Christianity Unveiled Part 6

1 Devotees are generally considered as scourges of society.

A devout woman has seldom the talent of conciliating the love of her husband and his domestics. A gloomy and melancholy religion cannot render its disciples very amiable. A sad and sullen monarch must have sad and sullen subjects: Christians have judiciously remarked, that Jesus Christ wept, but never smiled.

It is from an effect of the same zeal that enthusiastic Christians fly over every sea, and Continent to extend the empire of their G.o.d and make new proselytes. Stimulated by this zeal, missionaries go to trouble the repose of what they call heathen nations, whilst they would be astonished and enraged to find missionaries from those nations endeavouring to propagate a new religion in their country.1

When these propagators of the faith have had power in their hands, they have excited the most horrid rebellions; and have, in conquered countries, exercised cruelties calculated only to render the G.o.d detestable whom they pretended to serve. They have thought that men who have so long been strangers to their G.o.d could be little better than beasts; and, therefore, judged it lawful to exercise every kind of violence over them. In the eyes of a Christian, an infidel is seldom worthier than a dog.

It is apparently in imitation of the Jews that Christian nations have usurped the possessions of the inhabitants of the new world.

The Castilians and Portuguese had the same right to the possession of America and Africa, that the Hebrews had to make themselves masters of the land of Canaan, and exterminate its inhabitants, or reduce them to slavery. Have not Popes arrogated the right of disposing of distant empires to their favourite Monarchs in Europe? These manifest violations of the law of nature and of nations appeared just to those Christian Princes, in favour of whom religion sanctified avarice, cruelty, and usurpation.2

1 Kambi, Emperor of China, asked the Jesuit missionaries at Pekin, what they would say, if he should send missionaries to their nation. The revolts excited by the Jesuits in j.a.pan and Ethiopia are well known. A holy missionary has been heard to say, that without muskets, missionaries could never make proselytes.

2 St. Augustin says, that of right divine, all things belong to the just. A maxim which is founded on a pa.s.sage in the Psalms, which says, the just shall eat the fruit of the labour of the unrighteous. It is known that the Pope, by a bull given in favour of the kings of Castile, Arragon, and Portugal, fixed the line of demarcation which was to rule the conquests which each had gained over the infidels. After such principles, is not the whole earth to become a prey to Christian rapacity?

Humility is, also, considered by Christians as a sublime virtue, and of inestimable value. No super-natural and divine revelations are necessary to teach us that pride does not become man, and that it renders him disagreeable to others. All must be convinced, on a moment's reflection, that arrogance, presumption, and vanity, are disgusting and contemptible qualities.

But Christian humility is carried to a more refined extreme. The Christian must renounce his reason, mistrust his virtues, refuse to do justice to his own good actions, and repress all self-esteem, however well merited. Whence it appears, that this pretended virtue only degrades and debases man in his own eyes, deprives him of all energy, and stifles in him every desire of rendering himself useful to society.

To forbid mankind to esteem themselves and merit the esteem of others, is to break the only powerful string that inclines them to study, industry, and n.o.ble actions. This Christian virtue is calculated only to render them abject slaves, wholly useless to the world, and make all virtue give place in them, to a blind submission to their spiritual guides.

Let us not be surprised, that a religion which boasts of being supernatural should endeavour to unnaturalize man. This religion, in the delirium of its enthusiasm, forbids mankind to love themselves. It commands them to hate pleasures and court grief. It makes a merit of all voluntary evils they do unto themselves. Hence those austerities and penances so destructive to health; those extravagant mortifications, cruel privations, and gradual suicides, by which fanatic Christians think they merit heaven. It must be confessed, all Christians do not feel themselves capable of such marvellous perfections, but all believe themselves more or less obliged to mortify the flesh, and renounce the blessings prepared for them by a bounteous G.o.d, who, they suppose, offers his good things only that they may be refused, and would be offended should his creatures presume to touch them.

