English Secularism Part 8

On the other hand, Secularism proposes to transact the business of life on purely mercantile principles. It engages only in that cla.s.s of transactions the issue of which can be tested by the experience of this life. Its checks, if I may so speak, are drawn upon duty, good sense, and material effort, and are to be cashed from proceeds arising in our midst--under our own eyes--subject to ordinary commercial tests. Nature is the banker who pays all notes held by those who observe its laws. To use the words of Macbeth, it is here, "on this bank and shoal of time"

upon which we are cast, that nature pays its checks, and not elsewhere; which are honored now, and not in an unknown world, in some unknown time, and in an entirely unknown way. By lack of judgment, or sense, the Secularist may transact bad business; but he gives good security. His surety is experience. His references are to the facts of the present time. He puts all who have dealings with him on their guard. Secularism tells men that they must look out for themselves, act for themselves, within the limits of neither injuring nor harming others. Secularism does not profess to be infallible, but it acts on honest principles. It seeks to put progress on the business footing of good faith.* Adherents who accept the theory of this life for this life dwell in a land of their own--the land of cert.i.tude. Science and utilitarian morality are kings in that country, and rule there by right of conquest over error and superst.i.tion. In the kingdom of Thought there is no conquest over men, but over foolishness only. Outside the world of science and morality lies the great Debatable Ground of the existence of Deity and a Future State. The Ruler of the Debatable Ground is named Probability, and his two ministers are Curiosity and Speculation. Over that mighty plain, which is as wide as the universe and as old as time, no voice of the G.o.ds has ever been heard, and no footsteps of theirs have ever been traced. Philosophers have explored the field with telescopes of a longer range than the eyes of a thousand saints, and have recognised nothing save the silent and distant horizon. Priests have denounced them for not perceiving what was invisible. Sectaries have clamored, and the most ignorant have howled--as the most ignorant always do--that there is something there, because they want to see it. All the while the white mystery is still unpenetrated in this life.

* See Secularism a Religion which Gives Heaven no Trouble.

But a future being undisclosed is no proof that there is no future.

Those who reason through their desires will believe there is; those who reason through their understanding may yet hope that there is. In the meantime, all stand before the portals of the untrodden world in equal unknowingness. If faith can be piety, work is more so. To bring new beauty out of common life--is not that piety? To change blank stupidity into intelligent admiration of any work of nature--is not that piety? If our towns and streets be made to give gladness and cheerfulness to all who live or walk therein--is not that piety? If the prayer of innocence ascend to heaven through a pure atmosphere, instead of through the noisome and polluted air of uncleanness common in the purlieus of towns and of churches, and even cathedrals--is not that piety? Can we, in these days, conceive of religious persons being ignorant and dirty?

Yet they abound. If, therefore, we send to heaven clean, intelligent, bright-minded saints--is not that piety? It is no bad religion--as religions go--to believe in the good G.o.d of knowledge and cleanliness and cheerfulness and beauty, and offer at his altar the daily sacrifice of intelligent sincerity and material service.

We leave to others their own way of faith and worship. We ask only leave to take our own. Carlyle has told us that only two men are to be honored, and no third--the mechanic and the thinker: he who works with honest hand, making the world habitable; and he who works with his brain, making thought artistic and true. "All the rest," he adds with n.o.ble scorn, "are chaff, which the wind may blow whither it list-eth."

The certainty of heaven is for the useful alone. Mere belief is the easiest, the poorest, the shabbiest device by which conscientious men ever attempted to scale the walls of Paradise.

CHAPTER XVII. THE ETHICAL METHOD OF CONTROVERSY

"It was one of the secrets of my craft in the old days, when I wanted to weld iron or work steel to a fine purpose, to begin gently. If I began, as all learners do, to strike my heaviest blows at the start, the iron would crumble instead of welding, or the steel would suffer under my hammer, so that when it came to be tempered it would 'fly,' as we used to say, and rob the thing I had made of its finest quality."

