But if it be found that they were the victims of oppression; that they preached and exhibited love, peace, brotherhood; then it is plain that these who think differently are deniers of Christ, and misrepresent his system, as much as the free-thinker does.

It is of a piece with this falsification of history and the Bible, to mix up the Metropolitan Interments Bill, with the state of theology and the truth of Christianity. The shameful conduct of the dominant Church, in thus taxing the dead, is just as honourable as the free-thinker's artifice in taxing Christianity with the robbery of graves.

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"The tactics of the clergy respecting the Metropolitan Interments Bill, is of the usual kind: in one parish, as proved by Sir B. Hall, (and in many others it is the same,) the burial-grounds belonging to the parish, were purchased by the parish; yet the cormorant who holds the living, that of St. Giles, value £900 and odd per annum, with a deanship, value £1,000, is to have a perpetual annuity-a tax upon the dead-struck upon an average of the burials in that churchyard for five years: but as believers would pay, 'it is all working together for good.' The good we see in it, is that nations will rise up and sweep away for ever the crude religious systems that have cursed the earth."

It happens that no believers would use that passage in the above style; though it be a truth, that evils by overdoing themselves get intolerable: and further, many believers would sweep away this system which is NOT RELIGIOUS, but POLITICAL, and no part of Christianity. Undoubtedly it is a shame, that we cannot have cemeteries outside of towns, without paying toll at the dead house, to clergymen; but what has this to do with the purity or truth of religion? Let free-thinkers reckon with Parliament for that,-it is no sacrament of Christ's religion.

From this burlesque of Christianity, the writer concludes, "it is all of a piece; unwholesome, putrid, and must be removed-in its place must be reared a system of pure morality; we must live it, all men must be priests of it, all must be equal in it." We have no objection to the removal of these abuses which disgrace religion: if men will live that, no such practices can exist; then all will be priests, "ye are a royal priesthood;" and all will be equal; for none is to exercise lordship, since we are "all brethren."-(Matt. xxiii. 8-11. Mark x. 42, 46.)

What has Christianity then to do with Parliamentary Acts, and Episcopal lordship?—(1 Pet. v. 2, 3.) Or in the gentle words of the Freethinker "what to do with us are the doings of the Council of Nice? What weight do we place on the musty deeds of stupid synods? What care we for what that hoary libertine, Henry VIII. believed? or that peurile idiot, Edward? or those tigresses Elizabeth and Mary ?" To which we may add,—or parliament, or clergy, or bench of bishops? Give us something against JESUS CHRIST, HE IS OUR AUTHORITY. And to mistake the above characters for Christianity, is to deserve the title so gracefully applied to Edward.

This second number of the Free-thinker's Magazine, condemns itself, for from lack of matter (notwithstanding the editor seeks to fill up with abuse of Christianity, instead of fair arguments against its being abused,) we are treated, not only with a further reprint of Gibbon, but with an ALLEGORY, BY VOLTAIRE. That Allegory shews that Voltaire at least, could distinguish between Catholic Priestcraft and Christianity. And it is an answer to the free-thinker.

Taken in a dream into the next world, Voltaire met with several worthies; who had been the victims of persecution: he saw also the heaps of the bones of slaughtered saints: did he then conclude against Christianity? Hear him, and learn how to reason.

"Here I beheld a man (Jesus Christ) of mild and simple mien, who appeared about thirty-five years old. He was looking with compassion upon a distant heap of whitened skeletons, through which I had been led

to the abode of the sages. I was astonished to find his feet swelled and bloody, his hands in the same state, his side pierced, and his ribs laid bare by flogging. Good God! said I, is it possible that one of the just and wise should be in this state? I have just seen one treated in a very odious manner; but there is no comparison between his punishment and yours. BAD priests and bad judges poisoned him (Socrates.) Was it also by priests and judges that you were so cruelly assassinated? With great affability, he answered yes.' And who were those monsters? They were hypocrites.' [The parties by whom the Free-thinker crucifies the Son of God afresh, by denying his religion because of their hypocrisy.]

But did you say nothing, did you do nothing, that could serve them as a pretext? The wicked find a pretext in everything?

You did not then contribute anything by your discourses, either badly rendered, or badly interpreted, to those frightful masses of bones which I passed on my way to consult you? Impossible! I and mine lived in poverty and lowliness; my greatness was only in virtue.' [Then why does the Free-thinker quote A Bishop and Beadle, and the Book of Martyrs, against Christianity?]

Can we love God and eat meat on a Friday? [Asceticism.] I always ate what was given me; for I was too poor to give a dinner to any one.'

Might we love God and be just, and still be prudent enough not to entrust all the adventures of one's life to a person one does not know? [Confession.] Such was always my custom.'

Might not I, while doing good, be excused from making a pilgrimage to St. James of Compostella? [Penances, pilgrimages and Saint worship.] 'I was never in that country.'

Should I confine myself in a place of retirement with blockheads? [Monkery-Monasteries, &c.] 'I always made little journeys from town

to town.'

Well if it be so [if priestly burlesque, and free-thinking slander, form no part of your system.] I TAKE YOU FOR MY ONLY MASTER. Then he gave me a nod, which filled me with consolation. disappeared, and I was left with a good conscience."