Reason cannot approve virtues which are destructive to ourselves, nor admit a G.o.d who is delighted when mankind render themselves miserable, and voluntarily submit to torments. Reason and experience, without the aid of superst.i.tion, are sufficient to prove, that pa.s.sions and pleasures, pushed to excess, destroy us; and that the abuse of the best things becomes a real evil. Nature herself inculcates upon us the privation of things which prove injurious to us. A being, solicitous for his own preservation, must restrain irregular propensities, and fly whatever tends to his destruction. It is plain, that by the Christian religion, suicide is, at least, indirectly authorised.

It was in consequence of these fanatical ideas that, in the earliest ages of Christianity, the forests and deserts were peopled with perfect Christians, who by flying from the world, left their families dest.i.tute of support, and their country of citizens, to abandon themselves to an idle and contemplative life. Hence those legions of monks and cen.o.bites, who, under the standards of different enthusiasts, have enrolled themselves into a militia, burthensome and injurious to society. They thought to merit heaven, by burying talents, which might be serviceable to their fellow-citizens, and vowing a life of indolence and celibacy.

Thus, in nations which are the most faithful to Christianity, a mult.i.tude of men render themselves useless and wretched all their lives.

What heart is so hard as to refuse a tear to the lot of the hapless victims taken from that enchanting s.e.x which was destined to give happiness to our own! Unfortunate dupes of youthful enthusiasm, or sacrificed to the ambitious views of imperious families, they are for ever exiled from the world! They are bound by rash oaths to unending slavery and misery. Engagements, contradicted by every precept of nature, force them to perpetual virginity. It is in vain that riper feelings, sooner or later, warm their b.r.e.a.s.t.s, and make them groan under the weight of their imprudent vows. They regret their voluntary sterility, and find themselves forgotten in society. Cut off from their families, and subjected to troublesome and despotic gaolers, they sink into a life of disgust, of bitterness, and tears. In fine, thus exiled from society, thus unrelated and unbeloved, there only remains for them the shocking consolation of seducing other victims to share with them the torments of their solitude and mortifications.

The Christian religion seems to have undertaken to combat nature and reason in every thing. If it admits some virtues, approved by reason, it always carries them to a vicious excess. It never observes that just mean, which is the point of perfection. All illicit and shameful pleasures will be avoided by every man, who is desirous of his own preservation, and the esteem of his fellow-creatures. The heathens knew and taught this truth, notwithstanding the depravity of morals with which they are reproached by Christians.1 The church even recommends celibacy as a state of perfection, and considers the natural tie of marriage as an approach to sin. G.o.d, however, declares in Genesis, that it is not good for man to be alone. He also formally commanded all creatures to increase and multiply. His Son, in the gospel, comes to annul those laws. He teaches that, to attain to perfection, it is necessary to avoid marriage, and resist the strongest desire with which the breast of man is inspired--that of perpetuating his existence by a posterity, and providing supports for his old age and infirmities.

1 Aristotle and Epictetus recommend chast.i.ty of speech.

Menander said, that a good man could never consent to debauch a virgin or commit adultery. Tibullus said, casta placent superis. Mark Anthony thanks the G.o.ds, that he had preserved his chast.i.ty in his youth. The Romans made laws against adultery. Father Tachard informs us, that the Siamans forbid not only dishonest actions, but also impure thoughts and desires. Whence it appears, that chast.i.ty and purity of manners were esteemed even before the Christian religion existed.

If we consult reason, we find, that the pleasures of love are always injurious when taken in excess; and that they are always criminal when they prove injurious. We shall perceive, that to debauch a woman is to condemn her to distress and infamy, and annihilate to her all the advantages of society; that adultery is destructive to the greatest felicity of human life, conjugal union. Hence we shall be convinced, that marriage, being the only means of satisfying our desire of increasing the species and providing filial supports, is a state far more respectable and sacred, than the destructive celibacy and voluntary castration recommended as a virtue by the Christian religion.