--Robert Coliyer, D. D.

"THEY who believe that they have truth ask no favor, save that of being heard; they dare the judgment of mankind; refused co-operation, they invoke opposition, for opposition is their opportunity." This was the maxim I wrote at the beginning of the Secularistic movement, to show that we were willing to accept ourselves the controversy, which we contended was the sole means of establishing truth. No proposition, as Samuel Bailey showed, is to be trusted until it has been tested by very wide discussion. We soon found that the free and open field of Milton was not sufficient. It needed a "fair" as well as a "free and open encounter." Disputants require to be equally matched in debate as in arms.

The Secularist policy is to accept the purely moral teaching of the Bible, and to controvert its theology, in such respects as it contradicts and discourages ethical effort. Yet theological questions are always sought to be forced upon us. The Rev. Henry Townley followed me to the _Leader_ office (1853-1854) to induce me to discuss the question of the "existence of G.o.d." I never had done so, and objected that it would give the impression that Secularism was atheistic. He was so insistent and importunate that I consented to discuss the question with him. Never after did I do so with any one. The Rev. Brewin Grant endeavored to get my acceptance of propositions which pledged me to a wild opposition to Christianity. Mr. Samuel Morley, honorable in all things, admitted I had objected to it, but in the end I a.s.sented to it, that the discussion might not be broken off. Thomas Cooper was persistent that I should discuss with him the authenticity of the Scriptures. What I proposed was the proposition that the authenticity of the Scripture, its miracles, and prophecies are quite apart from moral truth.

The discussion took place in the city of York, lasting five nights.

Canon Robinson and Canon Hey presided alternately. Mr. Cooper was an able man in dealing with the stock propositions of Christianity; but their relevance as tests of morality was an entirely new subject to him.

He protested rather than reasoned, and declared he would never discuss the question of the ethical test of the truth of Scriptures; nor have I ever found any responsible minister willing to do so down to this day. Thus Christians should condemn with reservation the tendency in Secularists to debate theology, seeing how reluctant they are to do otherwise themselves. Christians seem incapable of understanding how much the objection to their cause arises in the revolt of the moral sense against it.

On first meeting Richard Carlile in 1842, some years before Secularism took a distinctive form, he invited me to hear him lecture upon the principles of the _Christian Warrior_,* of which he was editor, and to give my opinion thereon. In doing so I explained the ideas from which I have never departed; namely, that no theologic, astronomic, or miraculous mode of proving Scriptural doctrine could ever be made even intelligible, except to students of very considerable research.

Such theories, I contended, must rest, more or less, on critical and conjectural interpretation, and could never enable a workingman to dare the understanding of others in argument. Scientific interpretation laid entirely outside Christian requirements, and seemed to Christians as disingenuous evasion of what they took to be obvious truths. My contention was that the people have no historic or critical knowledge enabling them to determine the divine origin of Christianity.

* The last periodical Mr. Carlile edited.

On the platform he who has most knowledge of Hebrew, Greek, and Latin will always be able to silence any dissentient who has not equal information. If by accident a controversialist happen to possess this knowledge, it goes for nothing unless he has credit for cla.s.sical competency. In controversy of this nature it is not enough for a man to know; he must be known to know before his conclusions can command attention. To myself it was not of moment whether the Scriptures were authentic or inspired. My sole inquiry was, Did they contain clear moral guidance? If they did, I accepted that guidance with grat.i.tude. If I found maxims obviously useful and true, judged by human experience, I adopted them, whether given by inspiration or not. If precepts did not answer to this test, they were not acceptable, though all the apostles in session had signed them. To miracles I did not object, nor did I see any sense in endeavoring to explain them away. We all have reason to regret that no one performs them now. It was our misfortune that the power, delegated with so much pomp of promise to the saints, had not descended to these days. If any preacher or deacon could, in our day, feed five thousand men on a few loaves and a few small fishes, and leave as many baskets of fragments as would run a workhouse for a month, the Poor Law Commissioners would make a king of that saint. But if a precept enjoined me to believe what was not true, it would be a base precept, and all the miracles in the Scriptures could not alter its character; while, if a precept be honest and just, no miracle is wanted to attest it; indeed, a miracle to allure credence in it would only cast suspicion on its genuineness. The moral test of the Scriptures was sufficient, since it had the commanding advantage of appealing to the common sense of all sorts and conditions of men, of Christian or of Pagan persuasion.