The vision

May not the free-thinker learn a lesson of truthfulness, candour and duty, from Voltaire? And may not the Redeemer say, out of thine own Magazine will I judge thee?

N.B. We are sufficiently aware that to many of our readers it is unnecessary to expose the above form of infidelity; and that they would rather see its more refined shapes and subtle arguments explained: THESE WE SHALL CERTAINLY NOT NEGLECT IN THEIR TURN; but since we write mainly for the working classes, we are desirous first of all to exhibit the bolder and more popular forms of unbelief, that plain men may be able to meet the dishonest artifices we have exposed. The free-thinkers dissected in this article, are by no means at the bottom of the scale of intellect or influence, and are far from thinking soberly of themselves: this is a virtue, however, to which we may in some degree help them.

V.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF HUMAN NATURE.

The nature of man as spiritual, immortal, and responsible, will be the most frequent topic of this department: though sometimes we shall introduce MISCELLANEOUS subjects.

THE SEPARATE PROVINCES, OF PHILOSOPHY, SCIENCE, AND RELIGION.

"There is a spirit in man, and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth him understanding;" such is the declaration of Holy Writ, and such we regard as the firmest conclusion of the highest philosophy.

Ir is our purpose in this department, to make manifest and vindicate this great fact of human nature;—that man consists of something distinct from the bodily organization, a spirit, submitting to other laws than those of mechanism, chemistry and physiology; and to point out in plain language the qualities of that soul; so that our readers may know as clearly what spirit is, as some think they know what matter is."

We hope in these pages to present to all our readers a comprehensible system of their own spiritual nature, and in doing this, we shall endeavour to afford a defence of old and long recognized truths, for the present in danger of being overlooked by the influence of one of those periodical mental fashions, which are to the public mind what the skin is to those fellow creatures which occasionally at set times put on a new dress.

The only difference being, that changes of the public mind, as to a fashionable sentiment, are more gradual and infrequent; neither dependent upon nor measured by the revolutions of the sun, but resulting from other forces; and effected in varying periods.

Now we wish that like those creatures referred to, the old skin may be cast, by a process of nature, (not by the barbarous method of flaying ;) -by the force of those inward currents of life, which renew the surface, and put off the old man by the gradual mastery of the new.

Amidst all the superficial changes in a civilized and to some extent Christianized country, there is an under-current of good sense, and real life, which needs only to be fostered, in order to subordinate and overcome, everything contrary thereto. And it is to this life we appeal; to those truths and principles most surely believed by many, and never overthrown or shaken by any; that men may no longer have three or four inconsistent provinces of faith; but from a central and unquestioned position, examine the discordant materials added to their collection of indiscriminate mental curiosities.

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None can believe contradictions at the same time; but our minds are like some books; we often contradict ourselves on the next page.

It is useful therefore to have a collation and comparison of the table of contents; that we may see at one glance, whether the ingredients are consistent.

The main difficulty in teaching the great questions of philosophy, arises not from the abstruseness of the subjects, so much as from the technical language under which these questions have been buried: so that he who undertakes to instruct the people in these subjects, must first understand them so clearly, as to declare them in the vernacular tongue. Circulating his acquired capital in the current coin of the realm. As we are told respecting Demosthenes, that he buried himself in his underground study, till he had arranged his thoughts and mastered his language; being thus prepared to come up to, and electrify the people; so we want those who shall descend into the recesses and labyrinths of knowledge; to enquire anxiously what philosophy intends to utter; and then emerge from the gloom of study, to scatter plain and deep oracles, which will find a fitting echo, in the profundity of man's spiritual nature. Our main purpose in this enquiry will be, to shew the RELATION BETWEEN SCIENCE, PHILOSOPHY AND RELIGION; that we may know on some assignable grounds, which is to give way; and in what province either is supreme.

To prepare for a complete view of our subject, it is necessary then to notice, THE THREE GRAND LEADING DIVISIONS OF KNOWLEDGE, and the professions founded on them.

These divisions are Physics, Metaphysics, and Divinity; or Science, Philosophy, and Theology. Physics or science, has to do with observations of outward nature; the discovery of the orderly series of changes in material things; these changes in their observed order, constituting the laws of nature or methods and processes in physical objects. Metaphysics, or philosophy, deals first with human consciousness, the inward laws of thought, and the relations of outward nature to intelligence. This forms a bridge between science and religion. Whilst religion deals with our moral relations to the Creator and from our relation to him and his revealed will, indicates our relations to each other.

On these three general branches of knowledge, are founded three professions; Physiologists, in the widest sense, of professors of the natural sciences, including all subordinate branches, of astronomy, geology, chemistry, medicine, &c. Metaphysicians, dealing with intelligences and the principles on which they act. Divines, teaching human duty in

relation to the Supreme Will.

Originally, these three branches of knowledge were included in one profession-the priesthood; as the Eastern Magi, the British Druids, and for some time the miscalled Christian priesthood. And while knowledge was thus confined to a class, it was a monopoly of power; and like all monopolies, was an engine of oppression and delusion: it was the great agent of State policy and popular superstition.

But these three elements of knowledge, have since been separated, as well as extended beyond the clerical profession. And the result was a new distribution of power; and the priesthood either lost its influence or

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