Nature, or its author, invites man, by the attraction of pleasure, to multiply himself. He has unequivocally declared, that women are necessary to men. Experience shews, that they are formed for society, not solely for the purpose of a transient pleasure, but to give mutual a.s.sistance in the misfortunes of life, to produce and educate children, form them into citizens, and provide in them support for themselves in old age. In giving man superior strength, nature has pointed out his duty of labouring for the support of his family; the weaker organs of his companion are destined to functions less violent, but not less necessary. In giving her a soul more soft and sensible, nature has, by a tender sentiment, attached her more particularly to her children. Such are the sure bands which the Christian religion would tear asunder. Such the blessings it would wrest from man, while it subst.i.tutes in their place an unnatural celibacy, which renders man selfish and useless, depopulates society, and which can be advantageous only to the odious policy of some Christian priests, who, separating from their fellow-citizens, have formed a destructive body, which eternalizes itself without posterity. _Gens oterna in qua nemo nascitur._

If this religion has permitted marriage to some sects, who have not the temerity to soar to the highest pinnacle of perfection, it seems to have sufficiently punished them for this indulgence, by the unnatural shackles it has fixed on the connubial state. Thus, among them, we see divorce forbidden, and the most wretched unions indissoluble. Persons once married, are forced to groan under the weight of wedlock, even when affection and esteem are dead, and the place of these essentials to conjugal happiness is supplied by hatred and contempt. Temporal laws also conspiring with religion, forbid the wretched prisoners to break their chains. It seems as if the Christian religion exerted all its powers to make us view marriage with disgust, and give the preference to a celibacy which is pregnant with debauchery, adultery, and dissolution.

Yet the G.o.d of the Hebrews made divorce lawful, and I know not by what right his Son, who came to accomplish the law of Moses, revoked an indulgence so reasonable.

Such are the perfections which Christianity inculcates on her children, and such the virtues she prefers to those which are contemptuously styled human virtues. She even rejects these, and calls them false and sinful, because their possessors are, forsooth, not filled with faith.

What! the virtues of Greece and Rome, so amiable, and so heroic, were they not true virtues? If justice, humanity, generosity, temperance, and patience be not virtues, to what can the name be given? And are the virtues less because professed by heathens? Are not the virtues of Socrates, Cato, Epictetus, and Antonine, real and preferable to the zeal of the Cyrills, the obstinacy of Athanasius, the uselessness of Anthony, the rebellion of Chrysostom, the ferocity of Dominic, and the meanness of Francis?

All the virtues admitted by Christians, are either overstrained and fanatic, tending to render man useless, abject, and miserable; or obstinate, haughty, cruel, and destructive to society. Such are the effects of a religion, which contemning the earth, hesitates not to overwhelm it with trouble, provided it thereby heightens the triumph of its G.o.d over his enemies. No true morality can ever be compatible with such a religion.

CHAP. XIII.--OF THE PRACTICE AND DUTIES OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION.

If the Christian virtues be dest.i.tute of solidity, and produce no effect which reason can approve, we shall find nothing more estimable in a mult.i.tude of incommodious, useless, and often dangerous practices, which Christians consider as their sacred duties, and by means of which they are confident of obtaining the pardon and favour of G.o.d, and an eternal abode with him in unspeakable glory and felicity.

The first and most essential duty of Christians is prayer. To continual prayer their religion attaches its felicity. Their G.o.d, whom they suppose to be overflowing with bounty, refuses to bestow his blessings unsolicited. He grants them only to importunity. Sensible to flattery, like the kings of the earth, he exacts an etiquette, and hears no pet.i.tions unless they are presented in a certain form. What should we say of a father who, knowing the wants of his children, should refuse to give them necessary food, until wearied out with fervent supplications?

But in another view, does not it imply mistrust of the wisdom of G.o.d to prescribe rules for his conduct? Does it not imply a doubt of his immutability, to believe he can be prevailed on by his creatures to alter his designs? If he knows all things, what need is there of continually informing him what are the dispositions and desires of his subjects? If he is almighty, how can he be flattered with the submissions, adorations, and formalities with which Christians prostrate themselves before him?

In one word, prayer supposes a capricious G.o.d, deficient in memory, voracious of praise, fond of seeing his creatures abased in the dust, and anxious to receive at every instant the most abject marks of their submission.

Can these ideas, borrowed from earthly princes, be with propriety applied to an omnipotent Being, who created the universe for man, and desires only that he should be happy? Can it be supposed that such a Being, without equal and without rival, should be jealous of his glory?