Ethical criticism has this further merit, that on the platform of discussion the miner, the weaver, or farm-laborer is on the same level as the priest. A man goes to heaven upon his own judgment; whereas, if his belief is based on the learning of others, he goes to heaven second-hand.

When Mr. J. A. Froude wrote for John Henry Newman the Life of St.

Belletin, he ended with the words: "And this is all that is known, _and more than all_, of the life of a servant of G.o.d." In the Bible there appears to be a great deal more than was ever known. This does not concern the Secularist, though it does the scholar. If there be moral maxims in the Scripture, what does it matter how they got there?

CHAPTER XVIII. ITS DISCRIMINATION

"There is nothing so terrible as activity without insight"

--Goethe.

IN 1847 I commenced in the _Reasoner_ what I ent.i.tled "The Moral Remains of the Bible,"--a selection of some splendid moral stories, incidents, and sentences having ethical characteristics such as I doubted not would "remain" when the Bible came to be regarded as a human book. I wrote a "Logic of Life."* My _Trial of Theism_ was only "as accused of obstructing Secular life," as stated on the t.i.tle-page. The object was to show how much useful criticism could be entered upon without touching the questions of authenticity, or miracles, or the existence of deity.

Thus it was left to opponents to declare that things morally incredible were inspired by G.o.d. In this case it was not I, but _they_, who blasphemed.

* Companion to the "Logic of Death," both contained in The Trial of Theism.

Take the case of Samson's famous engagement with the Philistines at Ramath,--Lehi surrounded by a band of warlike Philistines (though, as the text implies, 3,000 of his own armed countrymen were at hand).

Samson, who had no weapon, was not given one by them, but had to look about for a "new jawbone of an a.s.s." With this singular instrument he killed, one after the other, a thousand Philistine soldiers, who were big, strong men, and, unless every blow was fatal, it must have taken several blows to kill some of them.

Are there three places in the human body where a single blow will be sure to kill a man? Did Samson know those places? And was he always able to direct his blow with unerring precision to one or other of those particular spots? If the thousand Philistines "surrounded" him, how did he keep the others off while he struggled with the one he was killing?

It is not conceivable that the Philistines stood there to be killed, and meekly submitted to ign.o.ble blows, death, and degradation. The jawbone must have been of strange texture to have crashed through armor, and have turned aside spears and swords of stalwart warriors without chipping, splitting, or breaking in two. What time it must have taken Samson to pursue each man, beat off his comrades, drag him from their midst, give him the asinine _coup de grace_, drag and cast his dead body upon the "heaps" of slain he was piling up! What struggling, scuffling, and turmoil of blood and blows Samson must have gone through! Spurted all over with blood, Barnum would have bought him for a Dime Museum as the deepest-colored Red Indian known. No Deerfoot could have been nimbler than Samson must have been on this mighty day. When this Herculean fight was over, which, with the utmost expedition, must have occupied Samson six days,--which would give 166 killed single-handed per day,--the only effect produced upon Samson appears to have been that he was "sore athirst." Even after this extraordinary use of the jawbone it was in such good condition that, a hollow place being "clave" in it, a fount of water gushed forth for refreshing this remarkable warrior. Were it not recorded in the Bible, it would be said that the writer intended to imply that the jawbone of the a.s.s is to be found only in the mouth of the reader.

Can it need miracle or prophecy, authenticity, or inspiration, to attest this story of the Jewish Jack-the-Giant-killer? What moral good can arise from a narration which it is reverence to reject? By leaving it to the Christian to say it is given by "inspiration" of G.o.d, it is he who blasphemes. But if the question of authenticity were raised, the character of the narrative would be lost sight of, and would not come into question; while the test of moral probability decides the invalidity of the story within the compa.s.s of the knowledge of an ordinary audience.

In the same manner, keeping to the policy of affirmation, he who maintains the self-existence, the self-action, and eternity of the universe can be met only by those who defame nature as a second-hand tool of G.o.d. Such are atheists towards nature, the author of their existence, and G.o.d must so regard them.

A single precept of Christ's, "Take no thought for the morrow," has bred swarms of mendicants in every age since this day; but a far more dangerous precept is "Resist not evil," which has made Christianity welcome to so many tyrants. Christ, whatever other sentiments he had, had a slave heart. Every friend of freedom knows that "resistance is the backbone of the world." The patriot poet* exclaims:

"Land of our Fathers--in their hour of need G.o.d help them, guarded by the pa.s.sive creed."

* Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes.

No miracle could make these precepts true, and he who proved their authenticity would be the enemy of mankind.

Whether Christ existed or not affects in no way what excellence and inimitableness there was in his delineated character. His offer of palpable materialistic evidence to Thomas showed that he recognised the right of scepticism to relevant satisfaction. His concession of proof in this case needed no supernatural testimony to render it admirable.

The reader will now see what the policy of Secularist advocacy is,--mainly to test theology by its ethical import. To many all policy is restraint; they cry down policy, and erect blundering into a virtue.

Whereas policy is guidance to a chosen end. Mathematics is but the policy of measurement; grammar but the policy of speech; logic but the policy of reason; arithmetic but the policy of calculation; temperance but the policy of health; trigonometry but the policy of navigation; roads but the policy of transit; music but the policy of controlling sound; art but the policy of beauty; law but the policy of protection; discipline but the policy of strength; love but the policy of affection.

An enemy may object to an adversary having a policy, because he is futile without one. The policy adopted may be bad, but no policy at all is idiocy, and commits a cause to the providence of Bedlam.

CHAPTER XIX. APART FROM CHRISTIANISM

"What is written by Moses can only be read by G.o.d."

--Bikar Proverb.

SECULARISM differs from Christianism in so far as it accepts only the teachings which pertain to man, and which are consonant with reason and experience.

Parts of the Bible have moral splendor in them, but no Christian will allow any one to take the parts he deems true, and reject as untrue those he deems false. He who ventured to be thus eclectic would be defamed as Paine was. Thus Christians compel those who would stand by reason to stand apart from them.

To accept a part, and put that forward as the whole--to pretend or even to a.s.sume it to be the whole--is dishonest. To retain a portion, and reject what you leave, and not say so, is deceiving. To contend that what you accept as the spirit of Christianity is in accordance with all that contradicts it, is to spend your days in harmonising opposite statements--a pursuit demoralising to the understanding. The Secularist has, therefore, to choose between dishonesty, the deception of others and deception of himself, or ethical principles independent of Christianity--and this is what he does:

The Bible being a bundle of Hebrew tracts on tribal life and tribal spite, its a.s.sumed infallibility is a burden, contradicting and misleading to all who accept it as a divine handbook of duty.

In papers issued by religious societies upon the Bible it is declared to be "so complete a system that nothing can be added to it, or taken from it," and that "it contains everything needful to be known or done." This is so false that no one, perceiving it, could be honest and not protest against it in the interest of others. Recently the Bishop of Worcester said: "It was of no use resisting the Higher Criticism. G.o.d had not been pleased to give us what might be called a perfect Bible."* Then it is prudence to seek a more trustworthy guide.

* Midland Evening News, 1893.