Can the prayers of man add glory to a Being beyond comparison superior to all others? Cannot Christians see, that, in endeavouring to honour and exalt their G.o.d, they only degrade and debase him?

It is also the opinion of Christians, that the prayers of one man may be serviceable to others. Partial to his favourites, G.o.d hears pet.i.tions only from their lips. He listens not to his people, unless their prayers be offered up to him through his ministers. He becomes a sultan, accessible only to his ministers, vizirs, eunuchs, and the women of his seraglio. Hence the millions of priests and cen.o.bites, who have no business on earth but to raise their idle hands to Heaven, and pray night and day for its blessings on society. Nations pay dearly for these important services, and these pious impostors live in splendour and ease, while real merit, labour, and industry languish in misery.

Under the pretence of devoting himself to prayer and other ceremonies of his worship, the Christian, particularly in some of the more superst.i.tious sects, is obliged to remain idle, and stand with arms across during a great part of the year. He is persuaded that he honours G.o.d by his inutility. Feasts and fasts, multiplied by the interests of priests and the credulity of the people, often suspended for long intervals the labours necessary to the subsistence of society. Men fly to temples to pray when they should stay at home and cultivate their fields. There their eyes are fed with childish ceremonies, and their ears are filled with fables and doctrines, of which they can comprehend nothing. This tyrannical religion makes it a crime for the poor labourer to endeavour, during consecrated days, to procure subsistence for a numerous and indigent family. And civil authority, in concert with religion, punishes those who have the audacity to earn bread, instead of praying or being idle.

Can reason subscribe to the ridiculous obligation of abstaining from certain aliments and meats which is imposed by some sects of Christians?

In consequence of these laws, people, who live by their labour, are forced to content themselves, during long intervals', with dear and unwholesome provisions, more proper to generate disease than repair strength.

What abject and ridiculous ideas must they entertain of G.o.d, who believe he can be offended by the quality of the food that enters into the stomachs of his creatures! Heaven, however, for a certain sum of money becomes sometimes more accommodating. Priests have been continually busied in straitening the path of their sectaries, that they might transgress more frequently; and that the revenue arising from their transgressions might thus become more ample. All things, even sin itself, among Christians, contribute to the profit of the priests.

No religion ever placed its sectaries in more complete and continual dependance on priests, than the Christian. Those harpies never lose sight of their prey. They take infallible measures for subjecting mankind, and making all contribute to their power, riches, and dominion.

Having a.s.sumed the office of mediator between the heavenly monarch and his subjects, these priests were looked upon as courtiers in favour, ministers commissioned to exercise power in his name, and favourites to whom he could refuse nothing. Thus they became absolute masters of the destiny of the Christians. They gained establishments and rendered themselves necessary by the introduction of innumerable practices and duties, which, though puerile and ridiculous, they had the address to make their flocks look upon as indispensibly necessary to their salvation. They represented the omission of these pretended duties as a crime infinitely greater than an open violation of all the laws of morality and reason.

Let us not then be surprized, that, in the most zealous, that is to say the most superst.i.tious sects, we see mankind perpetually infested with priests. Scarcely are they born, when, under the pretext of washing away original sin, their priests impose on them a mercenary baptism, and pretend to reconcile them with a G.o.d whom they have as yet been unable to offend. By means of a few words and magical ceremonies they are thus s.n.a.t.c.hed from the dominion of Satan. From the tenderest infancy their education is frequently entrusted to priests, whose princ.i.p.al care is to instil into them early the prejudices as necessary to the views of the church. Terrors are now introduced into their minds which increase during their whole lives. They are instructed in the fables, absurd doctrines, and incomprehensible mysteries of a marvellous religion. In one word, they are formed into superst.i.tious Christians, and rendered incapable of being useful citizens or enlightened men. Only one thing is represented to them as necessary, which is to be in all things devoutly submissive to his religion. "Be devout," say his teachers, "be blind, despise thy reason, attend to Heaven, and neglect earth; this is all thy G.o.d demands to conduct thee to eternal felicity."

To maintain the abject and fanatic ideas with which the priest has filled his pupils in their childhood, he commands them to come frequently, and deposit in his bosom their hidden faults, their most secret actions and thoughts. He obliges them to humiliate themselves at his feet, and render homage to his power. He frightens the criminals, and afterwards, if they are judged worthy, he reconciles them to G.o.d, who on the command of his ministers remits their sins. The Christian sects that admit this practice, boast of it as extremely useful in regulating the manners and restraining the pa.s.sions of men; but experience proves, that the countries in which this usage is most faithfully observed, are distinguished rather for the dissolution than the purity of their manners. By such easy expiations they are only emboldened in vice. The lives of Christians are circles of successive offences and concessions. The priesthood reap the profit of this practice, by means of which they exercise an absolute dominion over the consciences of mankind. How great must be the power of an order of men, who possess all the secrets of families, can kindle at pleasure the destructive flame of fanaticism, and open or shut the gates of heaven!

Without the consent of his priests, the Christian cannot partic.i.p.ate in the knowledge of the mysteries of his religion, from which they have a right to exclude him entirely. This privation, however, he has no great reason to lament. But the anathemas or excommunications of the priests generally do a real mischief to mankind. These spiritual punishments produce temporal effects, and every citizen who incurs the disgrace of the church is in danger of that of the government, and becomes odious to his fellow-citizens.

We have already remarked that priests have taken upon themselves the management of marriages. Without their consent, a Christian cannot, become a father. He must first submit to the capricious formalities of his religion, without which his children must be excluded from the rank of citizens.

During all his life, the Christian is obliged to a.s.sist in the ceremonies of worship under the direction of his priests. When he has performed this important duty, he esteems himself the favourite of G.o.d, and persuades himself that he no longer owes any thing to society. Thus frivolous practices take place of morality, which is always rendered subordinate to religion.

When death approaches, the Christian, stretched in agony on his bed, is still a.s.sailed in those distressful moments by priests. In some sects religion seems to have been invented to render the bitter death of man ten thousand times more bitter. A malicious priest comes to the couch of the dying man, and holds before him the spectacle of his approaching end, arrayed in more than all its terrors. Although this custom is destructive to citizens, it is extremely profitable to the priesthood,1 who owe much of their riches to legacies procured by it. Morality is not quite so highly advantaged by it. Experience proves, that most Christians live in security and postpone till death their reconciliation with G.o.d. By means of a late repentance, and largesses to the priesthood, their faults are expiated, and they are permitted to hope that Heaven will forget the acc.u.mulated crimes of a long and wicked life.

1 In Catholic countries.

Death itself does not terminate the empire of the priesthood in certain sects, which finds means to make money even out of the dead bodies of their followers. These, for a sufficient sum, are permitted to be deposited in temples, where they have the privilege of spreading infection and disease. The sacerdotal power extends still further. The prayers of the church are purchased at a dear rate, to deliver the souls of the dead from their pretended torments in the other world, inflicted for their purification. Happy they who are rich in a religion, whose priests being favourites with G.o.d, can be hired to prevail on him to remit the punishments which his immutable justice had intended to inflict!

Such are the princ.i.p.al duties recommended by the Christians; and upon the observation of these they believe their salvation to depend. Such are the arbitrary, ridiculous, and hurtful practices subst.i.tuted for the real duties of morality. We shall not combat the different superst.i.tious practices, admitted by some sects and rejected by others; such as the honours rendered to the memory of those pious fanatics and obscure contemplators whom Roman pontiffs have ranked among the saints. We say nothing of those pilgrimages which superst.i.tion has so often produced, nor those indulgences by means of which sins are remitted. We shall only observe, that these things are commonly' more respected where they are admitted, than the duties of morality, which in those places frequently, are wholly unknown. Mankind find their natural propensities much less thwarted by such rites, ceremonies, and practices, than by being virtuous. A good Christian is a man who conforms exactly to all that his priests exact from him; these subst.i.tute blindness and submission in the place of all virtues.

CHAP. XIV.--OF THE POLITICAL EFFECTS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION.