Before entering upon an inquiry into religious unbelief, we need to form a correct estimate of its prevalence. If, as many would have us think, there is nothing unusual in the present situation—if the age of faith is returning,1 it is hardly worth while to enter upon this inquiry at all. If, on the other hand, the forces hostile to the Christian faith differ essentially from those that stirred up waves of scepticism in the past—if there is overwhelming evidence that belief among educated men is fast decaying, it is surely high time to investigate the grounds of unbelief, and to welcome the fullest discussion concerning the best means of dealing with an entirely new and extremely grave situation. It is only the shortest-sighted policy that would shelve a disagreeable question until mischief had occurred. It is better to face the facts. From every point of view, concealment regarding a question of such vital importance as the truth of Christianity is to be deplored; while an attitude of indifference on a subject that should be of surpassing interest to us all can only be characterised as amazing—unless, indeed, the real explanation be that men have ceased to believe. [2]

We must, then, determine, in the first place, whether we are witnessing simply a wave of scepticism that will shortly subside again, or whether the present situation in the religious world is altogether unprecedented. The truth of the matter will best be learnt from the lips of those to whom pessimistic admissions must be peculiarly distressing, and who would therefore be the last either to raise a false alarm or to be guilty of an exaggeration. The Bishop of London has warned us2 that “the truth of the matter really is that all over Europe a great conflict is being fought between the old faith in a supernatural revelation and a growing disbelief in it.” The Bishop of Salisbury lately3 said: “There has been revealed to us the terrible and painful fact that a great many are giving up public worship, and that a large proportion of the people of England pay little attention to religion at all.” Not long ago Lord Hugh Cecil expressed4 the same opinion in the following words: “On all sides there are signs of the decay of the Faith. People do not go to church, or, if they go, it is for the sake of the music, or for some non-religious motive. The evidence is overwhelming that the doctrines of Christianity have passed into the region of doubt.” From Dr. Horton we learn that “vast numbers of people in England to-day have forsaken the best and highest ideal of life known to them before they have found a better and higher.... While Professor Haeckel and Professor Ray Lankester [3]do in their way offer an alternative, and present to us the solution of the great enigma according to their light, the bulk of people in our day surrender the old and tried ideal, fling it aside, assume that it is discredited, live without it, and make no serious attempt to find a better ideal.”5

Are there not indications, moreover, everywhere in the literature of the day? The works of some of our greatest scholars are either covertly or openly agnostic. The more thoughtful of our magazines, such as the Nineteenth Century, Fortnightly Review, Hibbert Journal, Independent Review, etc., are continually publishing articles which teem with heterodoxy. The “Do We Believe?” correspondence in the Daily Telegraph (not to mention the more recent controversies in the Standard, Daily Mail, and Daily News) was without precedent, and highly significant of the present state of religious unrest. In a lecture reported in the Tablet, Father Gerard voiced the growing feeling of apprehension when he referred to the “Do We Believe?” controversy and the “amazing success” of the Rationalist Press Association as indicating a situation of “the utmost gravity, as gravely disquieting as any with which in her long career the Church has ever been confronted.” Also it may be noticed that organised efforts have commenced all over England to answer inquiries concerning the truth of Christianity by means of apologetic literature and lectures. What do these inquiries portend? The reply is given in the warning of the Rev. Mark Pattison in his essay on “Tendencies of Religious Thought in England.” “When an age,” he says, “is [4]found occupied in proving its creed, this is but a token that the age has ceased to have a proper belief in it.”

Whichever way we turn the same spectacle confronts us. In France especially, and also in Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Holland, Belgium, Italy, Spain, the United States, Nicaragua, Ecuador, Brazil, and Argentina (where the men are practically all agnostics), freethought is making rapid progress. Only in Russia, where ninety per cent. of the population are uneducated, is the growth small and confined to the “intellectuals.” Never in the world’s history has there been so much disbelief in the “supernatural”; and, with the advance of science and education, this disbelief appears likely to be one day almost universal. Militant Rationalism is jubilant; while the pastor of the Theistic Church6 proclaims: “I see a battle coming. I do not, like Froude, predict that it will be fought once more, as of old, in blood and tears; but I am as certain as I am of to-morrow’s dawn that a mighty conflict is at hand which will revolutionise the religious thought and feeling of Christendom.”

It is sheer folly for the Church to comfort herself with the reflection that this is not the first time in the history of Christianity that disbelief has manifested itself. In the early days of the Church the heretic was not in possession of the knowledge that we have since acquired. He could not support his views, as he can now, with the facts of science. At every step he could be met by arguments which he had no adequate means of refuting, and if he dared to deny the “supernatural” there was an enormous preponderance of public opinion against him. Indeed, he [5]himself generally believed in the “supernatural,” though he was sceptical of the particular evidence of it on which Christianity had been founded. Retarded by Christianity itself—or, shall we say, by its interpreters?—knowledge was unable to advance; it receded, and the clock was put back in scientific research. Darkness reigned supreme for over a thousand years. At last the dawn began to break. What was the result? The children of light suffered for their temerity; but their ideas were eventually absorbed, and beliefs were suitably reformed. Thus the Copernican system was gradually accepted, and so were the discoveries which followed, up to fifty years ago. Then, however, the established beliefs received shock after shock in rapid succession—shocks from which they do not yet show any promise of recovering. The myriads of worlds in the processes of birth and death; the vast antiquity of the earth; the long history of man and his animal origin; the reign of natural law, and the consequent discredit of the supernatural; the suspicions aroused by the study of comparative mythology; the difficulties of “literal inspiration”; the doubt thrown by the Higher Criticism on many cherished beliefs—these and the like have shaken the very foundations of our faith, and are the cause of agnosticism among the vast majority of our leaders of thought and science.

Ecclesiastics, however, with certain notable exceptions, appear to be labouring under the delusion that a reconciliation has taken place of late between Religion and Science, and that the voice of the Higher Criticism has been hushed—at least, they are continually assuring us to this effect. They remain [6]under this delusion for two reasons. First, because they are more or less ignorant of science and of the preponderating opinion of the scientific world concerning the truth of Christianity. Secondly, because they are lulled into a feeling of security through misconceptions regarding the attitude of the laity. There appears to be the same, or nearly the same, average of religious conformity as heretofore, and the consensus of opinion seems to be all on the side of church and chapel. Any falling off in religious fervour is attributed to sheer carelessness rather than to unbelief. From the days of Huxley until quite lately there have been no attacks upon Christianity worth mentioning. The Churches fail to realise that this religious conformity and goodwill towards the Christian faith has generally no connection whatever with a conviction of the truth of Christianity, and that, where there is this conviction, it is usually among those who are ignorant of the chief causes for suspicion. I propose, therefore, in the first instance, to examine some of the more usual types among the laity. Obviously, in doing so I shall be omitting a great many shades of thought. I shall say very little about the opinions of the genuine believer or of the hopelessly thoughtless, and nothing of the opinions of evil-livers. My object is to set forth the types which are most likely to have been misunderstood by the clergy.

Let us commence, then, with the sceptical. They are not inclined, for the present at least, to propagate their views. Rightly or wrongly, they still hold the popular opinion that, while they themselves can [7]dispense with belief, the masses cannot. All that is asked of a “cultured” man is that he keep his opinion to himself. He may be an agnostic or—whether he realises it or not—practically an atheist; but he must not think of calling himself by such ugly names. “The uneducated freethinker,” our modern philosopher will say, “manifests a Philistine Voltaireanism—a spirit now disapproved by scholars and philosophers, who regard with serious consideration all the manifestations and products of human thought, from the earliest fetichism to the most recent developments of that religious tendency which appears to be a constitutional element in man.” Such high thoughts, according to this philosopher, are not for the common herd, who must continue to wallow in their ignorance, feeding on husks, which, however unsuitable for his own refined digestion, will serve well enough to nourish the religious instincts of the masses.

If of a mystical turn of mind, he will tell you that Christianity, like all other religions, may be but a symbol of a great Reality; and this person, though sceptical regarding the Christian dogmas, will possibly consider himself a Christian. Or, again, he may be without any leaning towards mysticism, and merely hold that religion, if sincere, is better for the mind than scepticism. “Better a belated and imperfect religion,” he will say, “than none at all. The heart has its claims on our consideration as well as the intellect. Study Comte’s General View of Positivism.”

Many agnostics are just as firmly convinced as believers that their country’s prosperity is bound up with the Christian belief. This is largely due to their still clinging to the Church’s teaching [8]concerning belief and morals. It is well to remember, however, that the feeling on this point of the average cultured Frenchman or Italian is quite the opposite. The measures now being taken by the French Government against the clergy are based upon the contention that the Church’s influence is injurious to the State’s welfare; and this feeling has reached such a pitch that Republican employees hardly dare admit their attendance at divine worship. During September, 1904, the Italian Government extended a cordial welcome to a Freethought Congress, and the proceedings were opened by the Minister of Public Instruction. But the average Englishman, be he ever so sure of the falsity of the Christian dogmas, can foresee nothing but immorality and anarchy as the result of the overthrow of Christianity. “Cui bono?” “Quo vadis?” he cries. “Leave well alone!” “It is easy enough to show that Christianity is false, but what have you to put in its place? What we want now is construction, not criticism and the flogging of a dying creed.” He forgets, it seems to me, that people cannot be hoodwinked for ever, and that, as Mr. Froude tells us, the Reformation was brought about by people refusing any longer to believe a lie. In addition to this concern for the public weal, the sceptic is influenced by motives of expediency. He is well aware of the odium he would incur should he proclaim his heterodox views concerning the popular religion. Such publicity might spoil his professional career, be the death-blow of his ambitions, cause him considerable pecuniary loss, alienate the friends he most values, and, worst of all, destroy the happiness of his home life. For these and similar reasons we find, in the case of the half-believer, [9]that he does not care to verify his doubts, but prefers to leave his opinions vague enough to be able to call himself a broad-minded Christian. Whether half-believing or distinctly agnostic, he usually holds that very common opinion regarding women, children, and religion—that, however little store a man may set by belief, it is wise to encourage it in the women folk, and also to hand over the children to them for their religious instruction. Besides, militant agnosticism is not the fashion. It is looked upon as “bad form,” or as smacking of socialism. Indifference is much the easier attitude.

Or, again, the average man is disposed to trust to the progress of science and the ultimate triumph of truth, and sees no reason why he should make any effort towards shortening the period of transition. In his contempt for the efforts of the “lowly born” and indigent secularists, he forgets that the greatest changes in the world’s history have been brought about from the smallest beginnings by these very “lower orders” he affects to despise. In our own times, was it not working men who first set in motion a revolution that will eventually reform Russia? Perhaps the commonest attitude of “the man in the street,” whatever his manner of belief may be, is one of good-natured indifference—an acquiescence in things as they are. Absence of the critical spirit or of anxious-mindedness, or of both, renders it easy for him to take things as he finds them, much after the manner of his primeval ancestors. His mind will not occupy itself with aught but the present. Naturally, too, he feels very strongly that what appears to make others happy should not be disturbed. In all this he makes various [10]questionable assumptions, which I am considering in subsequent chapters of this book.

It is unnecessary to refer to the opinions of the militant agnostic, as this type could never be accused of deceiving the Church. However, it maybe noted that Mr. Blatchford says, in the Clarion of February 3rd, 1905: “So far as I am concerned, I attacked religion because I believe it to be untrue, and because it seems to me to bar the way to liberty and happiness. The attack upon religion is a part of a task I have set myself.” There are statesmen and other persons of influence who are as incredulous as Mr. Blatchford regarding the truth of Christianity; but they do not, apparently, hold that Christianity bars the way to liberty and happiness (I give them credit for being ruled by the highest motives), and so the Church has their support. It is a weird arrangement between Unbelief and Belief, which cannot possibly last much longer; meanwhile, it tends to confuse and delay the answer to that gravest of questions: “Is Christianity true?”

Leaving the sceptic, let us examine another extremely common type—the man who is under the impression that he is a Christian, without either being particularly devout or having inquired at all deeply into the grounds of his faith. He is ignorant of the causes for doubt, because he has not had, or has not cared to afford, any time for such matters. I do not refer so much to the masses, who obviously have very little leisure, but to the more leisured and influential classes. Such a man’s scientific education, if he ever had any, was broken off early in life. A large proportion of those all-important years of his boyhood were devoted probably to an unwilling study of the “humanities.” [11]His faith is decidedly vague, and according to his own peculiar interpretation, an adjustment between his heavenly aspirations and his earthly inclinations. It has never been thought out, and is not the result of a thorough study of its tenets. He was born and bred a Christian, and all the nicest people he knows are Christians, or he thinks they are. He is, all unconsciously, a social chameleon taking his colour from the conditions in the midst of which he happens to live. He, too, like his heterodox brother, sneers at organised Freethought in this country, because it owes its inception and conduct chiefly to poor and lowly men, forgetting that it was from such a source that the mighty creed of Christendom itself arose. He forgets that the first Christian apostles were mostly working men. If he has heard or read anything of a sceptical nature, he has never stopped to inquire any further into it. He has no idea that the central features of the Bible have been attacked by men of the greatest learning and integrity, with the result that even the defenders of the faith ask for a reverent agnosticism as to the historical circumstances out of which, in the first instance, belief in the resurrection of Jesus Christ arose.7 Not knowing that the essentials are called in question, he sees no reason to trouble himself about mere details. It is enough for him that he feels sure that there must be some object in our existence, and that there must be a First Cause. It never occurs to him to consider whether his and the Christian conception of God can be reconciled. For him the truth of the Christian dogma is proved sufficiently by the unsatisfying nature of materialism. [12]Has he not been taught that he must have faith, and that faith is a feeling of trust divinely implanted, and not needing to be fed on evidences? Is not Christianity the civilising agent of the world, and the origin of all morality and all good works? Does not scepticism lead to atheism? If thought only leads to disbelief in God, he for one is not going to think.

In addition to the now fast dwindling band of sincere and thoughtful Christians there are, of course, many professing religionists who do think a little, a very little, on religious subjects; but the bulk of the male element are absolutely indifferent to the question of religion at all. The average subaltern is as good a sample of the latter type as any other. Speak to him about religion, and he is unutterably bored. A certain amount of church-going forms part of his ordinary round of duties. This is the sum-total of his “religious experiences.” For the rest, religion, or any question as to its truth in this or that particular, is, so far as he is concerned, a matter of supreme indifference.

People are usually (though less so now perhaps than formerly) so careful to keep their thoughts about religion to themselves that it is no wonder the Church is ignorant of the extent to which heterodoxy is rife. The colossal hypocrisy which speaks of “the reserve of Englishmen about their religion” needs exposure. Why should there be this dislike to talk upon religion—a religion which, if true, should make all worldly affairs sink into infinitesimal insignificance? Is it from a spirit of reverence, or is it not rather because the interpretations of God’s alleged revelation differ so widely that people neither wish to “give themselves away” by stating their own interpretations, nor to hear [13]the distasteful interpretations of others? If they were perfectly straightforward, they would run the danger both of hurting the feelings and falling in the estimation of their friends.

Sometimes there is a dread of appearing ridiculous, sometimes a dislike of appearing to cant. Yet surely, if we believe what we profess, there is nothing to be ashamed of, and we ought openly to testify to our faith. I can speak from personal experience when I say that the believing heathen of India, whether Hindoos, Mussulmans, or Parsees, have no qualms on this score. They see no necessity for “reserve” in the profession of their faith. They testify to it openly at all times and in all places. It forms, as it ought, an integral part of their every-day life.

This so-called “reserve” is also occasioned by the inability to live up to the ethical ideals demanded by our creed. Men wish neither to be hypocrites nor to be thought hypocrites. It is an inherent fault in Christian ethics that certain portions are not practicable. They are too much dominated by a belief in the near approach of the end of the world. “If we mechanically applied, as rules of conduct, Christ’s ideals of temper, we are certain, from common sense, that universal pauperism, lawlessness, and national extinction would follow.”8 Then, again, there is too much of the presumption that all men have an equal chance in the battle against temptations, and too little acknowledgment of the part played by heredity and environment; and thus the root of the evil is overlooked. Also, if we have a [14]strong “conviction of sin,” which, according to our spiritual advisers, is essential, and if we cannot hope to shake off the burden of sin by our own unaided endeavours, our moral fibre is liable to be weakened, and we may cease to cultivate the all-important qualities of self-reliance and self-respect. Emerson’s advice is far healthier: “The less we have to do with our sins the better.”

Whatever the many causes of this “proud reserve” may be, one of the consequences is that we remain in ignorance of our neighbour’s beliefs. If people discussed religious matters among themselves, they would make some surprising discoveries. The agnostic would find that “believers” are not the hypocrites he sometimes puts them down to be, for he would learn, to his surprise, that they are supremely ignorant of much that he assumed they would be sure to know. The believer would find that there are many more agnostics than he had ever dreamt there were, and he would also learn that their reason for abandoning belief was of a very different nature from what he had supposed.

When agnostics read the lessons in church, as they frequently do, and when, with their aid and the aid of others in various stages of heterodoxy, congregations in church and chapel on Sunday only amount to twenty-two per cent.9 of the population, and these chiefly women,10 what must not be the sum-total of [15]agnosticism, heterodoxy, and indifference among men in this most Christian of nations? The extent of unavowed or unconscious scepticism far exceeds that which is openly avowed or consciously felt. Laxity in keeping the Sabbath is now notoriously on the increase. Nothing can be more sensible than that people who have slaved for six days in the atmosphere of the office, etc., should go off for their “week end’s” golf, etc.; but for the clergy to attribute the consequent falling-off in church attendance solely to the extra facilities of travel tempting people to carelessness about religion is to adopt the method of the proverbial ostrich in the desert at the approach of a dreaded enemy. Unbelief and the advance of rationalism are really at the bottom of this new development; for all the carelessness, all the temptations in the world, would not persuade sane people to throw away their claims to eternal happiness by neglecting to worship their God—a God that demands this worship. How little do the clergy really know, or attempt to know, of the beliefs of the cultured portion of their congregations! As I write these words I receive, curiously enough, a letter which shows how unusual it is for the pastor to question his flock. The writer of the letter, a lady, says: “Isn’t Mr. X (the rector of a certain country parish) a gauche man? Mr. Z (an influential parishioner) didn’t go to Holy Communion, and so Mr. X asked him if he had been confirmed. Since then Mr. Z goes elsewhere to church.” Now, personally, I admire X’s courage. What he did [16]would not be done by the ordinary run of parsons. If they did that sort of thing, they would soon become exceedingly unpopular in the neighbourhood, and lose most of their fashionable and opulent congregation. But they would begin to learn the true state of affairs. They would learn, for instance, that some of the most regular and respectable of the male portion of their congregations were agnostic or heterodox, and that their attendance at divine worship was merely to set a good example to the “lower orders,” or to please their women-folk, or for some cause or other utterly unconnected with any desire to worship or any belief in the efficacy of so doing. There is doubtless a great deal to be said in favour of a spirit of toleration which inculcates non-interference with a man’s belief; but it all helps to hide the true state of affairs, and is surely overdone when it encourages men to attend a service where they are acting a part and making solemn declarations untruthfully.

There is one more type of person I should include among the many strange buttresses of the Church—namely, the person who refuses point blank to be enlightened. The Churches have been lulled into a sense of security by many causes, but chief among them, perhaps, there stands out the fact that people not only will not take the trouble to inquire into the grounds of their faith, but consider that it would be positively wicked to do any such thing. To such I can only repeat the words of the Rev. J. W. Diggle, now Bishop of Carlisle. “There are,” he says, “perhaps, few things, and certainly nothing of similar moment, about which men give themselves so little trouble, and take such little pains, as the ascertainment, by strict examination, of the foundations and [17]the evidences of their religion. Hence so many religious persons are like children who have not learned things accurately. They are fearful of being questioned, and are out of temper in an examination.” However, as an excuse for this timidity—for it is often nothing else—it must be conceded that a deep study of the evidences does, more often than not, end in agnosticism. This gives rise to the serious question: “If it is God who assists us to remain staunch to our creed, why does He so often forsake us, just when we are trying to lead more thoughtful lives and, consequently, study more deeply the faith we profess?” On the one hand, we find that modern agnosticism is not the result of carelessness, but of thoughtfulness. On the other hand, we observe that the Church numbers among some of its firmest adherents not only those who are ignorant through circumstances over which they have no control, or through thoughtlessness, but also those who remain ignorant through fear to inquire.

Has the Church, then, been deceived in her impression that a reconciliation has taken place between Christianity and Science? Most certainly. I grant that to some extent there exists a patched-up peace. The modern apologist no longer adopts the unwise course of maintaining every strange phenomenon to be miraculous as long as it is unexplained, whereby each advance of physical science used necessarily to be hostile to theology. He even goes further, and says that the Resurrection and all the miracles may be only the manifestation of some law which is as yet beyond the analysis of our short experience. But, as [18]I shall show later on, the new interpretations tone down hostility in one respect only to raise fresh and greater difficulties in another.

The manner in which misunderstandings occur on the subject of a reconciliation is well seen when we look into one of the Church’s most popular arguments in its favour—the appeal to the pronouncement by Lord Kelvin in support of a Creative Power. Lord Kelvin assured the world that modern biologists were “coming to the belief in the existence of a vital principle.”11 That this pronouncement raised a perfect storm of protest in the world of science is wholly ignored by the world of religion. Suppose, however, that the consensus of opinion had been otherwise, what conclusion could we draw? We simply obtain an argument for some form of Theism. The probability of the existence of a Creative Power would not in itself prove the truth of the Christian dogmas, although it would be a very necessary link in the chain of evidence. It is extremely doubtful whether any scientist or philosopher really holds the doctrine of a personal God, certainly not of the anthropomorphic God of Christianity. Let us take Sir Oliver Lodge, for example. He is continually being held up to us by the Church as an instance of a man of science who finds himself able to believe in the supernatural; but does the Church claim him as one of her fold? In the Hibbert Journal for April, 1904, he makes out a strong case for the entire re-interpretation of the Christian doctrine, in which, [19]among other dogmas, the Atonement and Virgin-birth are completely surrendered. He has never yet professed belief in a personal God, and seems to question His omnipotence.12 Again, in a paper which he contributed lately to a book of essays entitled Ideals of Science, he owns that science is a long way from actively supporting religion. In spite of this, no name is, or used to be, more frequently quoted than his, in support of the Church’s contention that a reconciliation has taken place.

The admissions of Sir Oliver Lodge are, in a certain sense, all the more important because he undoubtedly is one of the few men of science who still retain a strong belief in a spiritual world. In the Hibbert Journal for January, 1905, he informs us that he is opposed to a materialistic monism, such as Haeckel’s, and that “the progress of thought has left him [Haeckel], as well as his great English exemplar, Herbert Spencer, somewhat high and dry, belated and stranded by the tide of opinion which has now begun to flow in another direction.”13 This is the sort of statement which is eagerly seized upon by the Church; but it neither witnesses to the truth of Christianity, nor does it voice the opinion of the scientific world. It is the opinion of a scientist who believes that he has had “communication with spirits.”14 Professor [20]Ray Lankester, one of our leading biologists in England, indignantly refutes Sir Oliver’s strictures on Professor Haeckel.15

Now, it is, of course, quite true that there are schools of thought opposed to Haeckel’s. There is, for instance, the school which considers that science has no business to concern herself with theology; and there are the metaphysicians. But the point I wish to make clear is that all these schools are heterodox. They do not accept the Christian dogmas. It is so easy for false impressions on such matters to get about, and, I regret to add, this does not occur altogether by chance. When Haeckel, one of our greatest living biologists, was caught tripping in his knowledge of theology by a professor of that subject, the Church explained to the laity that the great Dr. Loofs had shown that Haeckel had forfeited his claim to consideration as a reliable man of science; and, on this basis, his Riddle of the Universe was held up to obloquy and derision. The Church, however, did not mention at the same time that Haeckel had expressly said that he was not skilled in theology, and that it was only in his own branch of knowledge that he spoke with authority. Nor did the Church mention that their champion, the learned theologian, Dr. Loofs, himself discredits the notion of the Virgin-birth, and that the chief bone of contention between the two professors was simply the question of the parentage of Jesus.

It is just because science and religion are in conflict that the religious naturally wish to discredit science. They will, if they are sufficiently ignorant, go so far [21]as Lady Blount,16 and hold that the earth is flat and without motion. But such persons should note that in the Church itself there are a few—the few best qualified to form an opinion—who accept all the main facts of science, and do not think, or pretend that they think, that there has been any reconciliation. The Rev. P. N. Waggett is one of these. He is an apologist of unusual scientific competence, and his new handbook for the clergy, Religion and Science, simply bristles with problems which he confesses have yet to be solved. However, he does not allow himself to be disturbed. Conclusions adverse to theology are to be resisted. In other words, we must possess our souls in patience until we can see a way out of our difficulties. He remarks: “There are conclusions which are to be dissolved, and conclusions which are to be avoided; but there are also conclusions which have to be resisted, held at bay—‘held up,’ I think some adventurous Western people call it—until we can see our way to destroy them. Such a resistance is not irrational.” He personally prefers “the positive or scientific treatment and pursuit of religion,” and he goes on to say that “this positive pursuit of the facts of the spirit must be maintained in spite of difficulties. It must be maintained in spite of outstanding discrepancies with science.” To my mind, the position here taken up by Mr. Waggett is the only possible one for a convinced Christian who has a real knowledge of science. He avoids the snares into which so many of his fellow clerics have fallen. For he does not jump at the conclusion that every “gap” in our [22]knowledge of life’s mysteries is a proof of the supernatural. Nor does he attempt to show, as many other apologists are wont to do, that there is no direct connection between science and religion. He does not try to escape the criticism of metaphysical conclusions which a scientific habit of thought engenders. But, while his position may appear at first sight a tenable one, whether it be so or not depends entirely upon the correctness of the assumption on which his argument is really based—the true witness of the heart, as against the false witness of the reason. It is interesting to compare Mr. Waggett’s position with that of another of the progressives. The Rev. John Kelman writes in Ideals of Science and Faith17: “So far as we have gone, the history of the past, viewed by the light in which the newer conceptions of the Bible have placed it, shows that, at the present moment in the progress of thought, science and religion are not in the least degree at strife. They need no reconciliation.” Suppose the Rev. J. Kelman to be right and the Rev. P. N. Waggett to be wrong, what then? It is the newer conceptions of the Bible which make it possible for Mr. Kelman to speak of a reconciliation—the very conceptions which the orthodox cannot and will not accept. The orthodox believer is told that religion and science are reconciled; but he is not told by what means. Thus the orthodox, who would never think of accepting the [23]“terribly heterodox” ideas of the advanced school, are all the time accepting a result which could only be arrived at by the help of those self-same ideas. In fact, it was the very necessity for a reconciliation which originated their invention.

So much is said about “scientific doubt” in these days that it is well to remember that doubts as to the truth of the Christian belief are not caused alone by purely scientific difficulties of faith. Carlyle refused to accept Darwin’s theories. His temperament was strongly inclined to a stern Puritanical piety, and his whole nature was antipathetic to science. Yet he did not think it possible that “educated honest men could profess much longer to believe in historical Christianity.” Renan, a profound scholar in Oriental languages, shows, in his famous work, The Life of Jesus, that, while keenly appreciative of all that was beautiful in the life and teaching of Jesus, he was forced, by his study of the Scriptures18 in the original, to the conclusion that the miraculous part of the narrative had no historical foundation. Leo Tolstoi, the helper of the helpless, whose voice is ever raised in the cause of universal love and peace, vainly sought an answer to religious doubts, and finally renounced Christian dogmas, building up a religion of his own. Numerous instances could be given showing that well-known and pious-minded thinkers have rejected Christianity on grounds other than scientific. And this diversity in the reasons for negation further tends to strengthen [24]those suspicions regarding our faith which it is now the apologist’s task to dispel.

A significant circumstance is the far more tolerant attitude of the better-informed clergy towards the unbeliever. There still remain persons of the Dr. Torrey and the Rev. J. Morgan Gibbon19 type, ready to vilify the agnostic; but their number is rapidly on the decrease. The clergy, as a whole, are more tolerant now than many of the pious laity. Why is this? Is it not because they are beginning to appreciate the perplexities of faith, and to learn that agnostics as a body can be, and are, good men? Under certain conditions they themselves have severe wrestlings with the dictates of reason, and it is only by prayer20 and occupying their minds in their work that they are able to dispel dark doubts. They will tell you that a faith such as theirs, and such as they hope you will attain after emergence from doubt, is a real faith, with which the faith of the ordinary person, accepting everything on trust, is not to be compared.

It is all very well to talk glibly, as so many do nowadays, of an age of tolerance. How can man be tolerant in matters concerning which God is alleged to have distinctly told us that He is not tolerant? It has often occurred to me that, were there such a person as the Devil, he must be much puzzled over the case of the high-minded agnostic, and more especially so if the latter conceived it his duty to propagate his views. In other words, if he were a militant agnostic—a Huxley or a Holyoake. For, on [25]the one hand, if the Devil could persuade the agnostic to adopt religious conformity at the expense of self-respect, he would ruin the agnostic’s character, and so drag one more soul into perdition; but he would at the same time be rendering the whole Christian community a service by saving them from the dangerous advice of the agnostic. On the other hand, if Satan aided the agnostic in the line of conduct which he was at present conscientiously pursuing, the soul of the latter would slip from Satan’s grasp (for I presume there can be no punishment for honesty); but, as Anti-Christ, Satan would reap a grand harvest from the seeds of unbelief sown by the agnostic. And the purer and more unselfish the life of the agnostic, the more the latter would influence people to share his opinions. How does God view this perplexing situation? We are told from the pulpit nowadays, by the broader-minded parson, not only that agnostics may be good men, but that they “exhibit the very temper which Christ blesses.”21 This curious truce between Believer and Unbeliever, each still holding fast to his belief or unbelief, only serves to demonstrate with added force that there is not, and cannot be, a reconciliation between Faith and Knowledge.

It is imperative that the Churches should appreciate the real character of the new outburst of scepticism. The controversy with rationalism has entered upon another phase—a phase far more dangerous to the [26]security of Christendom. As was inevitable, the suspicions regarding the faith have filtered down to classes that are not content to be duped because, forsooth, it is said to be for their good. They have none of the reasons of the upper-class agnostic for “lying low.” The enlightenment of the working man has been accelerated during the past year or so by the issue of cheap reprints from the books of our great scientists and thinkers, and by a direct attack upon religion by the well-known editor of the Clarion, Robert Blatchford. That the Churches are already partly alive to the new danger is evinced by their present anxious attitude towards the spread of knowledge likely to be damaging to the Faith. It was one of the subjects discussed at the Canterbury Diocesan Conference in June, 1904, and will, doubtless, be earnestly discussed at the next Church Congress, together with the whole question of the rapid increase in unbelief. While, however, the Church inveighs against the “reprints,” she gives out, also, that “Christianity is always strengthened by being attacked.” This is hardly consistent. For why not, then, allow the process of strengthening to continue by these means? Certainly, if Christianity be true, the Church ought to be strengthened. How could it be otherwise? It might compel her to discard some of her dogmas; but that would only be if they were false, and, in such case, she is better without them. Nothing but good should arise from a thorough examination of her tenets. She would be enabled to find out where her weakness lies, and thus to emerge from the ordeal stronger than ever.

Those who wish, as I do, to learn the whole truth concerning Christianity, hope that she will no longer [27]postpone a complete and unbiassed investigation of the whole of the anti-Christian arguments. Doubtless we shall get our wish in time; but meanwhile we deplore the delay, for reasons I have more particularly set forth in the concluding chapter of this book. If the honest truth be that she is not confident of the security of her position, are we to understand that the cause of Untruth is thought to be more likely to prosper than the cause of Truth?

Of the two conflicting views regarding the effect of anti-Christian attacks—the pessimistic and the optimistic—it is the former which appears to me the more likely to be correct. For consider what would occur should attacks of far greater severity be delivered—a contingency by no means impossible in the near future. Suppose the “rational” propagandists, instead of being hampered by the want of funds and influential support, were to become endowed with a fraction of the wealth of the Church, and were thus in a position to popularise their views by spending money in extensive advertisement of every description, by subsidising platform orators who would propound rationalism and non-theological ethics in every town and village, by relieving distress, and so on, would the Christian Faith be strengthened? Has it not already suffered since the sixpenny reprints began to bring knowledge within the reach of the people—the people who have, many of them, little or nothing to fear from an expression of their agnosticism? If militant rationalists were sufficiently possessed of this world’s goods to start an adequate fund for the lucrative employment of clergymen who find they can no longer subscribe to the articles of the Christian Faith, and who would leave the Church if they could do so without having [28]to face absolute ruin, would not the secessions increase in direct proportion to the increase of the fund and the consequent means of support?22 If those men of note who are even now agnostics at heart were to proclaim the fact and assist in propagandism, would not the flock follow the bell-wethers?

Whether hastened or not by the action of the propagandist, the masses, in these days of universal education, are bound to hear sooner or later of these grave doubts. The questioners of the Faith are no longer only the philosophers, scientists, and those who join hands with the Churches in prescribing a dietary of fairy tales for the preservation of the moral health of the masses. Many of the working class23 are far more thoughtful and intelligent regarding questions of science as it affects religion than is generally supposed. Hitherto they have been under two very considerable disadvantages—the costliness of the books and the want of leisure to read them. The leisure disability still holds good, though less so now that temperance is on the increase; but the books are to-day offered at popular prices, and are also finding their way into public libraries. The Church can, perhaps, depend for some time to come upon the non-interference and even active support of the upper classes, however sceptical they may be; but it is the proletariat which she will in future have to deal with [29]more and more. She is in a dilemma; her hand is forced. She realises that discussion will cause the unsettlement of minds hitherto unclouded by doubt, and yet matters have reached a stage when silence is impossible. It is doubtful whether she has yet fully realised the gravity of the task before her. I have explained how she seems to have been deceived as to the real meaning of the apparent suspension of hostilities during the past few years. She has also to learn how impossible it will be for the ordinary mind to accept the unconvincing and contradictory expositions of the Faith which are now offered to us under the title of Christian apologetics.

The time, then, has arrived when the pastor can no longer ignore or gloze over the thoughts that are stirring the minds of the intelligent portion of his flock. The cheap literature problem cannot be solved by applying disparaging adjectives, such as “shallow,” to writings emanating from the pens of Darwin, Huxley, Tyndall, S. Laing, Matthew Arnold, Sir Leslie Stephen, Renan, Haeckel, etc., easy though it be to excite prejudice by the use of a condemnatory adjective. Books that are still costly will some day be available at popular prices, and increase the perplexities of the people. I refer to books of the type of Lecky’s Rise and Influence of Rationalism in Europe, Buckle’s History of Civilisation in England, Frazer’s Golden Bough, Forlong’s Short Studies of the Science of Comparative Religions, Doane’s Bible Myths and their Parallels in other Religions, J. M. Robertson’s Christianity and Mythology and Pagan Christs, Spencer’s Principles of Sociology (Vol. I., Part I., [30]giving the Data of Sociology), Metchnikoff’s The Nature of Man, Haeckel’s The Evolution of Man,24 etc. Will not the Encyclopædia Biblica, with a title so innocent, and with an editor and many of its contributors in Holy Orders, soon find its way into our public libraries and be a thorn in the side of the orthodox? Think how a book such as Nunquam’s (Robert Blatchford) God and My Neighbour must already have been read by and have affected the convictions of thousands of the working class. And the grave doubts of a hard-headed artisan are not in the least likely to be dispelled by Anti-Nunquam,25 or any of the literature so far published as a panacea “in relief of doubt.”26 Indeed, some apologetic works are enough in themselves to create mistrust, though the reader had not read a single anti-Christian work! The extraordinary divergence in the views of the authors, to say nothing of the transparency of some of their arguments, prevents all chance of apologetics convincing any but those already determined to be convinced. The writer in one stage of thought absolutely contradicts a writer in another stage. Compare Goulburn and Pusey in their awful assertions of everlasting punishment with Allin’s Universalism Asserted and Larger Hope leaflets, or the views of a Wace regarding Evolution with the views of a Waggett. If we confine ourselves to making comparisons only between the advanced thinkers themselves, compare [31]the opinions of Dr. Gore, Bishop of Birmingham (late of Worcester), with those of Canons Henson and Cheyne. The deplorable state of religious apologetics is becoming notorious, and articles bearing on the subject are now appearing from time to time in our leading magazines.27

In defending the Faith the advanced school of the Church now frankly admit the difficulties of the old belief, and ask us to accept their new interpretations of Christianity. The older school of theologians, the school who can bring themselves neither to assert the truth of evolution nor to give a decided opinion on the verbal inspiration of the Bible, are unwillingly, very unwillingly, beginning to follow in their wake. The views of the two schools being in conflict on many vital points, it is impossible that they can ever be brought into agreement. Yet, unless concerted measures are soon taken, confusion will be worse confounded. To add to the perplexity of the situation, there are also the various views of the Nonconformists to be taken into account. Then there are the Scottish Churches, having on the one side the law-supported minority, standing for an infallible Bible and all the doctrines of John Calvin; and, on the other, the majority standing for a form of Christianity which is really Calvinism with a somewhat unequally-applied veneer of Higher Criticism. Finally there is the Irish Roman Catholic Church still sunk in the gross superstitions of the Dark Ages. [32]

The advanced school represent the section which is in close touch with modern thought, so that their new interpretations of the Faith constitute the one and only hope of arresting the advance of agnosticism. On the other hand, the justice of the objections to these new interpretations is borne out by the circumstance that many of the older school would no more think of accepting them than they would of giving up their belief; rather than accept them they prefer to deny the facts of science. Both sides do violence to their reason—the enlightened in using the subtleties of their intellect for interpretations which appear transparently false alike to the orthodox and to the unbeliever; the obscurantist in denying established facts. Consider for a moment what all this means. It means that the modern sceptic has the support of the strictly orthodox when he refutes the only explanations as yet offered to dispel his doubts. It means that the validity of the agnostic’s objections to these new-fangled interpretations is fully borne out by the common sense of Christians themselves, and that a denial of the facts of science and of the results of Biblical research is the only way we can escape from unbelief. If a puzzled truth-seeker tried to take a middle course, he would have to believe that black and white were the same colour, and his belief would degenerate into an exceedingly unedifying grey. There is a large proportion of this “grey” belief just now.

I cannot too strongly reiterate that this complete divergence in the interpretation of a revelation alleged to have been vouchsafed by God cannot but give rise to the most intense suspicion. The very word “apologetics” is self-condemnatory. How is it that [33]the claims of Christianity require all this vindication? Heresies and schisms and the need for apologetics form the constant note of Christian history from first to last. True there was a lull in the questionings of the Faith; but that was during the Dark Ages, when the priests adopted the policy of keeping the world in ignorance, and of destroying all the evidences against Christianity that they could lay their hands upon. If the events said to have happened really happened, and if God wished the world to know of them, why all this mystery, why the need for all these apologetics concerning them? Which of the conflicting explanations are we to take as correct?

The late Bishop of Durham, Dr. Westcott, in a passage in his book, Lessons from Work, says: “It would be easier if we might divest ourselves of the divine prerogative of reason. It would be easier, but would that be the life which Christ came down from heaven to show us and place within our reach?” It is not for me to quarrel with so emphatic a pronouncement in favour of using our reason; but such advice cannot be reconciled with the teaching of Christ or of our own Church—that we should receive God’s word as “babes.” Remember those strange words attributed to Him: “I thank Thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and revealed them unto babes.” From this one would gather that it was God’s pleasure to hide Himself from the wise, and therefore that the increase of agnosticism alongside the spread of knowledge was all part of the Divine plan. The Roman Catholic Church is more consistent. She obeys the alleged teaching of Christ in this respect to the letter. The truth is that when [34]Jesus spoke these words, if He ever did speak them, the vast majority of mankind were “babes.” His disciples were “babes”; His enemies the more enlightened. He did not foresee the advance of knowledge and the spread of education. Nor did the Church anticipate this increase in “wisdom,” or rather, I should say, she employed every possible means to hinder it. If God’s revelation may be understood by babes, it must be very simple. How, then, do we find it requiring all this explanation—explanation which no ordinary adult can understand? Who could call modern theology simple? Can we say that of our philosopher-Premier’s books, A Defence of Philosophic Doubt and The Foundations of Belief? Is it not because the Church recognises that the masses will never understand all these subtle explanations and pleas for a re-statement of Christianity that she is in no hurry to impart the new ideas from the pulpit? Even the more intellectual truthseeker is constantly recommended to trust less to his reason, and “to come to Christ as a little child.”

The objections of the more conservative to the new interpretations of Christianity are well expressed in the solemn words of a former Dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral, himself inveighed against, in his day, as somewhat of a freethinker. “Many,” writes Dean Mansell, “who would shrink with horror from the idea of rejecting Christ altogether, will yet speak and act as if they were at liberty to set up for themselves an eclectic Christianity, separating the essential from the superfluous portions of Christ’s teaching, deciding for themselves how much is permanent and necessary for all men, and how much is temporary and designed only for a particular age and people. Yet if Christ is [35]indeed God manifest in the Flesh, it is surely not less impious to attempt to improve His teaching than to reject it altogether. Nay, in one respect it is more so, for it is to acknowledge a doctrine as the revelation of God, and, at the same time, to proclaim that it is inferior to the wisdom of man.”

The Athanasian Creed controversy furnishes some striking examples of both conservative and latitudinarian opinions. Dr. Pusey is related to have said: “If the Athanasian Creed is touched, I see nothing to do but to give up my canonry.” Yet we find the present Primate, Dr. Randall Davidson, replying to a deputation of clergymen who desired to be relieved from the obligation of reciting this Creed: “I am in complete sympathy with the object you have at heart.” Presumably he is in agreement with Dr. Barnes, Hulsean professor of divinity, who, when lecturing lately at Cambridge on the Athanasian Creed, declared that there was “no authority in Scripture for its minatory clauses.” The well-meant attempt of the Dean of Westminster to smooth down the asperities of the Creed by singing instead of saying it, is typical of those pitiful attempts to tide over difficulties which are now so much in evidence. “We make,” says one of the old school, “unsuitable persons partakers of the Divine service of the Church, and then it is proposed to alter the Divine service to suit them. Let honest Unbelievers or Half-Believers absent themselves from the Assembly of the Faithful, and let the Faithful worship faithfully.” Yet, if this line of conduct were put into practice, if the modern Origens were anathematised and only those laymen admitted to Divine service who held all the articles of the Christian faith without mental reservations of any kind, every single advanced [36]theologian would be degraded from his office, and the present twenty-two per cent. who are church and chapel-goers would be reduced to—what shall we say? Well, the churches having cultured congregations would be almost empty. The modern spirit of toleration, admirable as it is in many ways, assists in preventing the discovery of the real truth of the matter. The Church is grossly deceiving herself if she really thinks that the apparent adherence of the majority of the well-to-do classes indicates that burning suspicions of the Christian dogmas have been quenched by Christian apologetics.

In the early part of this chapter I have alluded to the real causes for the apparent acquiescence of the majority in the claims of the Christian religion. Among these causes there is a somewhat complex one requiring, special notice, for it tends to confuse the main issue, more perhaps than any other. The Church is now appearing in an altogether novel role. Until quite recently her concern was only for the spiritual welfare of man, and she expected to gain her purpose by supernatural rather than by natural means. This plan, after many centuries of trial, has proved a terrible failure. It has not contributed either to man’s spiritual or material improvement. Now, in England, she is emulating the thorough-paced humanitarian in her devotion to the betterment of humanity by natural means. Never before has there been that interest in the material condition of the people which is now evinced by such institutions as the Church Temperance Society and Homes for Inebriates, the Church Army, the Church Lads [37]Brigade, the Church Rescue Societies, Homes for Waifs and Strays, etc. The Church, too, is now concerning herself with the better housing of the poor, the improvement of our jail system, and other rational methods for raising the social condition of the people and creating an environment likely to improve the moral atmosphere. All such measures, in fact, as have long ago been advocated by rationalists and social reformers are now taken up vigorously by the Churches. “Better late than never,” you will say. Quite so; but that is not the point. Far be it from me to decry these excellent results of “modern thought”; still, the fact remains that the issue is thereby confused, and will continue to be thus confused for some time to come. People will only look at what the Churches, in Protestant countries at least, are now doing, and see in it another proof of Christianity’s power for good. They will not trouble their heads to consider why it should have taken nearly 2,000 years before the Christian Church recognised such an essential portion of her duties towards her poorer neighbours.28

Nor is it only this increase of zeal for “raising humanity out of the gutter” which has confused the issue. Numerous are the ways in which Christianity obtains a prestige sometimes partly deserved, sometimes wholly undeserved. Good works belong to the former class. The Churches of all denominations have always occupied the position of grand almoners, and, in that they have carried out that trust conscientiously, they have fully earned the confidence of [38]the rich and the gratitude of the poor. But people are liable to forget that the huge donations given during their lifetime, and left in their wills by charitably disposed persons, are given usually from true humanitarian principles, and that kind hearts are to be found all over the world, quite apart from belief or unbelief. These gifts to the needy are not, let it be said to the credit of mankind, a mere soul-insurance, like the donations given, and often extorted, in the Roman Catholic and Greek Churches, for “Masses,” “Indulgences,” etc. All this charitable work, for which the Church is the agent employed, is usually put down entirely to the credit of the Church and Christianity. It does not seem to be realised that the “Golden Rule” is far older than Christianity, and is practised in other than Christian countries; and that the Church, in being entrusted very largely with the dispensation of charity, obtains credit for a service for which she is after all well paid, and which any properly selected body of laymen would perform quite as well, and possibly with more discrimination.

If all the good and none of the bad works performed in Christendom are to be attributed to the working of the Christian faith, the same argument must hold good of the Hindu or Buddhist faith, when the people are Hindoos or Buddhists. The code of ethics attached to a religion does, of course, make a difference; but it neither proves that the belief is correct, nor that it is impossible to have the ethics without the belief. Confucianism is an agnostic ethical system which the educated classes of Japan have adopted for centuries, and its splendid results are just now much in evidence. Only a few days ago I received a letter from an agnostic supporter of Christianity who said: “Look [39]at the good that Christianity does, look at its endless charitable organisations”; and he asked, “Could the Clarion people do anything of this kind?” It never occurred to him, and it never occurs to many of his way of thinking, that the “Clarion people” have very slender funds at present; and the charitable work that they do, though proportionately large, is not likely to come to his notice unless he takes the trouble to inquire. The vast majority of English people are professing Christians, and if any charitable work is to be done agnostics give their support to it, although the agents for it are Christians. However, I have not received a brief from the “Clarionettes.” My object is to show how the issue becomes confused, and, if my agnostic friend is correct in considering Christianity false and yet indispensable, the future is indeed full of alarms. What will happen, for instance, when the knowledge of this falsehood becomes common property? I am fully aware that my friend voices the opinion of many fairly thoughtful Englishmen; but this is because they are in the habit of hearing every useful advance in civilisation accredited to Christianity:—hospitals, though they existed long before Christianity, and only fell out of use after its introduction—the raised status of women, though it was on the introduction of Christianity that the status was lowered—abolition of slavery, though among the most strenuous advocates for the abolition were such well-known freethinkers as Ralph Waldo Emerson, John Stuart Mill, and Moncure Conway, while the whole of Tory England shouted its approval when General Lee drew his sword on behalf of the rights of “Old Virginia,” and while Gladstone, in his first Newark address, 1832, owned that slavery was justified by the [40]Bible—efforts for superseding the horrors and clumsiness of war, though freethinkers to a man are supporters of the movement, while Bishops from the pulpit offer up prayers for peace and in the same breath expatiate on the ennobling effects of war upon the race, and while the head of a mighty theocratic-autocratic Christian Government calls the nations to a peace conference, and then takes the first opportunity to prosecute the most unnecessary and bloody war the world has ever known.

It is erroneous assertions such as these which tend, perhaps, more than anything else, to confuse the simple question before us—the truth of Christianity. They are therefore discussed at greater length in a separate chapter devoted to popular fallacies. Meanwhile, in the present chapter I hope I have succeeded in giving some insight into the true nature of the present situation. [41]

In this and the following chapters I hope to show how matters stand with reference to the more important points at issue between the Christian apologist and the Rationalist. The truth or otherwise of the Bible miracles being of supreme importance, I begin with an examination of the position of apologetics with regard to them.

The question arises, “How, then, do the majority of our spiritual guides regard the accounts of miracles in the Bible?” Broadly speaking, miracles are divided by them into three classes—(1) mythical, but containing spiritual truths; (2) explicable naturally; (3) historical and vital. Should their views be of a very [46]advanced type, all the miracles will be relegated to the first two classes. If advanced, but not quite so much advanced, the fundamental miracles of the Incarnation, Resurrection, and Ascension will be taken into the third class; the miracles deemed to be not indispensable, or not serving a useful purpose, being explained away. Continuing to descend the scale of enlightenment, more and more miracles will find their way into the third class, until no miracles alleged to have been performed by Christ himself will be discredited—except, perhaps, those that appear particularly incredible or useless, such as sending devils into swine, turning water into wine, or withering a fig tree. Regarding the miracles alleged to have been performed by the Apostles we hear very little. Concerning the Old Testament miracles, however, opinions are freely expressed, and range between those of the Broad Church, who consider the miracles all belong to the first two classes, and those of the strictly orthodox, who maintain all the miraculous events to be facts, on the principle that, whether the whale swallowed Jonah or Jonah swallowed the whale, they must be true because they are related in the Holy Scriptures—the Scriptures that were accepted as historical by their Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. People who are the children of Christian parents have been brought up from childhood to a literal acceptance of the miracles, and now they are not only asked to give up the convictions so sedulously implanted while their minds were most receptive, but to choose between the conflicting views of the expounders of God’s word.

Let us consider some examples of the latest interpretations, and see if they appeal to our hearts and [47]minds. “In John v. (the authenticity of the passage is of no moment to this argument) we read that the stirring of the waters and the consequent healing virtue was attributed to the presence of an angel. The modern would speak of the pool as a medicinal spring. The fact is the same. The mode of description is different. The ancient knew little of what are called natural causes.”7 The explanation is sensible enough; but, while incidentally showing that the Evangelists were just as credulous and ignorant as other people of their times, it is a dangerous concession. For directly a natural explanation of this kind is allowed in one case, it must also be allowed as possible in another, and thus the fundamental miracles might be shorn of all that renders them of any value for substantiating our faith. Regarding the particular explanation under consideration, one may be permitted to ask, How is it the water has lost its medicinal qualities? Also, How is it the ancient’s belief is still foisted on the credulous modern? When visiting the traditional Pool of Bethesda, now in the custody of the Greek Church, I saw documents exposed in the gateway giving the words from the fifth chapter of St. John in fifty-six different languages!

The healing miracles performed by Jesus are now frequently attributed to the use of the same power as that by which faith-cures are effected at the present time—a power upon which the science of psychology is shedding a new light, and which mental therapeutics will one day place at the disposal of the human race. Apart from this disappointing alteration in the [48]character of the “mighty works” which were supposed to betoken the divinity of Christ, is there not something abhorrent in the thought that He should take advantage of a secret knowledge of the powers of nature, in order to impose upon the credulity of the age in which He lived, and thus secure the worship of His disciples? At least, if we are Christians, let us assume that Christ, as man, believed He was using supernatural powers, and that His disciples, if they had faith enough, could remove mountains, just as He undoubtedly believed, according to such an eminent authority as Dr. Sanday, that He really was casting out devils when He cured “the epileptic,” etc. It is certainly difficult to understand this ignorance of the Son of God; but, when apologists attempt to extricate Christian dogmas from the quagmire of doubt by such methods, they only succeed in causing them to disappear into it beyond all hope of recovery.

As I have alluded to the subject of Christ’s belief in “devil-possession,” I should mention here that there are still many cultured ecclesiastics, especially among those who still believe that there is such a personage as the Devil, who argue that there was such a malady as devil-possession in those days. Some even hold that it still exists. On the other hand, the Rev. David Smith, in his book, The Days of His Flesh, which professes to bring the Gospels “up to date,” holds that Jesus, “after his wont, fell in with the delusion,” and that in the case in which the Gadarene swine play so important a part, He, “like a wise physician, humanised the madman’s fancy, and feigned acquiescence in his lunatic craze.” Exorcism, it may be remarked, has been practised, in all times, wherever [49]a belief has existed in literal demoniacal possession. In the Latin and Greek Churches it is used in the baptism of both adults and infants, in the consecration of water, salt, oil, etc., and in specific cases of individuals supposed to be possessed by evil spirits. Exorcism in baptism is still retained also in some Lutheran Churches. In Jerusalem, at the present time, there are three dissenting sects, whose ministers practise the exorcism of spirits.

Opinions differ widely as to whether certain miracles actually occurred, or whether they admit of a natural explanation. Take the miracle of “the Feeding of the Five Thousand.” The school, of which the Bishop of Birmingham, late of Worcester, and the learned Dr. Sanday are the mouthpieces, consider that, “whatever may have actually occurred, a nineteenth-century observer would have given, if he had been present, a different account from that which has come down to us.” On the other hand, the Bishop of London believes this miracle to have occurred “because of the very humble, unimaginative [?], and truthful men who reported it.”8 Could any two views be more diametrically opposite?

Obviously, as has already been pointed out, destructive admissions concerning any one of the miracles tend to invalidate the truth of all the rest; and, therefore, we find that apologists of a less advanced stamp are still inclined to the view that the miracles connected with the life of Christ are miracles pure and simple. Godet, in his Defence of the Christian Faith, [50]explains that “It will become easy to understand why the prodigies which signalised the advent of Jesus Christ upon earth do not occur in our day.... The appearance of the perfectly Holy Man was so trenchant a break in the life of humanity up to that moment that from the shock it produced there resulted consequences which have not repeated themselves at any other period.... One condition was requisite—viz., that there should exist a Man fit to be associated with the exercise of the Creative Omnipotence.” Many doubters may be prepared to admit the necessity of miracles as explained by the learned Professor; but they contend that, up to the present time, there is no instance of a miracle having been proved, not even the alleged sinlessness of Jesus Christ, and they ask why, if God graciously furnished proofs to one generation, He did not, in His infinite wisdom, ordain that these proofs should be established for all time, beyond all possibility of cavil?

Passing on to the miracles of the Old Testament, we often find that those who still maintain that only the first chapters of the Bible are legendary will adopt a variation of the second class of interpretation—they will say that the events were of an ordinary character, but occurred in answer to prayer. Joshua is for them an historical character. However, Joshua x. 12–14 must not be taken literally, but allowance should be made for poetical licence. Joshua, it is explained, never really committed himself to the extent of commanding the sun and the moon to stand still, but only “besought God that the black clouds of the storm driving up the pass from the sea might not be allowed to blot out the sun and bring night prematurely before [51]his victory was complete.”9 This prayer, be it remembered, was for the sake of a work of butchery which God was supposed to have sanctioned! Besides, as the sun is said to have obeyed Joshua, and, further, it is said that “there was no day like that before it or after it,” at least we are to infer that something very unusual happened at Joshua’s request. The explanation we meet with in what are considered by some to be the “best” apologetics is that the language used is purely figurative, just as one might say, “I hope the sun won’t set too soon,” or “We never had such a day.”

Similarly there is the north-east wind theory as a possible explanation of what might have happened, if the “crossing of the Red Sea” ever took place, and if Moses be not as mythical as the rod with which he divided the waters.

Perhaps the most unsatisfactory explanation of all is that regarding the rainbow. It is agreed, there being no other alternative, that “it is not meant that the rainbow appeared for the first time to Noah [another purely legendary character] after the Flood [although this is certainly what the Bible leads one to suppose], but that it was adopted then as a visible sign of God’s covenant, as water is adopted for a somewhat similar covenant in the New Testament.”10 It is now known for a fact that, if there are any historical data for the story, the Flood could only have been local; but let that pass. Has the rainbow-covenant prevented millions of people perishing since then in many a mighty flood? Looking at God’s promise as a token of His pity for suffering humanity, [52]are not deaths occurring every moment, accompanied by agony so prolonged and supreme that, compared with them, a death by drowning would be a happy release? If Jews and Christians still really believe in this story, how is it that the rainbow attracts not the slightest devout attention? I have never yet heard this beautiful spectacle alluded to with any particular reverence. The reason is obvious. We know that the bow consists of all the prismatic colours produced in the atmosphere by the refraction and reflection of the sun’s light from the rain drops, and no one regards the Bible story seriously. Yet our divines try to save the credit of the Bible by interpretations which are obviously “catching at straws.” Such methods are as harmful as they are pitiful.

In all these examples the explanations offered to us seem to come to this—the phenomena were purely natural from start to finish, only they occurred opportunely and were afterwards poetically embellished; or they contain a spiritual meaning. Perhaps the most extraordinary argument ever brought forward concerning the “sun standing still” is that urged by the learned Bishop Westcott in his Gospel of the Resurrection. He says (pp. 38–9): “It would be positively immoral for us now to pray that the tides or the sun should not rise on a particular day; but, as long as the idea of the physical law which ruled them was unformed or indistinct, the prayer would have been reasonable, and (may we not suppose?) the fulfilment also.” It is difficult to believe that these can really be the words of one of the Church’s greatest scholars. To what extent will not bias influence the brain to use its powers perversely? It is far-fetched arguments of this kind that increase [53]rather than dispel doubt in the normal mind, and especially when they are brought forward in all seriousness by the very pillars of the Church. We are sometimes asked to banish our doubts and “craving for intellectualism,” as it is called, and “to come to Christ as little children and in Him to find rest.” Certainly it is only by letting our minds sink to the level of a little child’s, or, what is the same thing, to the level of a primeval man’s, that we could bring ourselves to accept such childish nonsense. A child asks for the moon, but does not know the physical impossibility of obtaining his desire. His prayer is therefore reasonable, and (may we not suppose?) the fulfilment also. This unconscious trifling with the truth—for in reality it is nothing else—reminds me of a passage in Dr. Smith’s orthodox, but somewhat out of date, Dictionary of the Bible, where an attempt is made to reconcile the Mosaic narrative of Creation with the discoveries of modern science. It runs as follows: “The very act of creation must have been the introducing of laws; but, when the work was finished, those laws may have suffered some modification.”11

We have seen that, while one section of apologists contend that belief in the miraculous is essential, other advocates of Christianity try to get rid of all difficulties by suggesting that such words as “miracles” and “supernatural” ought not to be used. In a paper on “The Effect of Science upon Christianity,” which he has contributed to the Christian Commonwealth, the Rev. R. F. Horton, M.A., D.D., affirms that “the word ‘supernatural’ is ill-chosen,” and he [54]adds that “it is unknown in the New Testament, and introduces ideas which are alien to those of Christ.” The word “miracles,”12 he holds, is equally unfortunate, and represents a notion which is not contained in the New Testament terms “signs” and “mighty works.” If this be not word-spinning, then what is? Does it matter whether we call the raising of Lazarus a “miracle” or a “sign”? Is the miraculous feeding of the multitudes rendered more credible if we call it a natural instead of a supernatural occurrence? Is not the whole point of the sign lost, too, if it be no longer supernatural—if it becomes a sort of juggling feat? Dr. Horton leaves us in no doubt as to the object of his play upon words. He aims at disposing of the difficulties connected with Christian miracles by affirming that everything in nature is miraculous. He observes: “There is no miracle in the New Testament so amazing as the fact that from protoplasm has developed the spiritual life of the saint.” He is voicing one of the latest pleas of the “advanced” apologists—a plea which is transparently vain and futile. Development from protoplasm, like all the other wonders of the universe, takes place in accordance with natural laws more or less perfectly understood; and these things have no sort of connection with the “signs” and “mighty works” of the New Testament. Miracles are rejected not because they are amazing, but because they are contradictory to experience and at variance with the laws of nature. So far the scientist considers the “reign of law” to be an established scientific fact, and he is naturally loth [55]to conclude, without the strongest evidence, that, after all, he has been deceived. Much less would he come to such a conclusion when there is not even a particle of trustworthy evidence. There is the significant circumstance, too, that the laws now discovered were unknown at the time of the alleged performance of miracles, and that the belief in miracles, and in the supposed continuance of miracles, varies in inverse proportion to knowledge.

The above samples of apologetics fairly represent the various ways in which miracles are now explained. Even if the reasoning were sound, it would hardly serve to strengthen the arguments for those miracles which cannot and must not be explained away—the miracles on which are based the central doctrines of the Christian Faith. Christianity stands or falls according as the Resurrection and Ascension are facts or not. The Rationalist’s criticisms have been presented in many articles and books, but perhaps nowhere more clearly and forcibly than in the well-known work, Supernatural Religion; and it is worthy of note that these criticisms have been further strengthened by the latest “Higher Criticism,” as set forth in the articles on the Resurrection and Ascension narratives in the Encyclopædia Biblica. I have specially referred to Supernatural Religion, because this book created a considerable stir in theological circles when it first appeared, some years ago, and also because its arguments are popularly supposed to have been completely demolished by Bishop Lightfoot in his Essays on the Work Called “Supernatural Religion.” But—and here is a good instance of the ease with which the laity can [56]be deceived—if anyone will take the trouble only to glance at these two works, he will find, to his astonishment, that the whole of the overwhelmingly important portion of the book under review, such as the chapters on miracles, on the Resurrection, on the Incarnation, and on the Ascension, has received no attention! Besides, there is A Reply to Dr. Lightfoot’s Essays13 which completely demolishes the Bishop’s arguments.

Such, then, is an outline of the state of apologetics on the subject of Miracles in general, and of those connected with the central doctrines of the Church in particular. Nothing could be more unsatisfactory, nothing more calculated to arouse suspicion of the Faith; and now, if we turn our attention to the “Higher Criticism,” and to the apologetics it has called forth, we shall find these suspicions still further strengthened. On the one hand a considerable proportion of these criticisms are accepted by the more enlightened divines, and, on the other hand, those who refuse to accept any of them urge that they undermine Christianity.

The Dean of Canterbury, Dr. Wace, is one of the latter class. Speaking at a men’s service (at St. Mary Bredin’s Church, Canterbury, on December 4th, 1904), he justly twits the critics for describing a considerable part of the Bible, and particularly the early part, as “not historical,” when “what they mean is that it is not true.” No subtle theories are required to support Dr. Wace’s belief in Christianity, for even the first chapter of Genesis is, in his opinion, a “substantially accurate” account of “that which [72]happened on earth before there were any men upon it,” and “is the best proof that the Bible proceeded from God.” He remains among the dwindling number of those who, in these days of Christian storm and stress, still cling to the old ideas about the Bible. His reasons for doing so are apparently similar to those given by “Roger” in a little pamphlet entitled Roger’s Reasons (by John Urquhart), where it is sought to reconcile the Bible and Science at the expense of accuracy, logic, and common sense. For the obscurantist, belief is made easy, and the apologies for the Faith can be comparatively straightforward. For the “enlightened” the conditions are reversed.

An example of the advanced views of a Church of England divine, and of the objections to these views of a strictly orthodox Churchman, may prove instructive. Reviewing the Bishop of Winchester’s book, On Holy Scripture and Criticism, the Church Times (of February 10th, 1905) pertinently observes: “Attacks upon the Gospel narratives of the Virgin Birth and the Resurrection, made with such persistence from within the Church, are ugly developments which were not anticipated in 1890. Yet, strange to say, there is no recognition of the new situation in the Bishop of Winchester’s book.”

This silence regarding points especially requiring explanation is, I fear, a common feature in religious apologetics. Look again at the reviewer’s next remark: “The Bishop forgets that the truth of the message is intimately connected with the authenticity of the record, and a critical theory which assails the one assails the other.” Here, then, we have an elementary truth frankly recognised; and, in plain English, it means that, if the Bishop’s criticisms be [73]true, Christianity is untrue. Entering into more detail, the writer goes on to say: “For example, the Bible record of the Fall and the truth of our Lord’s ‘atoning death on the Cross’ are closely connected with each other. Modern criticism discards the former as a myth, and indications abound on every side that the denial of the Fall leads to a denial of the Atonement. It is not too much to say that the new method of interpreting the Bible has helped to overthrow belief in Christ as a Divine Redeemer. His redemptive work and mediatorial office have been thrust into the background.”

The situation could not be put more lucidly. There is no hair-splitting or glozing here. The reviewer characterises this silence on crucial points as “grave omissions,” and he might have added that such omissions are calculated to arouse suspicions of the Faith. He continues: “Again the Bishop says:—

It is by no means ‘ever’ the spiritual and moral lesson only. Both in the Book of the Acts and St. Paul’s Epistles the historical and predictive portions of the Jewish Scriptures are constantly appealed to, and used as the basis of argument. The suggestion that the Apostles attached little importance to the latter is far from being borne out by the evidence. One of the chief things in which they differ from writers of the modern school is their use of Old Testament history and prediction. Compare the place which prophecy occupies in the Epistle to the Romans with the place it holds in the Bishop of Winchester’s [74]book, where no more than sixteen lines in 187 pages are allotted to it.

“Each of the Synoptic Gospels describes the scene at the Transfiguration, when Moses and Elias talked with our Lord in the sight of three of His disciples. St. Luke mentions that they talked about His approaching death. In the face of that narrative, those who say that our Lord knew no more of Moses than any Jew of the period are bound to explain how they reconcile the statement with the Evangelists’ account of the Transfiguration. No Jewish scribe of the first century a.d. could pretend to have seen or conversed with either Elijah or Moses. Bishop Ryle says of our Lord:—

“The Bishop does not perceive apparently that these arguments cut both ways, so that they tell against our Lord’s claim to foreknow the future quite as much as against His knowledge of the past. And we are entitled to ask how they can possibly be made to agree with the express testimony of the Evangelists that Moses and Elijah were seen in Christ’s company, and ‘spake of the decease which He should accomplish at Jerusalem.’”

I have quoted these apposite remarks at length because they will come with more force from the mouth of an orthodox believer than from anyone in doubt like myself. One cannot help wondering what the Bishop could have to urge in reply; for the ground is cut from under him by his own acceptance of so [75]much of modern criticism. As he is a high dignitary of the Church, it is all the more puzzling. Referring to the remarks concerning Moses, it may be mentioned that, according to the critics, Moses is not a historical personage.1 Whether the Bishop accepts this or not it is difficult to say; but apparently he does, from his desire to explain that, “in His references to Moses,” Christ “adopts the language of the Scribes.”

Dr. Driver’s new book on Genesis has also called forth some adverse criticisms from the less advanced. For example, Dr. Lock, the Warden of Keble, enumerates several considerations in support of the general trustworthiness of the patriarchal narratives, and observes that the fact of inspiration, once admitted on the higher level of a moral and spiritual tone, may “well carry its influence over into details of fact, and turn the balance when otherwise uncertain.” Personally, I very much doubt whether the general public, once informed of the truth, will ever be induced to look at facts through Dr. Lock’s spiritual spectacles. Dr. Driver, it should be added, informs us that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph were presumably monotheists, though their monotheism is rudimentary, and the terms in which they express themselves “suggest much riper spiritual capacities and experiences,” being, “in some cases, borrowed evidently from the phraseology of a much later age.” Can we depend upon such narrators to furnish us with true history? Commenting on Dr. Driver’s “impossible interpretations” of the words, “it shall bruise thy head,” and of “the story of the Fall,” his reviewer in the Church Times asks: “Was it, or was [76]it not, a promise made by God? This is the plain question which Dr. Driver’s readers are forced to ask.” Sceptical truthseekers, also, are asking the same question. When will they receive a “straight” answer?

The general public know little or nothing of the results of Bible criticism. Why should they? Not only do they deem it a dull subject, but those who attend church are being informed from the pulpit that “the Gospels have been battered by years of criticism, but have come out of it stronger than ever.”2 It is easy enough to make statements of this kind, and, doubtless, they serve temporarily to quiet the fears of a congregation who know very little of the subject, and are only too glad to believe what they are told so authoritatively; but, unfortunately, such statements are, to put it mildly, misleading. The ordinary man is wofully ignorant of the “Higher Criticism.” His ideas of Bible difficulties are mostly confined to common sense. He knows, perhaps, that scoffers of the London parks freethinking type gibe at Holy Writ, and he may himself have made fun of some passages that appear absurd; but here his knowledge of Bible criticism ceases. He is not aware that the critics are a body of the most erudite experts in theology, whose only motive for offering their opinion is to give to the world the result of their arduous [77]research—the motives, in fact, of a Bruno, a Darwin, or a Pasteur.

In view of this widespread ignorance, I propose to enumerate briefly a few of the results of modern criticism, and, in giving these results, I shall omit those arising from a study of comparative mythology and of evolution, as I have devoted separate chapters to that purpose.

A work has been issued lately which sums up the conclusions of Bible criticism—higher,3 lower or textual, and historical. It is called the Encyclopædia Biblica. Its four massive volumes set forth the new views, and support them by a mass of learning which deserves our serious consideration.4 Space permits of my giving only a few notes of its conclusions, and but meagre details of the wealth of evidence in support of them.

The Creation Story a Myth.—The story of the Creation as given in Genesis originated in a stock of primitive myths common to the Semitic races. Its coincidences with the Babylonian myth are so numerous that it is impossible to doubt the existence of a real historical connection between them. Many indications show that not till after the Exile in the sixth century B.C. did the story take its present shape.

The Patriarchs Unhistorical Figures.—Then, again, all the stories of the Patriarchs are legendary; they may contain some truth, though how much will [78]probably never be known; to suppose them entirely true is to throw historical criticism altogether overboard. Dr. Peters is the Episcopal rector of a large parish in New York, who has done good service in the past, both as Professor of Biblical Literature in the Episcopal Seminary at Philadelphia and as the first leader of the expedition to Babylonia sent out in 1888 by the University of Pennsylvania. He has lately written a book called The Early Hebrew Story: Its Historical Background. Canon Cheyne, reviewing this book in the Hibbert Journal for January, 1905, remarks: “It will be granted that Dr. Peters’s view of the origination of the stories of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and, to some extent, of Joseph, in myths, legends, and traditions of sanctuaries, is a sound one.”

Book of Genesis Legendary.—The book of Genesis is a composite narrative based on older records long since lost. It appears to have been compiled in the seventh century b.c., and to have been added to again later. The story of the Deluge is a Hebrew version of the Babylonian epic.

Book of Exodus Legendary.—The book of Exodus, too, is another composite legend which has long been mistaken for history. Sober history gives no warrant for supposing that the signs and wonders wrought by Moses ever occurred, that the first-born of Egypt were ever slain, or that Pharaoh was ever drowned in the Red Sea.

Moses a Legendary Character.—The historical character of Moses has not been established, and it is doubtful whether the name is that of an individual or that of a clan. The alleged origin of the Ten Commandments is purely legendary; it is probable that [79]they were framed not earlier than the time of Amos. It is admitted even by conservative critics that the original worship of the Israelites was not of an ethical character.

One of the first suspicions that ever crossed my mind was with regard to the sudden and complete disappearance of the “two tables of testimony, tables of stone written with the finger of God.”5 Later on, when I knew of the Moabite stone6 and the Rosetta stone,7 and especially when I learnt that there were inscriptions on bricks and cylinders of a far earlier date than that ascribed to the giving of the Ten Commandments, the old perplexity returned with added force. I remember, too, the same feeling of dissatisfaction and suspicion as I gazed on the clearly-cut Pali inscriptions in the Buddhist caves near Poona, and thought of those lost tables said to have been inscribed by the finger of God. I once put the question to a well-read clerical friend of mine: “How can these tables, written by the finger of God or by His direct inspiration, have been lost? How is it that they have simply disappeared without a word of explanatory comment in the Bible? It is inconceivably strange. What a witness would they not have been to the truth of the Old Testament account, and to the Divine authority for the Commandments!” His reply was: “It would never have done for these stones to have [80]been preserved, for they would have become objects of worship.” Granted that they might have become objects of adoration, which is worse—to worship faked relics such as the water in which Joseph of Arimathea washed the blood-stained body of Jesus, portions of wood from the true Cross, bits from the crown of thorns, and thousands of odd pieces of bone from the anatomy of the Saints; or to venerate stones that would at least have had the merit of being genuine? Why are we left without any reliable evidences of God’s miraculous revelation of Himself to men, while we have abundant evidence for occurrences of trifling importance to mankind that happened thousands of years before the alleged revelation? Hammurabi (a Babylonian monarch who flourished two thousand years or more before the Christian era) inscribed a very excellent, if somewhat drastic, code of laws upon a pillar of black diorite, and we have now got the stone and read the inscriptions; but the stone inscribed by God is lost!

The Book of Deuteronomy.—Evidence of every kind concurs to prove that in its original form it was a product of the seventh, not of the fifteenth, century B.C. In its present form, Deuteronomy is a composite and considerably modified version of the older work. Originally it may have consisted merely of the long speech attributed to Moses, and this may have been the book which was “found” in the temple in the reign of Josiah, the rest of the work being added shortly afterwards.

As it is difficult to believe that such a work would have remained in the temple undiscovered for eight hundred years, is it not reasonable to conclude that the book was placed there by men who thought the [81]time ripe for religious reforms—in fact, that a “pious fraud” was perpetrated?

The Psalms a Composite Book.—The fond delusion that all the Psalms were written by David (though why we should be anxious to ascribe what is really of much ethical value to a person confessedly immoral I never could understand) has been entirely dispelled. It is doubtful whether David wrote any of the Psalms.

Poetry and Prophetic Literature.—The book of Job is not a literary unity, nor was it written with any particular purpose; it is not a manufacture, but a growth.

Jonah is a Jewish midrash, or tradition, like the histories of Tobit and Susanna, and was certainly written after the Exile. Even orthodox clergymen now admit (in private) that the Jonah story is a fairy tale.

The great book of Isaiah is the work of several authors.

The book of Daniel was once assumed to be the most definitely prophetical of the Old Testament writings—a notion which is seriously discounted by the discovery that it was beyond question written in the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, after or during the happening of the events which were supposed to be foretold, and nearly 500 years after the time of its supposed author. It is questionable whether such a person as Daniel ever existed; but it is certain that his adventure in the den of lions, and that of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego in the fiery furnace, are as fabulous as any in the collection of Æsop.

“As a rule,” says Canon Cheyne, “the prophets directly connect the final restoration with the removal of the sins of their own age, and with the accomplishment of such a work of judgment as lies within their [82]own horizon; to Isaiah the last troubles are those of the Assyrian invasion; to Jeremiah the restoration follows on the exile to Babylon; Daniel connects the future glory with the overthrow of the Greek monarchy.”8

Referring to non-Christian parallels to the belief in a Messiah, Canon Cheyne draws special attention to a Babylonian parallel, and concludes that “it is historically very conceivable that a Babylonian belief may be the real parent both of this and of all other Messianic beliefs within the sphere of Babylonian influence.”9

The manner in which these so-called prophets can be looked upon as foretelling is explained elsewhere10 as follows: “The prophets in the Old Testament, being inspired to interpret human needs, became unconscious prophets of the Christ.... It is quite true that prophecy explained in this way is no longer available for the truth of Christianity to the same extent that it once was—at any rate, for the convincing of unbelievers.”

New Testament Chronology.—We do not know exactly when or where11 Jesus was born, when He died, or how long He ministered. As to the birth of Jesus, the only account which claims to give indications of date rests on a series of mistakes. No census was possible under Herod, and none took place under “Cyrenius” until A.D. 7. The only results which have a high degree of probability are the date A.D. 30 for the death of Jesus, and the period of about one [83]year—conservative opinion estimates it to be three years—for the length of His public ministry.

The Virgin Birth.—The Gospels themselves afford the amplest justification for a criticism of their narratives. Jesus Himself made no appeal to His supposed miraculous birth. The only two verses in the first chapter of St. Luke which clearly express the idea of a supernatural birth so disturb the connection that we are impelled to regard them as an interpolation. It is Joseph, and not Mary, whose descent is traced from the son of Jesse. The genealogy of Joseph, given in the first Gospel, is prior in date to the story of the Virgin Birth, and could have been drawn up only while he was regarded as the real father of Jesus. Also St. Paul’s statement that Jesus was born of the seed of David according to the flesh cannot be reconciled with the account of his having been born of a virgin. There is no recorded adoration of the Virgin by St. Paul, or, for the matter of that, by any of the Apostles or disciples.

Apologists point out that among the Jews, generally, the notion of supernatural birth did not attach to their conception of the Messiah. This is true; but in the school of thought of which Philo was head there were traditions that every child of promise was born of a virgin. Now Philo, the Hellenistic Jewish philosopher of Alexandria, was a contemporary of Christ, and the influence of his school is not disputed. Speaking of him in the article on Alexandria in his Dictionary of the Bible, Dr. Smith says: “It is impossible not to feel the important office which the mystic philosophy, of which Philo is the representative, fulfilled in preparing for the apprehension of the highest Christian truth.” In the next chapter we [84]shall see that this “mystic philosophy” sprang from a heathen source, and that for the whole birth and childhood story of St. Matthew, in its every detail, it is possible to trace a pagan substratum.

Jesus.—Professor A. B. Bruce,12 writer of the article on “Jesus,” points out that, while the Gospels may be regarded as, in the main, a trustworthy tradition, they are unreliable in many of their details. Those details turn out to be the all-important ones, for he goes on to show that: The Temptation is a symbolic representation of a spiritual experience; the story of the Crucifixion is not pure truth, but truth mixed with doubtful legend; the night trial, the mocking, the incident of Barabbas, the two thieves, and the preternatural concomitants of the death are picturesque accessories of doubtful authenticity; Christ’s conceptions of Messiahship were greatly influenced by the later Isaiah; while His spiritual intuitions are pure truth valid for all ages, His language concerning the Father shows limitation of vision; His acts of healing are considered to be real, though it does not follow that they were miraculous. Referring to the strange statement that Jesus declined to expound His parables to the people, lest they should be converted, we are assured that “it is not credible that Jesus would either cherish or avow such an inhuman intention, though it is possible that in His disappointment He may have expressed Himself in such a way as to be misunderstood.”

This is all very well; but, if this be granted, we are naturally anxious to know in how many more matters Jesus may not have been misunderstood. [85]What is the use of a revelation which can be misunderstood in this way? What can be the motive of the Omnipotent Revealer in allowing Himself to be misunderstood? Were not His hearers who misunderstood Him His own selected expositors?

We even find suspicion thrown on the supposed early belief in the divinity of Jesus. For the writer points out that, while in the Gospel of St. Luke Jesus is called “the Lord” about a dozen times, the earlier Gospels of St. Matthew and St. Mark refer to Him simply as “Jesus”—“a fact which seems to indicate the gradual evolution of the belief in His divinity.”

The conclusions of Professor Schmiedel, D.D., of Zürich, one of the writers of the article on the Gospels, are still more destructive. He admits13 that his criticisms “may have sometimes raised a doubt whether any credible elements were to be found in the Gospels at all,” and that there are only nine passages which “might be called the foundation-pillars for a truly scientific life of Jesus.” He admits also “the meagreness of the historical testimony regarding Jesus,” as well “in canonical writings outside of the Gospels” as “in profane writers such as Josephus, Tacitus, Suetonius, and Pliny.”

The Resurrection.—The all-important subject of the “Resurrection” is treated by Professor Schmiedel, who tells us that the Gospel accounts “exhibit contradictions of the most glaring kind.” The actuality of the Resurrection depends for its establishment upon these very narratives, and in such a case unimpeachable witnesses are naturally demanded. Such witnesses do not exist. The reality [86]of the appearances has ever been in dispute. The account of the watch at the sepulchre and the sealing of the tomb is now given up as unhistorical even by those who accept the story as a whole. “The statements as to the empty tomb are to be rejected.”14 The silence of St. Paul with regard to these details is unaccountable, if the story of the Resurrection be true. For him nothing less than the truth of Christianity rested on the actuality of the Resurrection of Jesus. During his visit to Jerusalem he had had opportunities of acquiring knowledge relating to it, and it may naturally be assumed that, when endeavouring to prove to the Corinthians the truth of the Resurrection, he would state fully and clearly all that he knew about it. It is admitted on all hands that the appearance recorded by him was in the nature of a vision—a purely subjective experience. And it is well known that St. Paul uses the same Greek word to describe both the appearance to himself and the appearances to the original disciples, thereby implying the possibility that the latter also were of a visionary or subjective character. An apologetic tendency is perceptible in the Gospel account, and this may help to explain the rise of unhistorical elements. It is probable that, in the absence of knowledge, conjectures were freely made, and many questions asked, the replies to which were afterwards assumed to be facts.

The Gospels.—The article on the Gospels by Dr. E. A. Abbott15 and Professor Schmiedel is crowded [87]with damaging criticism. The view hitherto current that the four Gospels were written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and appeared thirty or forty years after the death of Jesus, can, it is stated, no longer be maintained. The four Gospels were compiled from earlier materials which have perished, and the dates when they first appeared in their present form are given as follows:—Mark, certainly after the destruction of Jerusalem in the year 7016; Matthew, about 119 A.D.; Luke, between 100 and 110; and John, between 132 and 140. But, even if we accept more conservative opinions which place the earliest Gospel about 65 A.D., that would not, of course, make any material difference, nor affect the conclusions of criticism as to their contents. Some of their statements of fact are quite erroneous, and the data are often in direct contradiction to one another. The evangelists made it clear that they wrote with a “lack of concern for historical precision.” The imperfection of the Gospel accounts is everywhere manifest. Even if His ministry lasted only a few months, He must have said a thousandfold more, and repeated His sayings with many variations. The text must not be taken as a trustworthy guide to His original meaning. It merely shows us what the evangelists or their predecessors believed him to mean. The situations in which the words of Jesus are said to have been spoken cannot be implicitly accepted.

Both St. Matthew and St. Mark seem to have read [88]into the utterances of Jesus details borrowed from subsequent facts or controversies. The historical value of the third Gospel is lowered by evidence of the writer’s errors and misunderstandings. It has been widely assumed that it was written by the physician Luke, and that Luke was a companion of Paul. This view of its Pauline character, however, can now be maintained only in a very limited sense. It is clear that the third Gospel and the Acts are by the same author, but that author was not Luke. In the fourth Gospel we find more ambiguities than in all the other three together. The story of the raising of Lazarus cannot be considered historical. The common-sense view of the Synoptic omission of the raising of Lazarus is that earlier authors omitted the tradition because they did not accept it, and probably had never heard of it. “Is, then, the record of the raising of Lazarus a fiction?” asks Dr. Abbott. “Not a fiction, for it is a development. But it is non-historical, like the history of the Creation in Genesis, and like the records of the other miracles in the fourth Gospel, all of which are poetic developments.”17

Lastly, we are plainly warned that “it is vain to look to the Church fathers for trustworthy information on the subject of the origin of the Gospels.”18 This is an exceedingly grave admission when we remember that these same untrustworthy fathers of the Church did the work of sifting the wheat from the chaff—settling what was and what was not canonical.

It need hardly be said that these general conclusions, which are supported by evidence that has [89]satisfied numerous Christian scholars, entirely do away with the idea that the Gospels are credible and trustworthy narratives.

The Acts of the Apostles.—The sections of this book in which the narrative is written in the first person plural (says Professor Schmiedel) can be implicitly accepted; but it is equally certain that they are not by the same hand as the rest of the book. Apart from the “we” sections, no statement merits immediate acceptance on the mere ground of its presence in the book. The speeches are constructed by the author in accordance with his own conceptions. This book does not come from a companion of St. Paul; its date may be set down as between A.D. 105 and 130.

The Epistles of St. Paul.—The genuineness of the Pauline Epistles does not appear to be so clear as was once universally supposed. Advanced criticism, Professor van Manen19 tells us, in his elaborate article on “Paul,” has learned to recognise that none of these Epistles is by him, not even the four generally regarded as unassailable. Van Manen’s position, however, is exceptional. In the article on “Epistolary Literature” the Epistle to Philemon and the Epistles to the Philippians, Thessalonians, Galatians, Colossians, Ephesians, and even the Epistle to the Romans, are recognised as real letters written by St. Paul. The genuineness of four of the Epistles is, in any case, generally accepted. As these include the first Epistle to the Corinthians, this conclusion is of the greatest importance. The Bishop of London is [90]“content to rest his case, for not being intellectually ashamed of the documentary evidence, on the four undisputed Epistles of St. Paul.”20

The Apocalypse.—Criticism has clearly shown that the Book of Revelation can no longer be regarded as a literary unit, but is an admixture of Jewish with Christian ideas and speculations. Ancient testimony, that of Papias in particular, assumed the Presbyter John, and not the Apostle, to be its author.

This completes a summary of conclusions, arrived at by eminent Christian scholars of the more advanced school. Though they, or the majority of them, would be the last to make any such admission, the net result amounts practically to a surrender of the Christian dogmas.

These criticisms are, I repeat, the work not of anti-Christians, but of Christians, who have devoted themselves to Biblical research, and who are among the greatest living experts in that sphere of knowledge. Canon Cheyne, one of the two editors of the Encyclopædia Biblica, has now written a volume on Bible Problems and the New Material for their Solution, in which he appeals to Churchmen and scholars and all who are interested in Bible criticism for thoroughness of investigation. There can be no doubt that there is a crying need for this thorough investigation, which at present is being shirked. While the main results arrived at by the Higher Criticism are, it is [91]true, largely accepted by enlightened divines, the usual policy so far has been not to disseminate such knowledge. On this I shall have more to say in the concluding chapter of this book.

Dr. Harnack in Germany, and M. Loisy in France, may be cited as types of liberal theologians who proclaim their acceptance of the Higher Criticism. They both detach Christianity from mere narrative, and seek to appreciate it as a spiritual reality, which appeals to the imagination, the emotions, and the soul. Dr. Harnack is the Professor of Church History in the University of Berlin, and member of the Royal Prussian Academy, and a book called What is Christianity? is an English translation of sixteen lectures delivered by him in the University of Berlin, 1899–1900. In this book the effort to prove that the Gospels though unhistorical are yet historical, that Christianity though untrue is yet true, is strongly in evidence to any impartial reader. Take his remark on the “Miraculous Element” in Lecture II.; we find the same kind of specious argument on which I have already animadverted in the chapter on Miracles. He says: “Miracles, it is true, do not happen; but of the marvellous and the inexplicable there is no lack—that the earth in its course stood still, that a she-ass spoke, that a storm was quieted by a word,21 we do not believe, and we shall never again believe; but that the lame walked, the blind saw, and the deaf heard, will not be so summarily dismissed as an illusion.” Why? Because, after all, these may have been accomplished by the operation of a natural law with which we are as yet unacquainted! “Although [92]the order of Nature be inviolable, we are not yet by any means acquainted with all the forces working in it and acting reciprocally with other forces. Our acquaintance even with the forces inherent in matter, and with the field of their action, is incomplete; while of psychic forces we know very much less.” He gives the whole situation away, however, by making excuses for the Evangelists, such as “we know that the Gospels come from a time in which the marvellous may be said to have been something of almost daily occurrence,” and “we now know that eminent persons have not to wait until they have been long dead, or even for several years, to have miracles reported of them; they are reported at once, often the very next day.” Again, speaking of the first three Gospels, he says: “These Gospels are not, it is true, historical works any more than the fourth; they were not written with the simple object of giving the facts as they were; they were books composed for the work of evangelisation.” Such reasoning serves only to confirm one’s suspicions. Here is the unedifying spectacle of an erudite scholar using his intellectual powers to make out a case for a Faith built upon foundations which he has himself destroyed. We do not wish to be told that there is a substratum of truth in the Gospel narratives. The ordinary man feels strongly that the whole should be true if it be God’s Word. That this is, and always will be, the common-sense view of mankind is proved by the fact that it is held by the vast majority of the strictly orthodox, as well as by every Agnostic and every cultured heathen.

M. Loisy writes in much the same strain as Dr. Harnack, and finds adherents in both English and Roman Catholic Churches, as may be seen from the correspondence in the Church Times during April, 1904. [93]

In the Hibbert Journal (January, 1905) an Oxfordshire rector, the Rev. C. J. Shebbeare, presents the same aspect of liberal theology by means of various illustrations. He remarks: “It is evident that the lesson taught by our new teachers must have an important bearing upon popular religious conceptions and upon religious practice. Its chief effect will be to deliver us from the error of identifying religion with belief in the supernatural—an error of which it is not difficult to see the pernicious consequences” (italics are mine). This is all very well for those who can divest the Christian religion of its supernatural element, and yet remain honest believers. To my mind, this is simply non-Christian Theism, and the Theistic Church, Swallow Street, is the place where such persons should perform their devotions.

I crave the reader’s patience while I give one more example of advanced apologetics. The Rev. Arthur Moorhouse, M.A., B.D., Tutor in Old Testament Languages and Literature at Didsbury College, offers, in a lecture22 delivered at Manchester on “The Inspiration of the Old Testament,” “an unhesitating and emphatic denial” to the statement that there is any “untruth in the Old Testament.” Yet he tells us that “the early chapters of Genesis are not historical in our modern and scientific sense,” and asks us to remember that, “in the nature of things, it could not be history, for it deals with facts which are, of necessity, prehistoric”! Such pitiful shifts and evasions seem to many of us wholly unworthy of earnest men. “Our fathers,” says Mr. Moorhouse, “may have thought that this was history miraculously [94]dictated, but the Bible does not say so.” No, and the Bible does not say that it is speaking the truth, but “our fathers” were simple-minded enough to forget that such a guarantee was necessary on the part of a book which they, like Mr. Moorhouse, believed to be the inspired Word of God.

I cannot conclude this review of Bible criticism without an allusion to the opinions of those theologians who agree with the “Higher Critics” to an extent far exceeding anything the pious layman suspects. I shall omit, as being too advanced, the views of Dr. Driver, given in his “Genesis,” or of Canon Henson, as expressed in the Contemporary Review and in his book, The Value of the Bible and Other Sermons, or of Archdeacon Wilson, shown in his various interesting books and pamphlets; and will confine myself to comparatively conservative theology. I select, as representative of this type, The Divine Library of the Old Testament, by Dr. A. F. Kirkpatrick (Master of Selwyn College, Regius Professor of Hebrew in the University of Cambridge, and Canon of Ely Cathedral), and The Study of the Gospels, being a “Handbook for the Clergy,” by Dr. J. Armitage Robinson (Dean of Westminster).

In the former, which is among the books selected by the Christian Evidence Society for their Examination in March, 1907, we read: “The lectures do not attempt to deal with many of the graver questions which are being raised as to the Old Testament.” But it is just the more difficult questions, such as those examined with such destructive effect by the Higher Criticism, which specially require to be [95]answered. Why are they neglected? The author goes on to confess that “the books were constructed out of earlier narratives; some were formed by the union of previous collections of poetry or prophecies; some betray marks of a reviser’s hand; and even books which bear the names of well-known authors in some cases contain matter which must be attributed to other writers.” Also we find the following significant admissions. Referring to the important last twenty-seven chapters of Isaiah, he accepts Dr. Driver’s criticisms, and says: “I do not see how we can resist the conclusion that these chapters were not written by Isaiah, but by an unknown prophet towards the close of the Babylonian Exile”; and he owns that “it will inevitably seem to many students of the Bible that, in assigning the prophecy to a date so near to the events which it foretells, we are detracting from its truly predictive character and diminishing its value.” However, he considers that “Isaiah is great enough to share his glory with this disciple, in whom, being dead, he yet spoke; and, paradox as it may seem, the truly prophetic character of the work gains by being referred to the time of the Exile.” By what process of reasoning he arrives at this astonishing conclusion it is exceedingly difficult to comprehend.

Further admissions by Dr. Kirkpatrick must be noticed more briefly. They are: “The first chapter of Genesis is not, as we now know, a scientifically exact account of Creation.” “The account of the Fall is, it may be, an allegory rather than a history in the strict sense of the term.” “The Deluge was not universal in the sense that the waters covered the whole surface of the entire globe.” “The Psalms, like the Proverbs, have a long literary history. [96]They are poems by different authors, and David may be one of them.” “Modern criticism claims, and claims with justice, that the Hexateuch, like so many of the other books, is composite in its origin, and has a long literary history.” “That the Pentateuch was entirely written by Moses is merely a Jewish tradition, which passed into the Christian Church and was commonly accepted until modern times. [Yet how much hangs upon the trustworthiness of this same Jewish tradition, and how much else may not the Church have wrongfully accepted?] Some of the variations of the LXX.23 from the Hebrew text are due, no doubt, to errors and interpolations and deliberate alterations; but after all allowance has been made for these, I do not see how any candid critic can resist the conclusion that many of them represent variations existing in the Hebrew text from which the translation was made.” “It was probably at the very beginning of this period [from the Fall of Jerusalem to the end of the fifth century], towards the close of the first century a.d., that the final settlement of an authoritative text took place.... How came it that all the copies containing other readings have disappeared?... Copies differing from it [the standard text] would die out or be deliberately destroyed.” “The oldest Hebrew MS. in existence of which the date is known was written in 916 A.D.—i.e., separated by more than a thousand years from the latest of the works included in the Canon.”

Finally, the following crucial questions are offered [97](pp. 88–9) and left unanswered: “In what sense, it is asked, can this legislation, which is now said to be Mosaic in elemental germ and idea only, and to represent not the inspired deliverance of a supremely great individual, but the painful efforts of many generations of law-makers; these histories which have been compiled from primitive traditions, and chronicles, and annals, and what not; these books of prophecy which are not the authentic autographs of the prophets, but posthumous collections of such writings (if any) as they left behind them, eked out by the recollections of their disciples; these Proverbs and Psalms which have been handed down by tradition and altered and edited and re-edited; these histories which contain errors of date and fact, and have been, perhaps, ‘idealised’ by the reflection of the circumstances and ideas of the writer’s own times upon a distant past; these seeming narratives which may be allegories; and these would-be prophecies which may be histories; in what sense can these be said to be inspired? The problems raised are grave.” My own thoughts, and the thoughts of many like myself, are here candidly expressed. I have nothing to add, and can only echo this learned divine’s solemn words—the problems raised are grave!

Turning now to the Study of the Gospels, we learn from Dr. Robinson as follows: There is no proof that St. Matthew is the author of the first Gospel. He is unable to fix the date himself, but quotes Dr. Harnack, who says “probably 70–75,” and who also adds the important reservation, “except certain later additions.” St. Mark’s authorship, he thinks, is practically certain, and the year 65 is the probable date. “It is,” he says, “exceedingly probable that St. [98]Peter would not write or preach, even if he could speak at all, in any language but his mother tongue, the Aramaic of Galilee, a local dialect akin to Hebrew. When he wrote or preached to Greek-speaking people, he would use Mark or some other disciple as his interpreter.” What, then, may I ask, had become of the “gifts at Pentecost”?

St. Luke is, according to Dr. Robinson, the fellow-traveller of St. Paul, and the date of his Gospel shortly after 70. Regarding St. John’s, we are informed that Dr. Harnack fixes the date between 80 and 110, and thinks that it was written by another person of the same name—John the presbyter, or elder, of Ephesus. Dr. Robinson, however, in a chapter he devotes to the subject of the fourth Gospel, attempts to show its apostolic authorship.

Dr. Robinson admits that the authorship of all four Gospels is doubtful, but thinks that, regarding the second Gospel, we may accept the second-century tradition that it was written by St. Mark, and that St. Mark was the “interpreter” of St. Peter and wrote the Gospel in Rome from information derived from that Apostle. Very good; let us accept this conclusion. We have it, then, that one of the Gospels is from the mouth of an eye-witness. This eye-witness, however, was, after all, an eye-witness of only one year (or, according to conservative criticism, three years) of Christ’s life; he was an illiterate person, and the information he imparted after thirty or forty years had to be written down by another person in another language, and there is no telling how faithful or unfaithful the translation may have been. Besides, as Dr. Robinson points out in his chapters on “The Great Sermon” and “The Non-Marcan Document,” [99]there are very important omissions in St. Mark’s Gospel. Referring to a supposed source for the information furnished by other evangelists, but omitted by St. Mark, he says: “You may gain some general idea of the scope of this document (the Non-Marcan24) by underlining in St. Luke’s Gospel all those portions which are to be found in St. Matthew, but are not to be found in St. Mark.”

Now, what are these omissions in St. Mark? Are they trivial? Let us judge for ourselves by taking a few selections. There is no mention whatever of the story of Christ’s miraculous birth, nor of the other incidents of His childhood which are said to be in fulfilment of prophecy, and there is no mention of the great Sermon on the Mount. The story of the Resurrection is told in a few sentences, and the Ascension in one sentence. Unfortunately, too, these very sentences are admittedly interpolations, and St. Mark really ends at xvi. 8.25 So there is no account of either the Incarnation, Resurrection, or Ascension, and we are left with oral traditions, “lost” documents, and unknown copyists, as the only source from which to obtain any detailed information concerning the very groundwork of our Creed! Could anything be more unsatisfactory, more calculated to arouse suspicion of the “Christian Verities”—the Gospel truths? I am completely at a loss to understand [100]how the Bishop of Gloucester26 can say that the “Higher Criticism” has been a “gain to the Church,” or the Bishop of London26 that “the New Testament stands ten times as strong as it did fifty years ago.” It would seem to be a case of “where ignorance is bliss,” etc., or else of the wish being father to the thought.

There is much more that I should wish to call attention to, did space permit, but I have now, I think, given some insight into modern Bible criticism, and the extent to which it is accepted by Christians. It only remains, in conclusion, to ask for earnest thought on this new aspect of “the Word of God.” In doing so the following additional considerations may be borne in mind.

The facts and truths established by Science are no longer made the subject of attacks by Christian apologists in the manner that they used to be; they are now considered by them to be the unfolding, through God’s Providence, of pieces of information hitherto concealed from us. A scientific discovery (by men who are more often than not Agnostics) simply means that God wills to reveal another detail of His eternal methods. There must be, we are told, a frank modification, or even the abandonment, of certain preconceived ideas which, faulty as they were, had sufficed for man in an earlier stage of his development, and had come to be regarded as integral parts of his religious faith. This is the substance of the modern apologist’s argument which is intended to reconcile all outlying discrepancies between our new knowledge and our old beliefs. The new explanation, based upon the assumption that revelation is progressive, will come as a surprise to the rank and file of Christendom, who have hitherto been given to understand that the Bible contained the one, only, and sufficient revelation of God to man. However, [116]there is no alternative. If accepted, many grave difficulties of faith are swept away. Nay, more; the reasonableness of our faith is immensely strengthened, and the facts of science and research become a valuable adjunct to the armour of the Christian apologist. On the other hand, a refusal to accept spells disaster to the Christian faith. The truth of progressive revelation is, therefore, a matter of life or death for the Christian religion; and, of all branches of modern research, it is Comparative Mythology which absolutely demands the complete establishment of this theory. If true, our belief is further verified by the startling discoveries of the ethnologist; if untrue, it is irrevocably shattered. Accordingly, in this chapter I am giving a prominent place to the discussion of this theory.

I think I may safely say that there is no department of knowledge about which so little is known by the ordinary man, and even, I regret to say, by the majority of ecclesiastics, as Comparative Mythology. Yet it is the study of this science perhaps more than of any other which is causing well-informed men and women to lose faith in Christianity. Ask Christian professors in our universities who are in touch with the thought around them, and you will hear that their sceptical friends are all telling them the same thing; they cannot get over anthropology, and especially that branch of it which concerns itself with the traditions and beliefs of primitive peoples. Recent ethnological research has thrown an entirely new light upon old problems. The discoveries of science, including the animal origin of man, may, by a stretch of imagination and faith, be reconciled with belief; so also the disclosures of the Higher Criticism; but the very [117]origin of Christianity is exposed by the study of Comparative Mythology. “It is indeed a melancholy and in some respects thankless task to strike at the foundations of beliefs in which, as in a strong tower, the hopes and aspirations of humanity through long ages have sought a refuge from the storm and stress of life. Yet sooner or later it is inevitable that the battery of the comparative method should breach these venerable walls, mantled over with the ivy and mosses and wild flowers of a thousand tender and sacred associations.”1

Some years ago there were ecclesiastics who took a lively interest in Comparative Mythology. Students of Pagan religions as well as Christian missionaries were bent on discovering more striking and more startling coincidences in order to use them in confirmation of their favourite theory that some rays of a primeval revelation, or some reflection of the Jewish religion, had reached the uttermost ends of the world. Subsequently the study of comparative mythology seems to have lost much of its charm. Why?

“The theory that there was a primeval preternatural revelation granted to the fathers of the human race, and that the grains of truth which catch our eye when exploring the temples of heathen gods are the scattered fragments of that sacred heirloom—the seeds that fell by the wayside or upon stony places—would find but few supporters at present; no more, in fact, than the theory that there was in the beginning one complete and perfect primeval language, broken up in later times into the numberless languages of the world.” “The opinion,” again, “that the Pagan religions were [118]mere corruptions of the religion of the Old Testament, once supported by men of high authority and great learning, is now as completely surrendered as the attempts to explain Greek and Latin as corruptions of Hebrew.”2

It will be as well, in the first place, to see exactly what the Church herself now says on the matter; how far she recognises that gigantic strides have been made in a study formerly pursued in a manner necessarily elementary by the Alexandrian schools; how far she concedes the conclusions of the modern ethnologist; and how far she approves of progressive revelation as the explanation for the whole enigma of the parallels between ancient beliefs and our own. For this purpose I think I cannot do better than quote from two striking articles on the subject in the Church Times. They were contributed by the editor of The Treasury magazine. “The study,” he says, “of folk-lore, of anthropology, of primitive myth and ritual, has made enormous strides within the last quarter of a century, and the fruits of that study are now forced, for the first time,3 upon the attention of the general public. Presented in outline, the situation is as follows: We have been accustomed to consider Christianity apart from all other religions. We have recognised, indeed, the historical preparation for it so far as that is described in the pages of the Old Testament; but we have thought of that preparation as conducted among a single people, and by means of a unique revelation. Of pagan religions we have known practically nothing. The mythology of the [119]Greeks and Romans, which some of us had to learn at school, seemed to be a collection of pointless fairy tales. And as regards other and more primitive races, both ancient and modern, the statement that ‘the heathen, in his blindness, bows down to wood and stone’ comprised accurately the sum of our knowledge. That there could be any but the vaguest likeness between them and our own beliefs was unimaginable. Possibly there was a belief in the Fatherhood of some supreme being, some vague conception of a future life; while sacrificial rites, as we knew, were not peculiar to the Jews. But the other doctrines of our Creed we regarded as exclusively our own. The ideas of a Triune God-head, of an Incarnate Saviour, of the Virgin Birth, of the Second Advent, of the Sacraments, of the Communion of Saints—these seemed to be the distinctive possessions of Christianity; these were marks clearly dividing it from any form of paganism. So, at least, we imagined. [Had we not every reason thus to imagine on the authority of Holy Scripture?] But it proves that we were completely mistaken. The modern study of primitive religion shows that every one of these beliefs is, or has been, held in some part or other of the pagan world quite independently of Christian influence, and that, while we are bound to speak of these beliefs as, in a sense, distinctly Christian, to term them exclusively Christian is no longer possible.... In these early mythologies we can discern the longing for a personal God, capable of direct communication with man, and for some sort of union between the divine and human natures. Whence did these instincts themselves originate? The one tenable reply seems to be that they were God-implanted.... The Zoroastrian anticipates the advent [120]of a ‘Saviour’ (Saoshyas), who will end the strife between good and evil, personified as Ormuzd and Ahriman, by sweeping away evil from the earth. In the ancient Vedic and Scandinavian religions, in the Old-World creeds of Egypt and Babylon, in the legends of Mexico and Polynesia, is found, in a variety of guises, the same fundamental idea. Always there is a sense of a supremely righteous Power; of a world tainted with evil, and out of harmony with the Power above it; of the coming of some Deliverer, who will establish a kingdom of righteousness. Once more, in many mythologies the idea of a Virgin Birth is associated with that of a Divine Incarnation. Men felt instinctively that the entrance of a Divine Being into the human race must take place in a miraculous way. And thus the Spirit of God, working by means of what we may term the instinctive feelings of mankind, prepared the human race throughout the world for the coming of the Son of God, to be born of a pure Virgin, to take our nature upon Him for evermore, and to redeem us from the power of sin.... We find conceptions, such as that of the Hindu Trimurti, which seem to remember the doctrine of the Trinity. In the sacramental meals of totem-worship, when a sacred animal is killed, and partaken of by the worshippers in order that its power may be communicated to them [not to mention “sacred” men killed with the same idea], there seems a dim anticipation of the highest Christian rite. Baptism as a cleansing and symbolical ceremony was known centuries before the Christian era.... These rites and beliefs, obscured by superstition and insufficient to satisfy the longing which brought them into existence, were designed to serve as the schoolmasters who would lead [121]the heathen at length to Christ” (cf. Galatians iii. 24).

These remarks, by a clergyman of the Church of England, will enable the ordinary person, who for the most part knows nothing whatever about these things, to realise the immense importance of the questions raised by Comparative Mythology.

Before proceeding any further, it will be advisable to consider some concrete examples of the parallels between the beliefs and teachings of ancient religions and those of the Christian religion.

I must ask the reader’s patience if I postpone my final remarks on Progressive Revelation until I have adduced some illustrations of the beliefs and customs of primitive man, as here also this same theory has to apply. Thus far the pagan beliefs have appeared to be of a comparatively harmless character; but this can by no means be said of the beliefs of savage man. He does not confine himself, like his more [143]civilised brother, to mystical beliefs in Saviours who once upon a time suffered for him, and whose body and blood are to be symbolically assimilated; but, being of a realistic (or shall we say materialistic?) turn of mind, he prefers (the inevitable result of a restricted intellectual development)25 to satisfy his religious emotions with the spectacle of a real human-divine sufferer, and by a sacrificial feast of real flesh and blood. Can this be God’s method of revealing Himself? True, the religious convictions of civilised man have been a fruitful source of human agony, both physical and mental, in many a bloody fight and massacre, in cruel and relentless persecutions, in every refinement of excruciating torture and pitiable distress to body and mind; but it is possible to gloze over all this with various specious arguments. It is not so easy to do so with examples drawn from the history of savage races. The only thing is that so few have ever had these examples brought before them, or, at least, have ever thought of connecting them with anything that has to do with the truth of Christianity. I shall, therefore, now give some illustrations of the beliefs and customs of primitive man. A vivid description may succeed in convincing the reader of the absurdity of the new theory, where mere vague ideas of savage ritual would fail. “Of the human sacrifices of rude peoples, those of the Mexicans are perhaps the most instructive, for in them the theanthropic character of the victim comes out most clearly.”26 “When we go to the records of the cultures [144]and creeds of Mexico and Peru, records wonderfully preserved in the teeth of the fanaticism which would have destroyed them all if it could, we stand clear of the frauds and prejudices alike of Jew and Christian.... We are faced by a civilisation and a religion that reached wealth and complexity by normal evolution from the stages of early savagery and barbarism without ever coming in contact with those of Europe till the moment of collision and destruction.”27 We shall begin, therefore, with the ancient American.

If Progressive Revelation be true, it is the most marvellous proof of the truth of Christianity—far the greatest proof that has ever yet been presented to us. Far greater, for instance, than the prophecies of those so-called prophets of the Old Testament, who, it now transpires, were only anticipating or describing events of their own times. It is such a proof as Christianity is [160]in dire need of just now—a proof that will save her from a peril which every hour brings nearer. Why, then, do we hear so little of this great discovery from the pulpit?46 How comes it that it is discovered so many years after the fulfilment of these unconscious prophecies of the pagans? Why is it produced merely to confute the sceptic and restore confidence to that infinitesimally small number who happen to have studied, and therefore to have had their suspicions aroused by, Comparative Mythology? We are to believe that God revealed Himself by an exceedingly slow and painful process, extending over thousands upon thousands of years, and entailing the most horrible customs among savages. This process, mark you, not only led to the establishment of Christianity as the world became more civilised, but to the establishment of those other great religions which to this day are hostile to the reception of Christianity! Simple-minded people will never be induced to agree that revelation can be progressive in the manner now indicated to us by the apologist. Rather they will agree with the nationalist, who denies the originality of Christianity, contending that it is a cult which adopted, step by step, the mysteries, the miracles, and the myths of the popular Gentile religions. Some freethinkers, indeed, go so far as to say that the whole Gospel story is nothing more than a myth; but the greater number consider that there is a substratum of truth, and that round this have slowly gathered the religious ideas and doctrines that were current in the old pagan world. The precise manner in which, they conjecture, the transformation actually [161]took place is a large subject, and there are differences of opinion—e.g., some are inclined to think that Essenism, others that Mithraism, played a leading part; but the point to be borne in mind is that there is no difficulty whatever in understanding how the absorption of myths could have taken place, or how the Christian cult could have arisen and prospered.

I especially mention this, as some apologists argue that there was not sufficient time for heathen accretions between the death of Jesus and the writing of the Gospels. I can only reiterate the remark of the well-known professor of Church history, Dr. Harnack: “We know that the Gospels come from a time in which the marvellous may be said to have been something of almost daily occurrence. We now know that eminent persons have not to wait until they have been long dead, or even for several years, to have miracles reported of them; they are reported at once, often the very next day.” Also, I should call attention to the notes on Essenism and Mithraism at the close of this chapter, as they contain the answer to this final objection. But, personally, I fail to see how the “time” objection can in any case be maintained when we remember that the whole world had already been conversant for ages past with stories of suffering Saviours, similar in all essentials to the Gospel narratives. Besides, we know that documents have been tampered with more or less (the sceptic says “more,” the apologist “less”), and that the composition of the Gospels took place many years after the events they purport to describe; while the age was one when men were extremely credulous, and when, consciously and unconsciously, imposing upon this credulity was the ordinary method of propagating a Faith. [162]

Darwin tells us that “there is no exception to the rule that every organic being naturally increases at such a high rate that, if not destroyed, the earth would soon be covered by the progeny of a single pair. Even slow-breeding man has doubled in twenty-five years, and at this rate in less than a thousand years there would literally not be standing room for his progeny.”11 [I commend this passage to the notice of President Roosevelt and others who are so anxious that we should obey God’s command to Noah, and “be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth.”] “If all the offspring of the elephant, the slowest breeder known, survived, there would be, in seven hundred and fifty years, nearly nineteen million elephants, descended from the first pair. If the eight or nine million eggs which the roe of a cod is said to contain, developed into adult codfishes, the sea would quickly become a solid mass of them. It is the same with the plants. The lower organisms multiply with an astonishing rapidity, some minute fungi increasing a billion-fold in a few hours. But we need not give further examples of this fecundity whereby Nature, ‘so careless of the single life,’ secures the race against extinction. The result is obvious—a ceaseless struggle for food and place. In that struggle the race is to the swift, and the battle to the strong; [181]the weaker, be it in brain or body, going to the wall; the vast majority never reaching maturity, or, if they do, attaining it only to be starved or slain. As among men competition is sharper between those of the same trade, so throughout the organic world the struggle is less severe between different species than between members of the same species, because these compete more fiercely for their common needs—plants for the same soil, carnivora for the same prey.”12

The problem of evil has exercised the mind of man from all time, and has never yet been solved. In our own time the solution by theology seems farther off than ever, now that the existence of the Devil is denied, while the law of prey and struggle for existence is admitted to be the Creator’s own handiwork—to be His Divine plan for the evolution of all living things. Surely we must admit the inherent cruelty of the process? Professor Huxley, in an article on the “Struggle for Existence,” concludes that, “since thousands of times a minute, were our ears sharp enough, we should hear sighs and groans of pain like those heard by Dante at the gate of hell [not to mention what we should not hear—the anguish and terror borne in silence], the world cannot be governed by what we call benevolence.”13

Winwood Reade, in his striking book, The Martyrdom of Man, says: “But it is when we open the Book of Nature, that book inscribed in blood and tears; it is when we study the laws regulating life, the laws productive of development, that we see plainly how illusive is this theory that God is Love. In all things [182]there is cruel, profligate, and abandoned waste. Of all the animals that are born a few only can survive; and it is owing to this law that development takes place. The law of murder is the law of growth. Life is one long tragedy; creation is one great crime. Is it the law of a kind Creator that no animal shall rise to excellence except by being fatal to the life of others? It is useless to say that pain has its benevolence, that massacre has its mercy. Why is it so ordained that bad should be the raw material of good? Pain is not less pain because it is useful; murder is not less murder because it is conducive to development. There is blood upon the hand still, and all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten it.”14

Robert Blatchford (Nunquam), in his book, God and My Neighbour, which has caused no little stir of late in certain quarters, speaks to the same effect: “On land and in sea the animal creation chase and maim and slay and devour each other. The beautiful swallow on the wing devours the equally beautiful gnat. The graceful flying fish, like a fair white bird, goes glancing above the blue magnificence of the tropical seas. His flight is one of terror; he is pursued by the ravenous dolphin. The ichneumon-fly lays eggs under the skin of the caterpillar. The eggs are hatched by the warmth of the caterpillar’s blood. They produce a brood of larvæ which devour the caterpillar alive.... A germ flies from a stagnant pool, and the laughing child, its mother’s darling, dies dreadfully of diphtheria. A tidal wave rolls land-ward, and twenty thousand human beings are drowned or crushed to death. A volcano bursts suddenly into [183]eruption, and the beautiful city is a heap of ruins, and its inhabitants are charred or mangled corpses. And the Heavenly Father, who is Love and has power to save, makes no sign.... Only man helps man. Only man pities; only man tries to save.”

“But,” it may be said, “you are giving only the one side—the freethinker’s side—of the question. What are the Christian evolutionist’s replies to these terrible attacks upon our Heavenly Father?” You shall hear them, and judge for yourself whether they are likely to convince the multitude.

In the second chapter of his book on Darwinism, Dr. Alfred Russel Wallace lays himself out to say all that can be said, and a great deal that cannot reasonably be said, in extenuation of God’s plan. He owns that, “to many persons, Nature appears calm, orderly, and peaceful. They see the birds singing in the trees, the insects hovering over the flowers, and all living things in the possession of health and in the enjoyment of a sunny existence. But they do not see, and hardly ever think of, the means by which this beauty and harmony and enjoyment is brought about. They do not see the constant and daily search after food, the failure to obtain which means weakness or death; the constant effort to escape enemies; the ever-recurring struggle against the forces of Nature. This daily and hourly struggle, this incessant warfare, is, nevertheless, the very means by which much of the beauty and harmony and enjoyment in Nature is produced, and also affords one of the most important elements in bringing about the origin of the species.” After showing that the struggle for existence has proved a stumbling-block in the way of those who would fain believe in the all-wise and benevolent Ruler of the [184]universe, he goes on to say that “all this is greatly exaggerated”; that “the supposed torments and miseries of animals have little real existence, but are the reflection of the imagined sensations of cultivated men and women under similar circumstances”; and that “the amount of actual suffering caused by the struggle for existence among animals is altogether insignificant.” Space, and a consideration for a possibly impatient reader, prevent my wading through the paltry reasons he proceeds to bring forward in order to try to prove that pain is not pain, and that the less degree of pain suffered by an animal or a savage is an excuse for its infliction.

The Rev. Professor Flint’s book on Theism15 is much patronised by the Church as an apologetic book of the highest order. The Professor tries to show (p. 204) that, although the process of development involves privation, pain, and conflict, it is subservient to the noblest end, because the final result is, as he alleges, order and beauty. All the perfections of sentient creatures are, he owns, due to this painful process. “Through it the lion has gained its strength, the deer its speed, the dog its sagacity. The suffering which the conflict involves may indicate that God has made even animals for some higher end than happiness—that He cares for animals’ perfection as well as for animals’ enjoyment. The ends are eminently worthy of a Divine intelligence.” The Professor does not explain why, to paraphrase one of Mr. Lowes Dickenson’s sage remarks, the less perfectly evolved generations should be sacrificed in order that future [185]generations may be heirs of an unearned increment. Myself, I fail to see that even the ends, whatever they may happen to be—and they appear distinctly nebulous—can ever justify the cruel means; and I feel sure that our dumb fellow-creatures, the principal parties concerned, would agree with me, had they the power of reflection and speech. How can they, how can we, profess to approve of a plan that brings only unhappiness in its train? Suppose it were necessary in order to give more happiness in an after-life, the creature might meekly wonder why he or she had first to suffer pain, but could imagine, as the pious imagine, that it must be for some good purpose. Does Dr. Flint mean to say that there is an after-life for all living things? The learned Professor tries to explain pain away by describing its preservative use. He says (p. 246): “Were animals insusceptible of pain, they would be in continual peril.” That would certainly spoil the evolutionary Creator’s plans; but it hardly excuses His methods. Professor Flint, however, argues that, though pain is not an end in itself, it is a means to an end, and “its end is a benevolent one.” How, I ask does it profit the creature itself to become ever so graceful in appearance, ever so perfect in mind and body, if it is only to gratify its Maker, who has an end in view with which it is in no wise itself concerned, and to attain which infinite pain has to be endured? Which would you or I rather be—lovely and unhappy, or ugly and happy?

There is another of these attempts to relieve doubt which I should like to bring to notice. The little book entitled In Relief of Doubt, by the Rev. E. Welsh, highly recommended by the Bishop of London, and one of the books selected by the Christian Evidence [186]Society for their examination in March, 1907, is quoted from by Dr. Warschauer16 when refuting Mr. Blatchford’s remarks on the cruelty of Nature. Dr. Warschauer selects the passage where Mr. Welsh says (p. 103): “We probably overstate the actual anguish of the lower creatures, imagining that they are bundles of sensitive nerves and quick brains like our own, and that they therefore have our sensibility to pain. A trodden worm writhes, and we credit it with all the pain that the foot of a Brobdingnag would inflict on a delicate child under his heel.” Now, I am quite sure we credit no such thing. If we did, we, and especially the Isaak Waltons among us, would be perfect monsters of cruelty. Mark, too, how Messrs. Welsh and Warschauer carefully select for their illustration a worm—one of the lowly organised invertebrates! I may mention that Dr. Warschauer’s book was particularly recommended to me by a well-read cleric, who thought that it was an admirable and complete refutation of Mr. Blatchford’s arguments. Dr. Warschauer will hardly advance his cause by transparently omitting all mention of the higher animals, or of that bundle of nerves called man.

Nor will the average man agree with Professor Wallace that “it is difficult even to imagine a system by which a greater balance of happiness could have been secured.” Was it, for example, impossible for God to have decreed that sentient life should feed only on non-sentient life? Could He not have brought about development without all this terrible struggle? One would think that Messrs. Warschauer and Wallace must not only have had a particularly good time [187]themselves in this world, but must have purposely shut their eyes to the misery all round them. If they had to change places with a wounded Russian or Japanese writhing in agony on the battlefield, I wonder whether their optimism would stand the test? The bravest of us shudder at the idea of being buried alive, and yet this was just the very fate of many a poor fellow in that truly terrible war. Not that man did not do his utmost. “One by one the dead and injured were carefully and tenderly taken out,” relates an eye-witness, “and many a tear was shed by strong men at the terrible sights we had to witness. The worst part of our work was to have to endure the agonising cries of the men who were suffering terrible torture; but everyone helped so willingly that we felt that we were not doing enough.” Please note, on the one hand, the cruel torture, and, on the other, the sympathy of man.

I will not weary or distress you further, gentle reader, with harrowing details of the pain that is endured alike by man and beast. It is all so well known. I shall only ask you to listen to a little story from the leaves of a naturalist’s note-book, and to put to yourself a few questions. “A sparrow-hawk suddenly dashed under the branches of a hedgerow oak, and seized a linnet. But the bird of prey had not calculated upon the missel-thrush whose nest was in the oak, and who made it his business to have no suspicious strangers loitering in the neighbourhood. With an angry ‘jarr,’ and a swoop that would have done credit to the hawk himself, the plucky missel-thrush was upon the marauder almost at the same instant that the linnet was seized; a feather—a hawk’s feather—floated in the air, and the astonished bird of prey flung himself sideways, and spread his talons to [188]meet the next assault. This action released the linnet, who sped away into the next parish like a bullet, while the missel-thrush, perched in the oak tree again, noisily threatened to repeat the attack. So the sparrow-hawk departed in the opposite direction to the linnet, and in two minutes all birddom was twittering and squabbling as before on the site of what was so very nearly a sudden tragedy.” Is not your sympathy, humane reader, all with the linnet and its gallant rescuer, although the hawk was but carrying out the behests of its Maker! Does it not give us a thrill of pleasure when the lion is baulked of his prey—when the pet lamb is rescued from the butcher? Are we, then, more merciful than God? Was it Jesus or was it the gentle Gautama that marked

The hypothesis respecting the past history of Nature, which was formerly, and is still very largely, accepted by Christians, is the doctrine fully and clearly stated in the immortal poem of John Milton—the English Divina Commedia—Paradise Lost. There is the best of reasons for the popularity of this doctrine. [189]It agrees literally with the plain words of the Bible. The hypothesis is briefly this: “That this visible universe of ours came into existence at no great distance of time from the present, and that the parts of which it is composed made their appearance, in a certain definite order, in the space of six natural days, in such a manner that on the first of these days light appeared; that on the second the firmament or sky separated the waters above from the waters beneath the firmament; that on the third day the waters drew away from the dry land, and upon it a varied vegetable life, similar to that which now exists, made its appearance; that the fourth day was signalised by the apparition of the sun, the stars, the moon, and the planets; that on the fifth day aquatic animals originated within the waters; that on the sixth day the earth gave rise to our four-footed terrestrial creatures, and to all variations of terrestrial animals except birds, which had appeared on the preceding day; and, finally, that man appeared upon the earth, and the emergence of the universe from chaos was finished.”18 This interpretation is that which has been instilled into most of us in our childhood; but, “if we are to listen to many expositors of no mean authority, we must believe that what seems so clearly defined in Genesis—as if very great pains had been taken that there should be no possibility of mistake—is not the meaning of the text at all. The account is divided into periods that we may make just as long or as short as convenience requires. We are also to understand that it is consistent with the original text to believe that the most complex plants and animals may have been evolved [190]by natural processes, lasting for millions of years, out of structureless rudiments. A person who is not a Hebrew scholar can only stand aside and admire the marvellous flexibility of a language which admits of such diverse interpretations.”19

Furthermore, we are to understand that there is no disagreement between theology and science in the sequence of the six acts of creation. Here at least we are not asked to twist words round so that one may mean a million. We have a definite statement which science either supports or it does not. The reader who knows that the verdict of science is negative may ask: “What is the use of wasting my time over a Christian argument which has long since been exploded?” I crave his pardon and patience; but, however true it may be that Mr. Gladstone’s position was shown to be untenable, it is equally true that an enormous number of persons still persist in maintaining that there is a remarkable coincidence of the Pentateuchal story with the result of modern investigation, and that science supports them in this conclusion. The Very Rev. Henry Wace, D.D., Dean of Canterbury, in his address before the Christian Association of University College, London, on May 7th, 1903, reminded his hearers that a President of the British Association (Sir William Dawson) had stated that “it would not be easy even now to construct a statement of the development of the world in popular terms so concise and so accurate” as the first chapter of Genesis. And Dr. Wace asks: “From whence could have come this marvellous approximation, to say the least, to the facts which science has been [191]slowly revealing but from the Divine wisdom which alone was cognizant of them, and could alone make them known to mankind?”

A short time ago a lady very kindly sent me a little pamphlet, entitled Roger’s Reasons; or, The Bible and Science, written by the Rev. John Urquhart. In this there is a resurrection pie of the old, old arguments, dished up again in such a guise as to take in the unwary and ill-informed, who would have no suspicion that the food thus given them for their refection was not only stale, but had been condemned as unfit for mental consumption by the whole of the scientific faculty. The lady above mentioned considered the reasoning perfectly convincing, and so possibly would ninety-nine Christian ladies out of a hundred. Mr. Urquhart is now much in evidence as a Christian apologist, and his pamphlet is being distributed broadcast (81,000 have already been issued), so that it does seem worth while taking some notice of the attempts that are still being made to treat the Creation myth as a Divine revelation. That modern science does not support either the interpretation put upon the Bible story of the Creation by Mr. Urquhart or by Mr. Gladstone, or any interpretation which is compatible with the general sense of the narrative, can be ascertained by anyone who will read Professor Huxley’s essays, “The Interpreters of Genesis” and “Mr. Gladstone and Genesis.” A few quotations from these essays may enable the reader to form a slight idea of the decisive manner in which the assertion that modern science supports the Bible narrative is controverted by science herself.

Speaking of Mr. Gladstone’s contention that the statements in the first two verses of Genesis are [192]supported by the nebular hypothesis, Professor Huxley remarks: “But science knows nothing of any stage in which the universe could be said, in other than a metaphorical and popular sense, to be formless or empty; or in any respect less the seat of law and order than it is now. One might as well talk of a fresh-laid hen’s egg being ‘without form and void’ because the chick therein is potential and not actual, as apply such terms to the nebulous mass which contains a potential solar system.”

In a note at the end of the second essay, “Mr. Gladstone and Genesis,” there is an excellent exposition of the “Proper Sense of the ‘Mosaic’ Narrative of the Creation.” Among other points, Huxley, of course, notices how the stars are, as it were, thrown in—“He made the stars also.” These words have always struck me as making it peculiarly clear that the “Mosaic” narrative originated from man, and not from God. The unknown authors of the Hexateuchal compilation were almost as ignorant of the nature of the stars and of their unthinkable distance away from us as a camel-driver in Sind, who gravely informed a friend of mine that the stars were once quite close to the earth, until one fine day a certain woman (it is always the woman who causes the mischief) grabbed hold of one and used it for cleaning her child, whereupon the gods, much annoyed at such presumption on the part of mankind, moved them far enough off to be safe from further desecration.

That the order of Creation as given in the Bible cannot be maintained will be clearly seen if we take the particular case of the birds and creeping things. Science does not affirm that the birds were made before “everything that creepeth upon the earth.” [193]Mr. Gladstone tries to get over the difficulty by excluding reptiles, lizards, etc., from the category of creeping things. This will appear in the course of the following quotations from Professor Huxley’s essay on “Mr. Gladstone and Genesis”:—

“Mr. Gladstone’s views as to the proper method of dealing with grave and difficult scientific and religious problems had permitted him to base a solemn ‘plea for a revelation of truth from God’ upon an error as to a matter of fact, from which the intelligent perusal of a manual of palæontology would have saved him.... He does, indeed, make a great parade of authorities, and I have the greatest respect for those authorities whom Mr. Gladstone mentions. If he will get them to sign a joint memorial to the effect that our present palæontological evidence proves that birds appeared before the ‘land population’ of terrestrial reptiles, I shall think it my duty to reconsider my position—but not till then.... I have every respect for the singer of the Song of the Three Children (whoever he may have been); I desire to cast no shadow of doubt upon, but, on the contrary, marvel at, the exactness of Mr. Gladstone’s information as to the considerations which ‘affected the method of the Mosaic writer’; nor do I venture to doubt that the inconvenient intrusion of these contemptible reptiles—‘a family fallen from greatness,’ a miserable, decayed aristocracy reduced to mere ‘skulkers about the earth,’ in consequence, apparently, of difficulties about the occupation of land arising out of the earth-hunger of their former serfs, the mammals—into an apologetic argument, which would otherwise run quite smoothly, is in every way to be deprecated. Still, the wretched creatures stand there, importunately demanding notice; and, however different may [194]be the practice in that contentious atmosphere with which Mr. Gladstone expresses and laments his familiarity, in the atmosphere of science it really is of no avail whatever to shut one’s eyes to facts, or to try and bury them out of sight under a tumulus of rhetoric.... However reprehensible, and, indeed, contemptible, terrestrial reptiles may be, the only question which appears to me to be relevant to my argument is whether these creatures are or are not comprised under the denomination of ‘everything that creepeth upon the ground.’... Hence I commend the following extract from the eleventh chapter of Leviticus to Mr. Gladstone’s serious attention:—

The merest Sunday-school exegesis, therefore, suffices to prove that, when the Mosaic writer in Genesis 1. 24 speaks of ‘creeping things,’ he means to include lizards among them. This being so, it is agreed on all hands that terrestrial lizards and other reptiles allied to lizards occur in the Permian strata. It is further agreed that the Triassic strata were deposited after these. Moreover, it is well known that, even if certain footprints are to be taken as unquestionable evidence of the existence of birds, they are not known to occur in rocks earlier than the Trias, while indubitable remains of birds are not to be met with till much later. Hence it follows that natural science does not ‘affirm’ the statement that birds were made on the fifth day, and ‘everything that creepeth on the ground’ on the sixth, on which Mr. Gladstone rests his order; [195]for, as is shown by Leviticus, the ‘Mosaic writer’ includes lizards among his creeping things.”20

The crust of the earth is a book having for its pages strata that have, fortunately, been upturned for our perusal, and the story it tells must be true. The series of fossiliferous deposits which contain the remains of the animals which have lived on the earth in past ages of its history afford the evidence required concerning the order of appearance of the different species. As Professor Huxley says elsewhere21: “When we consider these simple facts, we see how absolutely futile are the attempts that have been made to draw a parallel between the story told by so much of the crust of the earth as is known to us and the story which Milton tells.” Still, the story which Milton tells is in accord with the story which the Bible tells to those who are not given to playing conjuring tricks with the plain meaning of words.

Finally, we must remember that “hundreds of thousands of animal species, as distinct as those which now compose our water, land, and air populations, have come into existence and died out again.” “If the species of animals have all been separately created, then it follows that hundreds of thousands of acts of creative energy have occurred, at intervals throughout the whole time recorded by the fossiliferous rocks; and, during the greater part of that time, the ‘creation’ of the members of the water, land, and air populations must have gone on contemporaneously.”22 [196]

The common-sense view of the Creation story, and one that is now widely accepted even by orthodox Christians, is that it is a myth. Many of us will, therefore, agree with Professor Huxley when he says: “I suppose it to be an hypothesis respecting the origin of the universe which some ancient thinker found himself able to reconcile with his knowledge, or what he thought was knowledge, of the nature of things, and therefore assumed to be true. As such, I hold it to be not merely an interesting, but a venerable, monument of a stage in the mental progress of mankind; and I find it difficult to suppose that any one who is acquainted with the cosmogonies of other nations—and especially with those of the Egyptians and the Babylonians, with whom the Israelites were in such frequent and intimate communication—should consider it to possess either more or less scientific importance than may be allotted to these.”23

It may not be inappropriate to conclude this section with Milton’s conception of the last act of creation, so charmingly simple and so strictly according to the Bible and what Christ Himself believed, and yet so completely untrue:—

—Paradise Lost, Book VII., 449–456, 505–510, 516–528.

The third and last of the Evolution stumbling-blocks is that connected with the dogma of the Fall and Atonement. Before considering this, it will be better, I think, to summarise as briefly and simply as possible some of the chief proofs of our animal origin. The well-informed can skip this section, which is intended for the benefit of that vast majority—the ill-informed. Space will not permit me to do much more than allude to the proofs; but anyone really desirous of convincing himself or herself of the truth of the doctrine, and at the same time wishing to avoid details that might possibly prove wearisome, will find it popularly treated in Huxley’s work on Man’s Place in Nature (Macmillan); in Dennis Hird’s An Easy Outline of Evolution (Watts & Co.; 2s. 6d.); in Edward Clodd’s The Story of Creation (Watts & Co.; 6d.); in S. Laing’s Modern Science and Modern Thought [198](Watts & Co.; 6d.); in Haeckel’s Riddle of the Universe (Watts & Co.; 6d.), though this can hardly, perhaps, be described as popular; and in Metchnikoff’s The Nature of Man (Heinemann, 1903; 12s. 6d.). The most complete work on the subject is Haeckel’s The Evolution of Man (Watts & Co., 1905; 42s.; abridged edition, 2s.). This is in two volumes, copiously illustrated, of which the first is entirely devoted to human embryology or ontogeny, a branch of science which furnishes the most overwhelming evidence.

The proofs may, roughly speaking, be grouped under three heads—the extraordinary affinity of bodily structure, the revelations of embryology, and the tale told by the useless rudimentary organs. We will commence with

Our next task is to study the arguments for theism. Under these may be ranged—the cosmological argument, which concludes that there must be one eternal, unconditioned, self-existent cause; the teleological1 argument, which concludes that nature’s first cause must be an intelligence; and the ethical argument—the proof from the moral order and conscience—which concludes that the supreme intelligence must be a moral, a beneficent being. To these may be added the argument from religious experience.

The hypothesis of modern science is that everything as it now exists in the universe is the result of an infinite series of causes and effects; everything that happens is the result of something else that happened previously, and so on backwards to all eternity. The agnostic scientist says that we know nothing about this Infinite Cause, and that the idea of a First Cause is absurd. The Theist affirms that there is an Eternal Infinite Being who is the First Cause. He says that it is absurd not to believe in a First Cause, that materialistic theories are so absurd compared with his that for this reason alone he would remain a Theist. He appears entirely to lose sight of the fact that by predicating a First Cause he only [222]removes the mystery a stage further back. He tells us nothing about the origin of the First Cause or the state of things that preceded it. The appearance of a First Cause upon the scene only increases the great mystery. Certainly it does not solve it. We are no forwarder. The creation of a mystery to explain a mystery is a very ancient custom, but it is a custom that has not met with the approbation of science.

The Theist apparently thinks, however, that he has science on his side. Thus, in the Baird Lectures of 1876, Dr. Flint stated that “the progress of science has not more convincingly and completely dispersed the once prevalent notion that the universe was created about 6,000 years ago than it has convincingly and completely established that everything of which our senses inform us has had a commencement in time.”6 This opinion is still proclaimed by the Church to be the opinion of science. But modern science does not point to a beginning of the scheme of things. The consensus of opinion is entirely the other way. So far as we know, the ultimate cause recedes for ever and ever beyond the time when there was no distinction of earth and sea and atmosphere, all being mingled together in nebulous matter. Where would the Theist fix the “commencement”? The gaps on which theology at one time relied are rapidly disappearing. The apparent chasm between the organic and inorganic, between the lifeless and that which lives, according to the latest conceptions of science, no longer exists. Man may even succeed in manufacturing life, so that yet another teleological argument may collapse. [223]

A candid and unbiassed examination of the so-called theistic proofs can but lead to the one conclusion: they are worthless. Even if the cosmological and teleological arguments were satisfactory, and even if “religious” experiences proved the existence of a spirit world, the ethical argument undoubtedly breaks down, carrying along with it all that fragile structure of which the theist’s theories are composed. Yes, the problem of evil is insoluble. “We have not,” says John Stuart Mill,52 “to attempt the impossible problem of reconciling infinite benevolence and justice with infinite power in the Creator of such a world as this. To attempt to do so not only involves absolute contradiction in an intellectual point of view, but exhibits to excess the revolting spectacle of a Jesuitical defence of moral enormities.” The latest defence by an approved apologist of the Church of England will be found in [265]chap. xiv. of Pro Fide. It has been conducted with conspicuous candour, and such harsh terms as “Jesuitical” and “revolting” are no longer applicable. Whether, however, this is likely to prove any more successful than previous attempts, and to serve as an antidote to scepticism, may be seen by a glance at the following summary of the line of argument. The author relies, to begin with, upon the theological assumption that moral evil arises from the abuse of God’s gift to man of a free will. He also argues that the transmission of a tendency to sin is not unjust, because a remedy for it has been provided. As for physical evil, this, he maintains, subserves important moral purposes in the case of man, and in the case of animals it is more than compensated for by physical good. In the end, however, he is forced, as we have seen, to fall back upon the hypothesis of a personal devil. In other words, he presents us with those sophistical arguments of theistic apologists which we have been investigating, and then, finding, as a perfectly honest mind must find, that these are inadequate, he has, after all, to rely upon those ancient theological dogmas which owe their origin to the insolubility of the problem. Let those accept his special pleading who can. There are many who read an apologetic work with minds already made up to be persuaded by it, and where there is this bias there cannot be straight thinking. For those who keep an open mind the conclusion is inevitable: apart from the revelation which has been called in question there is no proof, there never can be any proof, of the existence of the God of the Christian. If there be a First Cause, if there be a Supreme Intelligence, if there be a Deity at all, we know nothing of [266]His nature and nothing of His intentions with regard to us.

Finally we have to consider some arguments that have often quite as much weight with the believer as Bible apologetics or Theistic proofs. They are: (1) The power of Christianity for good; (2) the marvellous spread of Christianity; (3) the witness of the Christian martyrs; and (4) the universality of the religious instinct. The first of these—the power of Christianity for good—opens up a large question, and I have thought it advisable, therefore, to select for special investigation two popular beliefs springing from this source—namely, the belief that woman owes her present position to Christianity, and the belief that the overthrow of Christianity would endanger society and the nation. The point now under consideration is not whether Christianity ought to have been, but whether it has been, a power for good. Although the apologist, when hard pressed as to this or that evidence of failure, attributes it to the fault of man, he nevertheless continues stoutly to maintain that Christianity has indeed worked wonders for mankind. This we should certainly expect of it, if it be a true belief, and it is a claim therefore which cannot be too closely investigated. [274]

It would be a comparatively easy, though lengthy, task to make out an exceedingly strong case against Christianity by enlarging upon the inhumanity and immorality of the Dark Ages, and comparing this with the far more humane and moral conduct of men in pre-Christian civilisations. One could point to the rock-graven edicts of King Asoka (263–226 B.C.), and show that in the matter of discountenancing slavery, of humanity to prisoners, of denouncing war, of founding hospitals, of abolishing blood sacrifices, of inculcating religious toleration, and of teaching purity of life, all that is now so complacently claimed for Christianity was anticipated. Or again, one might dwell on the dark side of Christendom, even in this year of grace 1907, and draw some very odious comparisons, especially as we have so recently been presented with the object-lesson of a heathen race which excels many, and equals any, of the Christian races in nearly all those virtues we prize and call Christian. But I have no intention of embarking upon such a wide sea of controversy.

One controversial subject, however, I feel bound to notice, because the disputed point is at the root of the whole matter. We are so accustomed to hear every humane or unselfish deed, and every moral act, described as Christian that “good” and “Christian” have almost become synonymous terms. It never occurs to us to ask, or we never give a second thought to the question, how much the humane principles now accepted among civilised nations may be due to education, experience, and evolution, and how much to Christian influence. The Rationalist attributes the improvement chiefly to the former, and, in any case, to the working of natural forces; the Christian chiefly [275]to the latter, and, in any case, to the working of supernatural forces.

All that is beneficial in civilisation, both on its material and on what is called its spiritual side, is placed by the Christian to the credit of Christianity, and the hand of God is traced with becoming reverence in every discovery which ameliorates our lot. This, although the promoters and discoverers are often non-Christians, and although it is well known that it is the Church that has chiefly delayed the advance of science. Whatever may be the case now, the education of the masses never concerned her in olden times. Rather her concern was then that the people should not be educated, much as it is in Russia at the present time. Such education as she did encourage was of the type imparted in the Mohammedan University at Cairo to-day—the three R’s and the Koran—and for similar reasons. As late as 1846 Cobden writes to a friend on the subject of national education: “I took the repeal of the Corn Laws as light amusement compared with the difficult task of inducing the priests of all denominations to agree to suffer the people to be educated.” Again, Lord Macaulay, speaking of the Roman Catholic Church, in the first chapter of his History of England, says that “during the last three centuries to stunt the growth of the human mind has been her chief object. Throughout Christendom, whatever advance has been made in knowledge, in freedom, in wealth, and in the arts of life, has been made in spite of her, and has everywhere been in inverse proportion to her power. The loveliest and most fertile provinces of Europe have, under her rule, been sunk in poverty, in political servitude, and in intellectual torpor.” [276]

So long as organisms are adapted to their environment, neither progressive nor retrogressive development will occur. Because, after the Dark Ages, Europe progressed while Asia stagnated and Africa retrogressed, is modern civilisation to be placed to the credit of the Christian religion? As rationally might any one of the ancient civilisations be credited to the popular superstition of the country then in the van of progress. To such absurd lengths are these pretensions carried that we find persons ignorant enough and fanatical enough to attribute the present predominance of Christian nations to their religion. For a reply to such I cannot better that given by a learned Buddhist monk to a missionary who had told him that nations of the West had become powerful because of their Christianity. “The fact is,” retorted the monk, “that nations have become powerful in the degree to which they have rejected the precepts of Christianity, in the extent to which they have substituted for the Christian maxim of ‘Love thy neighbour as thyself’ that other maxim which shoots 300 bullets a minute.”

Returning to the only contention really worth considering, let us assume that there has been moral progress in Christendom, and let us assume also that this has nothing to do with the advance of Humanitarianism in the present, or with pre-Christian (Buddhist, for instance) teaching in the past. Are we to conclude that this is a proof of the divine origin of Christianity? I must confess I fail to see how any improvement which there may be in the matter of coarse vice among the proletariat, of dishonesty among the commercial classes, of corruptness among the professional, and of sensuality among the leisured classes, can be any proof that Jesus, one of the [277]world’s reformers, was God Incarnate. Christian teaching embodies precepts of the greatest ethical value, borrowed, as we now know, from the doctrines of ancient moralists and religious teachers. Would it not indeed be strange if this teaching had done no good whatever—if the leaven had had no elevating influences at all, whereas the teachings of Confucius and Buddha have produced those admirable results which even Christians are at last prepared to admit? Dr. Warschauer explains in Anti-Nunquam, p. 72, that Agnostics are good men, “because, willingly or unwillingly, they have taken in Christian ideas through every pore.” How, then, does he explain the virtues of the Japanese?

Let us now leave generalisation, and investigate in some detail an important Christian argument which has the contention of Christianity’s power for good as its source. It forms a striking illustration of the way fallacies may arise from a hard-and-fast adhesion to convictions that are justified rather by the heart than by history.

The majority of women still remain true believers. There appear to be numerous reasons, psychological and educational, for their attitude. Woman is more imaginative, more emotional, and more sensitive to external suggestion than man. As to her education, men, even those who have no religious belief whatever, prefer to keep her in ignorance of their views, partly under a vague notion that unbelief would undermine her virtue and lessen her amiability, and partly because [278]they deem her religious influence an essential element in the upbringing of their children. In addition to all this, woman is taught by the Church that Christianity is her best friend. Prominent prelates of the Church proclaim that “the Gospel has given woman the position she holds to-day.”2 Nothing could very well be more contrary to fact. One can only suppose that these expounders of the truth are speaking according to the dictates of their hearts, and without having really studied the question, or else that they believe their cause is served by deliberately closing their eyes to inconvenient facts. The question is one of supreme importance, as it is chiefly women who are now the mainstay of the Faith.

People with little or no knowledge of those portions of history that specially bear upon the question are easily deceived. The average woman’s ideas concerning the pre-Christian civilisations are decidedly vague. Her ideas may also be further confused by lurid accounts from the pulpit of the licentiousness prevalent among the upper classes during the earlier and also the last years of the Roman Empire; while nothing is told her about the unrestrained licence of the aristocracy during the Middle Ages, and the degraded condition of the masses during, say, the eighteenth century, “when,” says Sir Walter Besant, “for drunkenness, brutality, and ignorance, the Englishman of the baser kind reached the lowest depth ever reached by civilised man.” Clerics who unconsciously mislead their congregations with this argument cannot be aware of those hard facts of history which render it untenable. For their benefit, [279]and for the benefit of their dupes, let us glance at a few of these facts.

The status of women among the “barbarians” is vouched for by the Romans, their enemies, and therefore unexceptionable witnesses. Nothing impressed the Romans more than the equality of the sexes among the northern nations, the man’s reverence for womanhood, the woman’s sympathy with manhood, and the high code of morality that was the natural outcome of this well-balanced state of society.

At a time when the men of the “Chosen People” were insulting and unjust to their women, heathen women enjoyed a position which their Christian, not to mention their Mohammedan, descendants might well envy. “Polygamy only began to disappear among the Jews in the fifth century B.C., and so curious was the influence of the Old Testament on the early Christian Church that several of the Fathers could not bring themselves to condemn it, and it was not officially suppressed by the Church until A.D. 1060. Luther and the Reformers allowed it even later. Yet polygamy was one of the surest signs of a contempt of woman, and it had been rejected by Greeks, Romans, and barbarians long before the Hebrews began to perceive its enormity.”3

“The part women played in old Japan,” writes the founder of the first university for women in Japan,4 “was very remarkable, especially before the arrival of Buddhism and Confucianism. Men and women were almost equal in their social position. There was then [280]no shadow of the barbarous idea that men were everything and women nothing. Women’s power even in politics was great, and history tells us that there were nine women who ascended the throne in olden times. Women in general were not inferior to men physically, mentally, or morally. They were noted for their bravery, and distinguished themselves on the field of battle. In the literary world they were not less noted for their brilliant productions. Their moral conduct was most blameless, and commanded universal respect. Their natural temperament was cheerful and optimistic, and charmed the sterner sex. Such being the attainments and characteristics of women in olden times, we can fairly believe that they were as well educated as men were, although there were not existing any institutions of instruction for women. This was the springtime of Japanese womanhood, when it blossomed undisturbed, and exerted a strong and beneficial influence on the life of old Japan. The introduction of Buddhism and Confucianism, however, began to create great changes in the position of women. And yet so powerful were women in society when these two religions came to Japan that their rapid spread in our country was due to the earnest endeavours of women.” Speaking of the feudal age, he remarks: “The social environment of the age and the prevalence of Buddhism and Confucianism worked hand in hand to bring about the subjection of women.” The analogy between the experiences of the Japanese lady and her European sister is a striking one. (There is an analogy, too, between the conduct of the Buddhist priests and that of the Roman Catholic priests in the Middle Ages, or even in Southern Italy to-day. “The sins of the present generation of [281]priests,” said Count Okuma in the course of an interview, “are many, and the hells about which they preach are prepared for the like of them.”5 “The majority of the priests are utterly degenerate and hopelessly ignorant.”6)

Look on these pictures, one of 2000 B.C. and the other of A.D. 1850:—

Picture I.—Two thousand years before the Christian era “woman was more free and more honoured in Egypt than she is in any country of the world to-day. She was the mistress of the house.7... She inherited equally with her brothers, and had full control of her property. She could go where she liked, or speak with whom she liked. She was ‘juridically the equal of man,’ says M. Paturet, ‘having the same rights and being treated in the same fashion’; and the same authority observes that it was not as mother, but as woman, as a being equal in dignity, that she was thus honoured. There was polygamy in theory, but the first wife was generally able to exact conditions in her marriage contract which effectually prevented it. The inscriptions show, says Maspéro, that she remained to the end of her life ‘the beloved of her husband and the mistress of the house.’”8

Picture II.—In enlightened Boston, about 1850 (under the English Common Law), woman could not hold any property, either inherited or earned. A woman, either married or unmarried, could hold no office [282]of trust or power. She was not recognised as a citizen. The status of a married woman was little better than that of a domestic servant. By the English Common Law her husband was her lord and master. He had the sole custody of her person, and of her children while minors. He could punish her “with a stick no thicker than his thumb,” and she could not complain against him. He was the owner of all her real estate and of her earnings. She had no personal rights, and could hardly call her soul her own. Her husband could steal her children, rob her of her clothing, neglect to support the family: she had no legal redress.9

Not until near the middle of the nineteenth century did that movement commence which has radically improved, and will continue to improve, the position of women. And who took the chief, and, in the initial stage, the only, part in this reform movement? Freethinkers. Who were silent when they were not active opponents? The clergy. “It was just those who most radically abandoned Christianity—Owen, Holyoake, and Mill—that were the most logical and ungrudging in their plea for woman. It was the Mary Wollstonecrafts, Harriet Martineaus, Frances Wrights, George Eliots, Helen Taylors, and Annie Besants that distinguished themselves by fearlessness and unselfishness... The clergy never discovered any injustice to woman; and only one in a thousand could see it when it was pointed out.... All honour to the memory of those clergymen who, like Kingsley and Farrar, protested against the injustice to the full extent of their idea of [283]womanhood.... On the Continent there has been the same story of general clerical opposition and general heterodox support.”10 “Mr. Pinchwife,”11 too, has undoubtedly had a hand in the subjection of woman; but we are investigating the grounds for the contention that Christianity has laid on woman a burden of gratitude, and that, if Christianity were overthrown, women would sink into unknown depths of degradation. Do the above-stated facts bear out that contention?

The question arises: Why has Christianity stood in the way of woman’s cause? The answer is simple enough: Christianity, in adopting the Old Testament, adopted with it the Hebrew conception of woman. Her inferiority to man was established by her origin from his rib and the leading part she took in his fall. The Vicar of Crantock tabulates12 the reasons why a Christian woman should cover her head in church, as follows:—

[284]

The Jews’ idea of a woman was sanctioned by no less an authority than Jehovah; nor did the Christ of the Gospels give one word of clear guidance on this or any other social problem, or enter one word of explicit protest against the injustice of the Judaic treatment of women. Again, the teaching of St. Paul was based on the Old Testament, and the teaching of the Fathers was based on the Old Testament and St. Paul. A few quotations from the sayings of some of these Fathers, whose contempt of marriage became one of the great errors of the Church, may prove instructive:—

—St. Gregory of Nazianzum.

If women only knew of these sayings, would they approve of the “appeal to the first six centuries”?

Bad as the position of woman was under the [285]influence of the early Church teaching, it was, in many respects, still worse during the Middle Ages. “Life-long seclusion in the inner apartments of the house of a man she has not chosen, or internment in a nunnery—that is, either degraded or unnatural—is the choice (within limits) of the daughter of the wealthy. Life-long drudgery, with few and coarse pleasures, with a long vista of sticks and whips, and scold’s bridles, and ducking stools—with, perhaps, the brutal ‘ordeal’ on the slightest suspicion, or the ghastly death of the witch, is the prospect of the daughter of the poor.”13 Even the Reformation altered more than it improved the condition of woman. How could it be otherwise when the Reformers were nothing if not Bibliolaters?

Of the movement for the betterment of woman’s position that eventually took place, not by the aid, but in spite, of the Church, I have already spoken. All the evidence we possess regarding the history of Heathendom and Christendom conclusively shows that Christianity has done much to lower, and but little to elevate, the position of women. Should I have succeeded in arousing the interest of my gentle readers, or should they wish to verify my statements, I implore them to read well-known works of competent authorities on this subject. The astounding but apparently prevalent idea, that woman is only secured by Christianity from the brutal assaults of man, will appear in the next argument we are about to consider. [286]

I have elsewhere commented on the opinion prevalent in England (and in some other, but not all other, Christian countries) that, to quote Canon Henson, “the real elements of the Christian Faith are those that have made European nations the most powerful in the world,”14 and that the overthrow of Christianity would endanger the nation. Many go still farther, and prophesy absolute chaos. People who have been imbued with the Church’s teaching, and who have spent their lives in Christian surroundings, are naturally convinced that belief and morality are indissoluble partners—that Christianity is a power for good in this respect above all others. Therefore, when Professor Flint says, “It [the Christian Faith] could not be displaced without shaking society from top to bottom,”15 he expresses a very popular opinion among believers and semi-believers. Even among Agnostics there are many who, while recognising the fallacy so far as they themselves are concerned, still seem to consider that society would be insufficiently protected from criminals by its own instinct of self-preservation, and that, to maintain order among the masses, the hand of the law must, for the present, be strengthened by appeals to a supernatural sanction of conduct. Both Herbert Spencer and Matthew Arnold, for example, thought the world at large stood in peril of a moral collapse, while, as the latter puts it, “the old (theologically-derived) sanction of conduct is [287]out of date, and the new is not yet born.” “Few things can happen more disastrous,” writes Herbert Spencer, “than the decay and death of a regulative system no longer fit, before another and fitter regulative system has grown up to replace it” (see Preface, dated July, 1879, to The Data of Ethics). It is for reasons such as these that so many Agnostics still lend their moral support to the Churches; for men rightly uphold what they deem essential to the common weal, whether it be Christ-worship in England or ancestor-worship in Japan.

This deeply-rooted conviction regarding belief and conduct has been partially considered in the first section of this chapter, and, the subject being one of the greatest importance, I am also devoting to its consideration a portion of the concluding chapter of this book. I shall confine myself here to the warning given to us by the Church and the pious laity—that we must expect nothing less than chaos should the Resurrection, and along with it, of course, the whole fabric of Christianity, be ultimately disproved.

This view has been illustrated in Mr. Guy Thorne’s book, When it was Dark. The book may be seen on every bookstall, has had an extraordinary sale,16 and has been much appreciated by many pious-minded persons (especially by those of the High Church persuasion, the book being written by a partisan of that cult). The anti-Christian propagandist is here represented as knowing that Christ is God; but, for some unexplained and exceedingly mysterious reason, utilising a huge fortune and a powerful intellect in unscrupulous endeavours to spread disbelief. He is a [288]deceiver of mankind, a genuine Satan in human shape. He leads the life of an ascetic, so the usual grounds given for disbelief are removed. With the assistance of another man (a real villain, this time, of the lowest type), one of the greatest savants of the day, a gigantic fraud is perpetrated, and the Resurrection thereby definitely disproved. Immediately an epidemic of crime breaks out among quondam Christians, which nothing can quell. The restraints of order are paralysed, and the criminal element is rampant. The violence and viciousness of men were, please to note, specially directed against the weaker sex, who had to keep at home and bar the door. Not only Agnostics, but any who happened to differ in their views from this champion of Christianity, come in for a share of Mr. Thorne’s invective. The wonder is how an author of his ability could be capable of penning such an effusion; and that it can be read and appreciated, as it undoubtedly has been by many excellent persons of his way of thinking, only shows how easily bias may cloud the intellect. It requires an effort, too, to understand how this book can appeal to one of the chief dignitaries of the Church; but there, conspicuously printed on the cover, we are treated to an extract from his sermon in praise of the book.

I submit that there is not a Rationalist in the world, however militant, who would descend to forgery to promote his cause. He would not hold the pious opinion that the end justifies the means. On the contrary, the curtain has but now fallen upon a scene where a Christian Church ranged herself on the side of forgers while freethinkers like Zola and Clémenceau fought the battle of truth.

According to Mr. Guy Thorne and the admirers of [289]his book, the Christian races are innately far worse than Jews, Turks, infidels, and heretics—far worse, indeed, than savages and animals—for they are only held in check from the commission of the vilest excesses by their belief in the Resurrection. Chaos and crime are rife in certain cities in Russia and Poland to-day. What is the cause? Unbelief? Is it not rather the result of the cruel laws and despicable methods of a Christian government, aided by Christian butchers, calling themselves soldiers, and by a Christian hooligan element such as it would be hard to find outside a Christian city? This chaos occurs, mind you, under a powerful Christian theocratic government; and the head of the Holy Synod, Pobiedonostseff, was, before his removal, one of the prime movers. The terrible atrocities of which the unfortunate Jews have been the victims were undoubtedly connived at by the authorities, and inhuman crimes have been perpetrated by Christians that would be impossible in humane Japan. The policy of keeping the masses steeped in the grossest superstitions of the orthodox Church is now bearing fruit, adding to the chaos and bloodshed and hindering the work of reform. It is belief, not unbelief, that has played a leading part in creating this chaos, and in stirring up man’s cruellest passions.

As to the safety of women (in the event of the Resurrection being discredited), where in civilised Christendom, may I ask, could a lady be left for days and nights alone in a tent or open house? She can be, in the Indian jungle or in the Australian bush. For such protection as may there be necessary (and the open house testifies how little it is required) she relies upon her heathen servants. Almost the only danger in [290]India is from religious fanatics, and in Australia from Christian criminals. In what Christian country would it be safe to have paper windows and walls, as in Japan? My wife and I slept in strange, out-of-the-way native hotels in Japan in perfect security, though a would-be criminal had only to tear through a thin piece of paper! Belief in the Resurrection is rapidly decaying in France to-day. Are cases of assault on women any the more prevalent on that account? If belief in the Resurrection is so essential, how comes it that we have allied ourselves to a heathen nation, and made friends with another that is fast giving up this belief? How comes it that in our own Government two of the most responsible posts are now occupied by declared Agnostics?

“What, then,” asks the Rev. Prebendary W. A. Whitworth,17 “was the original gospel of power which overran the world with such astonishing success?” The spread of Christianity is thought by nearly all good Christians to have been marvellous. Was it? That is the question we have next to consider. In the first place, let us see what we are told on this point by recognised theologians. In his book, The Bible in the Church, we are reminded by the learned Dr. Westcott, the late Bishop of Durham, that the dispersion of the Jews exercised a great influence upon the spread of Christianity. “The pagans got the idea of monotheism, while the Jews themselves dropped the idea of a ‘kingdom’ and substituted a ‘faith.’” He also [291]reminds us of the broad unity of the Roman Empire, and of the dispersion of the Jews being co-extensive with its limits, and concludes that “during the lifetime of St. Paul every condition was realised for proclaiming the Gospel to the world.” “Without such preparation,” he says, “the spread of Christianity would be historically inconceivable, and it is a remarkable example of Divine Providence.” Here, then, we have an admission of purely natural causes, and, although the believer may be able to look upon them with reverence, as Providential, he can hardly claim them to be at the same time a witness to the power of the Gospel. Also, we shall see that there were many other natural causes at work, and that among them were some which the pious would be the last to connect with a Divine Providence.

Historians find that the rapidity of the spread has been much exaggerated, and that it was not until the Emperor Constantine convened the Council of Nicæa in A.D. 325 that the spread commenced to emerge from insignificance. Even then the adhesion to the new Faith was for a long period of a purely nominal character, the unwilling converts remaining, to all intents, pagans after they were baptised. The spread of Christianity was for a long time confined to cosmopolitan trading towns only, the villagers remaining pagans—hence the name. (Mutatis mutandis, it is the villagers who are now the last to be touched by the spread of “paganism.”) What were the “Providential” methods of conversion? The prevailing ignorance and superstition were taken advantage of by the propagators of the Gospel and frauds freely perpetrated, while “edicts of toleration removed the temporal disadvantages which had [292]hitherto retarded the progress of Christianity.”18 After the Emperor Constantine had been converted, “the cities which signalised a forward zeal, by the voluntary destruction of their temples, were distinguished by municipal privileges, and rewarded with popular donations.”19 When these measures failed, Church and State had recourse to persecution, quite as cruel as, and on a scale that far exceeded, the persecution of the early Christians by the heathen. For instance, the Emperor Theodosius, at the suggestion of the ecclesiastics who governed his conscience, promulgated, in the space of fifteen years (A.D. 380–394), “at least fifteen severe edicts against the heretics, more especially against those who rejected the doctrine of the Trinity.”20 Buddhism, on the contrary, unlike Christianity and Mohammedanism, was promulgated without persecution or religious wars, and spread far more rapidly than Christianity. In his apologetic work, Anti-Theistic Theories, Dr. Flint refers to Buddhism thus: “The very marvellous system of thought called Buddhism, which originated in India about 500 years B.C., has spread over a greater area of the earth and gained more adherents than even Christianity, and by peaceful means—by the power of persuasion—not by the force of arms, not by persecution.”

Why did the Emperor Constantine embrace Christianity? Was it not mainly because he believed that it had a power to wipe away his own heinous crimes?21 Even his old age “was disgraced by the opposite, [293]yet reconcilable, vices of rapaciousness and prodigality.”22 Although he acknowledged the Faith, he put off his baptism till he was on his death-bed, in order that he might continue to lead a wicked life as long as possible.23 As an instrument for spreading God’s word he is even worse than that royal adulterer and murderer whom we are asked to look upon as a prototype of Christ and His prime ancestor.

On all these matters of history the learned Bishop Westcott is silent, although, as examples of Divine Providence, they would appear sufficiently remarkable. Lest Gibbon’s testimony be deemed untrustworthy on account of his anti-Christian bias, the following extract from a prize essay in Christian apologetics may be noted. Not only does it bear out some of the historian’s statements concerning the causes of the spread of Christianity, but it discloses the significant fact that the clergy increased their power and influence by working upon the emotions of wealthy women, and that £.s.d. and its female contributors were then, as now, a sine qua non.24—“Nine years after the conversion of Constantine to the Christian faith he promulgated that great edict which, more than any other enactment, may be said to have lain at the foundation [294]of clerical power during the ensuing centuries, and relieved the Christian Church from that restriction under which, in common with the Jews, they had so long laboured—the incapacity of profiting by the testamentary liberality of their wealthy proselytes. To convince us of the abundance in which the stream of wealth flowed into the newly opened channel, and of the influence obtained by the clergy, in those days as in the present, over the piety and pliability of the weaker sex, more especially at Rome, we possess not only the testimony of a Pagan historian,25 but the less suspicious evidence of an edict published by the Emperor Valentinian26 fifty years after that of Constantine, addressed to Damasus, Bishop of that city, and imposing a limit to the extravagant donations of females. The clergy, moreover, might look for an increase of worldly substance not only from the prosperity of their friends, but from the downfall of their enemies; for the Theodosian code contains a series of stringent enactments by the Emperor Honorius,27 in terms of which not only the deserted temples of Paganism, but even the meeting-houses and possessions of Donatists, Manichæan, and other heretical corporations, were made over to the Catholic Church.”28

There was yet another, and possibly the chief, cause for the ultimate spread of Christianity. In the [295]chapter on comparative mythology I have described and commented upon the various rationalistic theories concerning the origins of Christian beliefs and ceremonies. As a matter of fact, Mithraism spread just as much, or more, until Christianity obtained the necessary political power to suppress it. Not only from these anti-Christian theories, but also from the admissions of apologists concerning them, it appears that Christianity gained ground, not so much because there was something new either in its dogma or in its promise, but rather because these were so closely paralleled in many pagan cults. Let us take, for example, the spread of Christianity in Egypt. “The Egyptians who embraced Christianity found that the moral system of the old cult and that of the new religion were so similar, and the promises of resurrection and immortality in each so alike, that they transferred their allegiance from Osiris to Jesus of Nazareth without difficulty. Moreover, Isis and the child Horus were straightway identified with Mary the Virgin and her Son.”29 “The knowledge of the ancient Egyptian religion which we now possess fully justifies the assertion that the rapid growth and progress of Christianity in Egypt were due mainly to the fact that the new religion, which was preached there by St. Mark and his immediate followers, in all its essentials so closely resembled that which was the outcome of Osiris, Isis, and Horus that popular opposition was entirely disarmed.”30 We have, then, here one of the main factors in the growth of Christianity. I cannot find that Bishop Westcott recognises this as a part of the preparation in which the [296]hand of God can be traced; but advanced apologists very largely do so now, and hence the precious theory of progressive revelation.

We may now pass on to another very popular argument.

My allusions to religious persecutions may remind some of my readers of the experiences of the early Christians, and of the witness to the truth of Christianity furnished by the “noble army of martyrs”; and they may say: “Admitting that there be nothing extraordinary in the mere fact of Christianity’s spread, you must allow that its power over men’s minds is little, if at all, short of miraculous. Men could not have given their lives for a falsehood.” This argument will not bear the slightest scrutiny. “Steadfastness under persecution says much for the sincerity, and still more for the tenacity, of the believer, but very little for the objective truth of that which he believes.”31 Supposing the noble army were a historical fact, the argument based upon it would be adequately met by pointing to the last Ghazi who ran amok in the hope of a speedy delivery from a dirty and ugly spouse on earth, and of reaping the reward of a clean and lovely houri in heaven.

But the noble army is not altogether a historical fact. The truth is that martyr-making became an ecclesiastical industry. The historian Gibbon estimates that at most about two thousand Christians fell in the Diocletian persecution—which was the only general persecution—and this estimate is now [297]commonly accepted. “Since,” says Gibbon, “it cannot be doubted that the Christians were more numerous, and their enemies more exasperated, in the time of Diocletian than they had ever been in any former persecution, this probable and moderate computation may teach us to estimate the number of primitive saints and martyrs who sacrificed their lives for the important purpose of introducing Christianity into the world.”32 Compare these figures with the numbers who have suffered death in modern times for the sake of introducing a non-Christian faith. The Bab Abbas Effendi suffered martyrdom for his zeal in 1850, and between that date and now the most conservative opinion on the Babi martyrdoms puts them at ten thousand. (N.B.—No hopes of wealth and honours, no imperial edicts, have assisted the really remarkable spread of Babism.) As a matter of fact, a considerable portion of the history of man is a history of his martyrdom. “Our own prosperity is founded on the agonies of the past.”33 If religious ladies could spare the time (from the absorbing occupation of reading the very latest works of fiction or the lives of the “grandes amoureuses”) to read Winwood Reade’s Martyrdom of Man, a book none the less interesting because it treats of historical facts, they would begin to realise that martyrs are not a Christian monopoly. [298]

The hostile evidence appears to be overwhelming. Christianity cannot be true. Provided that we see things as they really are, and not as we wish them to be, we cannot but come to this conclusion. Let me recall to the reader’s mind the more salient points.

Chapter I.: The Situation.—All over Christendom a great conflict has commenced between naturalists and supernaturalists. The real attitude of the laity, and especially of the cultured portion of it, is far more sceptical than the clergy imagine, or, at any rate, are prepared to admit. They do not realise that agnostics and semi-believers have, not deliberately perhaps, but none the less really, joined in a conspiracy of silence, either on account of their conviction of the need for Christianity as a restraint during the prevalence of ignorance, or on account of their regard for public and private opinion and vested interests, or last but not least, on account of sheer indifference. To put it frankly, the Churches have for their chief ally nowadays the trinity of ignorance, insincerity, and indifference. Not only is this alliance one which they ought to be the first to repudiate, but it cannot be depended upon in the near future. Though a [318]mind be built, as it were, in water-tight compartments, a flood of truth that is strong enough will burst them open.

Christianity and science are not reconciled. The character of the present wave of scepticism differs from that of all others in the history of Christianity or of mankind, in that it has the support of modern knowledge. It has all the appearance of a wave that will increase in strength, and finally destroy all the present faiths of the world. Plenty of “cheap” agnosticism, of a priori “infidelity,” is still to be met with, and of this, as Professor Huxley once remarked, a man of the calibre of Butler, of the “Analogy,” can easily make short work; but the scepticism of the modern scientist is of another kind. It arises from a mastery of the laws of Nature. The Christian apologies to meet this scepticism are unsatisfactory to the last degree. Often they are based on premises the truth of which is open to the gravest doubt, or they betray ignorance of established facts. They are also conflicting, so that the arguments of the advanced and the arguments of the conservative are mutually destructive, the latter frequently bearing out the contentions of the rationalist regarding the former. For these reasons they are totally unconvincing. Meanwhile the main issue of the conflict is confused and delayed by various side issues, which have nothing really to do with the question of Christianity’s truth. There is further delay through the currency of a number of popular fallacies.

Chapter II.: Miracles.—Belief in miracles is necessary if Christianity be true. The various attempts to explain miracles are evasions, not solutions of a difficulty, and are as specious as they are conflicting. [319]Few thinkers could bring themselves to agree with Canon Mason that miracles are no longer needed because “the Holy Spirit, with His eternal freshness of life, does not cramp Himself by obsolete and antiquated methods of action.”1 The fundamental miracles are not historical facts. The evidence for all miracles is totally inadequate. No miracle has ever occurred.

Chapter III.: Modern Bible Criticism.—All non-Christian and some Christian theologians accept the conclusions of the Higher Criticism in their entirety, while many learned divines accept much that is destructive of beliefs that have been held for nearly two millenniums. The critics show that the Bible is not historically true, and explain that “we must turn from external details to the great spiritual truths which underlie them.” As observed by the Dean of Canterbury,2 “they only say that they are not historical; what they mean is that they are not true.” The strictly orthodox and the rationalist are at one in agreeing that historic truth is essential to Christianity; that Christianity claims to be built not on ideas, but on facts; and that the far-fetched explanations of the advanced school cannot be accepted. The rationalist, however, finds himself forced to admit the validity of the destructive criticisms, and also finds further grounds for unbelief in the silence of historians, in the manner in which the alleged revelation was transmitted, and in those sober facts which so completely impugn the divinity of Jesus. [320]

Chapter IV.: Comparative Mythology.—The similarity of beliefs, customs, and teachings in ancient religions with those in the Christian religion are as numerous as they are remarkable. These parallels deprive Christianity of any claim to originality, and furnish an explanation of its origin which completely destroys our belief in its truth. The theory of a progressive revelation is the outcome of dire necessity, for the survival of Christianity depends upon its acceptance. This theory is for many and cogent reasons quite untenable. It is not, and cannot be, accepted by the strictly orthodox. The latter endeavour, therefore, to disprove the closeness of the parallels, or, failing this, to prove that they are Christian accretions. Enlightened divines, on the other hand, acknowledge the parallels, and rely upon the theory of progressive revelation to explain them.

Chapter V.: Evolution.—For the benefit of those who may be ill-informed on the subject, the theory of evolution is explained, and convincing proofs of our animal origin are submitted. The theory is generally accepted by the cultured, though much ignorance and prejudice concerning it still prevail. The evolutionary processes are completely at variance with the Bible and with our ideas of God. The Churches as a body do not accept evolution willingly, and are chary in acknowledging its truth in their public utterances. Many of their most distinguished members are, however, evolutionists, and these profess that evolution is helpful to belief. Their arguments are singularly unconvincing. The doctrine of the Fall is untenable.

Chapter VI.: Theistic Proofs.—Many, honestly deeming themselves to be Christians, are in reality [321]either deists or non-Christian theists. The recognised arguments for Theism are the evidences of a First Cause, of design and directivity, and of benevolence. Not one of these is accepted by more than a very small minority of scientific men. The evidence of design and directivity is more apparent than real, while, with regard to benevolence, it would be easier to demonstrate the very reverse. The evidence from religious experience is another argument, which has recently been submitted to the cultured, as a final proof of the existence of the spiritual world. This argument is shown not only to be full of absurdities, but indirectly to furnish natural explanations for much that has hitherto puzzled mankind, and led to belief in the supernatural.

Chapter VII.: Popular Arguments.—Finally, there are certain popular arguments which help to confirm the believer, and to determine the friendly attitude of the average unbeliever. Broadly speaking, they are all comprised under two main assertions—Christianity’s power for good, and the universality of the religious instinct. So long as we confine ourselves to a shallow and biassed examination, the flaws in these assumptions will pass unnoticed; but when we submit them to a closer examination, with open minds, we find that they cannot be substantiated by the facts of either ancient or modern history.

I may be permitted to add that I attach the greatest importance to the object-lesson now presented to us by Russia and Japan. Not only have we here an excellent illustration of the fallacies concerning the power of Christianity and the connection between conduct and belief, but this illustration has been [322]given to the whole world. Among the millions who have watched events, thousands upon thousands must have some inkling of the place that religion holds in the minds of these two peoples, and, therefore, must have found much that will cause them to modify their opinions concerning these popular arguments. I cannot imagine any other conjunction of circumstances which could have resulted in such a broadcast sowing of the seeds of scepticism.

The Main Conclusion.—It is customary in Christian apologetics to palliate the inadequacy of any one particular argument or set of arguments for belief by reminding us that we must take into consideration the combined weight of all the other (equally inadequate) arguments. The apologist of unbelief has no need to ask this of his readers. On the contrary, he is able to point out a number of arguments, each of which is, of itself, fully sufficient to warrant their joining the ranks of the unbelievers. For instance, he can point to any one of the following as fairly conclusive evidence:—The dismal failure3 of Christianity after nearly two thousand years’ trial; the apparent impossibility of and complete want of evidence for the miracles on which Christianity is founded; the destructive criticism of the Bible, which cannot be gainsaid; the intensely grave suspicions thrown upon the originality of Christianity by the revelations of comparative mythology; the various dilemmas arising from the accepted doctrine of evolution; the inadequacy and conflicting character of the so-called [323]Theistic proofs (proofs of a personal Deity); and, finally, the fallacies in arguments hitherto so popular and faith-producing. We cannot get away from facts. Modern knowledge forces us to admit that the Christian Faith cannot be true.

Having arrived at this main conclusion, the unbeliever is at once confronted with many burning questions. I shall endeavour to outline the answers to those that seem the more pressing; but the subject is a large one, and cannot be adequately treated in a few short paragraphs. The main difficulty is, of course, the morality problem, and, if that admits of a favourable solution, we shall be in a better position to consider the next question: Should the unbeliever keep his unbelief to himself, or should he speak out?

Presuming that we have come to the conclusion that Christianity is not true, are we to say so, or are we to be silent? A believer, with ideas so advanced that his belief amounts to little more than “a reverent agnosticism” concerning the fundamental dogmas of Christianity, is still able to speak out, because while he destroys he also constructs. He has new interpretations of Christianity to offer us. The unbeliever can offer no such interpretations. He simply believes Christianity to be untrue, and, should he give his reasons, he knows he may persuade others to think so also. He must, therefore, it seems, keep his unbelief [347]to himself, unless he is prepared to show that the destruction of belief will be beneficial. In considering this question of frank avowal of our unbelief, we must not forget that, try as we may to avoid it, we are bound from time to time to find ourselves in a position where we have to choose between telling the truth or telling a lie; while our silence, or any manœuvre with intent to deceive, is one continual evasion of the truth. Is it not time, as John Morley urges,34 to abandon “those habits of hypocritical conformity and compliance which have filled the air of the England of to-day with gross and obscure mists”? In moral life truth is our guide, so that the arguments for its repression must be irrefutable. Now, if it can be shown that the objections to candour are more imaginary than real, not only are we robbed of the excuse for further concealment, but we are morally bound to fly our true colours openly. Nor is this all. Should it become plain to us that actual good will come of truth-telling, or that the probable good far outweighs the possible evil, it behoves us to take an active part in, or at least to lend our support to, the spread of truth.

When Rationalism reigns supreme,—

1. Morality will be founded on a firm basis. Its origin and necessity being better understood, it will also be better practised, whether in commerce, in politics, or in our social relations—i.e., both in our public and in our private conduct. Also the present atmosphere of religious insincerity will be cleared. Relieved of this temptation to deceive our neighbour and even ourselves, our moral fibre will be strengthened, and we shall be far less likely to be hypocrites in other matters.

2. Social evils will stand a better chance of being redressed.

3. All religious intolerance will disappear once and for all. [366]

4. An era of peace and happiness may at last be realised, because the methods of its attainment will be scientific and rational. We shall have recognised the fact that a gospel which proclaims a sword and eternal damnation cannot at the same time be a gospel of good tidings, cannot bring “Peace on earth, goodwill towards men.”

It may be said that such optimism is absurd, but is it really so?

Morality.—Have we not seen51 that morality can be taught apart from belief, and, indeed, that it is better so taught? May we not reasonably expect, therefore, that morality will advance side by side with Rationalism? In the famous words of Kant, “The death of dogma is the birth of morals.” Our moral progress has not been checked by the machinations of devils, but rather by our belief in such personages. Also by our ignorance—ignorance of the origin and purpose of morality, ignorance of the true causes of immorality, ignorance of the laws of heredity and environment. Science is the good fairy who will assist moral weaklings, and reduce their numbers in succeeding generations. Supernatural religion was perhaps a phase through which humanity had to grope towards the light of reason and knowledge. “But we are now facing the dawn of that better and happier day when piety shall be confined within the sphere of the natural, when morals shall be looked upon and cultivated as essential conditions of a truly blessed social life, and when all mankind shall aim, not at imaginary happiness in a purely imaginary realm, but at real prosperity in a profoundly real [367]world. This would be the exaltation, not destruction, of morality; the glorification, not annihilation, of the sense of responsibility; the enthronement, not repudiation, of the joy of altruistic service.”52

Social Problems.—Broad-minded divines are now exalting the service of man as it has never before been exalted. “Serve men,” they say, “and you will find God. Help men, and Christ is here.”53 “The test of Christianity is,” Canon Wilson informs us, “the resolve and the power of Christians to solve social problems. If the Bible inspires Christians with the zeal and the wisdom and the love needed for this task, no one will dispute its claims to be verily ‘the Word of God.’”54 This inspiration to improve the lot of our fellow-creatures furnishes, we are told, the final test of the Bible’s truth. We are entitled to ask, therefore, How comes it that the inspiration has hitherto so signally failed to manifest itself, and that it only appears now when the aspirations of the democracy can no longer be disregarded? To give an example from history, did not slavery flourish side by side with the Christian Church?55 Was it not abolished only when the further development of humanitarian principles caused men’s hearts to rebel against its cruelty and injustice?

The Church is at last devoting more attention to social evils and to the removal of their causes. What has taught her this duty if it be not the [368]growing spirit of nationalism?56 The Church has been forced, as it were, to keep pace with the rise of Rationalism. It is her only chance of prolonging her existence. Her new attitude in this respect will undoubtedly be the means of confusing the issue—the truth of Christianity—for some years to come. Therefore it is that, while thankful for the improvement, it is our bounden duty to expose the real truth of the matter—to see that Rationalism is not robbed of its due meed of praise, that the merit of the improvement is ascribed to its proper source.

Also we are to see that the process of improvement is not delayed. Undoubtedly the progress of Rationalism will ultimately involve important changes in political institutions and philosophic theories; but it is the cure of social evils which cannot be wrought too soon. In proportion as we accept the natural and reject the supernatural diagnosis of social diseases so shall we alleviate and possibly cure them.

Religious Tolerance.—Have we not seen that religious intolerance has been the evil genius which throughout the history of Christianity has been an enemy of progress and a lively cause of strife and misery? “The Christian Church has been more cruel and shed more human blood than any other Church or institution in the world. Let the Jew alone bear witness among the crowd of victims.”57 Also, Christians, in the course of their intestine dissensions, have [369]inflicted far greater severities on each other than they have ever experienced from the zeal of infidels.58

To-day, despite the rise and influence of Rationalism in Europe, “racial and religious prejudice are certainly present among us, and they form a latent source of cruelty and injustice which can at any time, if we are weak enough or wicked enough to give it free play, stain the land with the most amazing oppressions.”59 Religious animus, even in a country priding itself on its tolerant spirit, has by no means burnt itself out. Do we not see it flaring up again in the “War of the Kirks,” the Education controversy, and the arguments for the retention of the Athanasian Creed?

It is necessary, as Buckle observes,60 that men should learn to doubt, before they begin to tolerate; and that they should recognise the fallibility of their own opinions, before they respect the opinions of their opponents. We may never entirely agree on questions that are for the present at least shrouded in mystery; but, though the old adage, “Quot homines, tot sententiæ,” may remain true for all time, wide differences of opinion will disappear, and with them the odium theologicum. There can only be intolerance where belief is dogmatic, and that the religion of the future will never be. The uncertainty, the reasons why others may not be able to accept this or that philosophic speculation, will be recognised. [370]

If any discoveries await us, we are sure, at all events, that they will not confirm a dogma that would consign the greater portion of the human race to unspeakable and eternal torment; they will not confirm Christ’s description of the Last Judgment, when the Son of Man is to say: “Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the Devil and his angels.” It is the fashion nowadays for Latitudinarians to explain away everything that appears too incongruous or vindictive, and the word “everlasting” is said to be a mistranslation; but the meaning of one at least of the sayings attributed to Jesus is only too clear: “Many are called, but few are chosen” (Matt. xxii. 14.) What, then, is to become of the many? If we are to believe the “Word of God,” their awful fate, temporary or otherwise, is certain—“Whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire” (Rev. xx. 15); or again, “And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth” (Matt. xiii. 42). It is cruel doctrines of this kind that have arrested the growth of love and pity, and Rationalism is therefore the sworn enemy of such doctrines, as well as of the religious intolerance which springs from them.

Peace.61—In an address by the late Archbishop of Canterbury, when Bishop of London, delivered at the Polytechnic, Regent Street,62 we are presented with an argument of Christian apologetics, the weight of which rests upon the presumption that Christ did not wish the Church to begin with any bloodshed! “It is sometimes questioned,” said Dr. Temple, “by [371]those who would throw discredit upon the narrative, that our Lord tells them [the disciples] to go into Galilee, and yet He intended to see them that evening. But the whole thing is perfectly clear to those who consider the circumstances. Our Lord appeared to them in the evening, and there can be no doubt that He intended to do so even when He told these women that they were to desire all the disciples to go down into Galilee. But it was of great importance that there should be no gathering of the disciples in Jerusalem, because the inevitable result would have been an alarm on the part of the Jews, and Pontius Pilate would have been compelled, in order to keep the city perfectly quiet, to disperse such an assembly by force; and it is likely enough that the Church would have begun with bloodshed. But our Lord did not choose to have any such beginning. He told them all to go into Galilee.” Are there any grounds for this presumption, any grounds for presuming that God ever wishes to prevent bloodshed? None whatever from a study of history. None whatever from a study of the Bible. None whatever from a study of Christ’s own words: “Think not that I am come to send peace on earth; I came not to send peace, but a sword.”

Look at the present day! “We live in a time,” exclaims the Kaiser,63 “in which every young German capable of bearing arms must be ready to step forward for his Fatherland.” “The signs of the times make it the duty of the nation to strengthen its defences against unrighteous attacks.”64 “History, viewed as [372]a whole,” says Major Stewart Murray,65 warningly, “is nothing but a succession of struggles for existence among rival nations, in which, in the long run, only the strong armed survive.” Similar notes of warning are echoing and re-echoing through the length and breadth of Christendom. Is this no reflection upon Christianity’s power for good? Look at the picture! Christian nations all armed to the teeth, with their “powder dry” and their “swords keen,” each distrustful of the other, each ready to spring at the other’s throat.

What has the Rationalist to say to this state of things? What remedy does he propose to apply? The prophets foretell that we can look forward to the abolition of war only when the engines of destruction—flying ships armed with weapons of death, for example—are of so fearful a nature that it will at last be brought home to mortals that this clumsy and barbarous machine for settling disputes is too absurd, too suicidal for further employment. But need we wait long weary years, burdened with the thousand and one curses of war and militarism,66 till this supreme horror has been invented?

In the resolution adopted at the Fourteenth Peace [373]Congress67 we find the following stirring appeal: “We are beginning to understand that the rights of the citizen within the State can only be fully respected when, by the establishment of international juridical order, absolute security shall be obtained for all nations. The demand for this international security is becoming daily more urgent, on the one hand because modern progress binds together millions of the most diverse interests, on the other hand because the stream of democracy, or what it would be more proper to call the aspirations of the masses of the people after happiness, is rising continually in an immense and irresistible flood. International security can only be assured by federation; so federation will come about, for it is indispensable as liberty to the citizen, as air to the lungs. But it behoves us to see that it comes before we are laid in the tomb. What we ought to labour for with an unresting ardour is that federation should be accomplished while we are yet alive, so that we may not be thwarted of the legitimate share of happiness that belongs to us here below.” Yes, this strikes the right chord; but before the hopes of these peace enthusiasts can be fulfilled Rationalism must have advanced considerably further than it has up to the present. At the third National Peace Congress held at Birmingham on June 13th and 14th, 1906, the opinion was expressed that the King and the working classes were already on the side of peace, and it only remained, therefore, to convert the Church and the middle classes. How are we to set about their conversion? Even if we could persuade the Church that war was not an essential to [374]the welfare of nations, we could hardly expect her to agree with us at present either as to the cause or the cure of the evil. The prime cause of war is Nature’s cruel law, the “struggle for existence”; and the Rationalist’s proposals for its alleviation run counter to the teachings of the Church. For this among other cogent reasons, I conceive that it behoves us to see that the truth about Christianity be known “before we are laid in the tomb,” and that “what we ought to labour for with an unresting ardour” is that this “should be accomplished while we are yet alive, so that we may not be thwarted of the legitimate share of happiness that belongs to us here below.”

The close association of war and religion has never ceased to act for the injury of mankind. The “Lord of Hosts,” the “Lord mighty in battle,” is expected to take interest in bloodshed rather than in the pursuits of peace, and to be always ready to join in the fray—to fight for His People; both sides, be it remembered, claiming His assistance. True Christianity owns as its Master a Prince of Peace; but in no particular has its failure in practice been more marked than in its impotency to carry out this, one of its chief missions. Why? Apart from religion being frequently the actual occasion of the strife,68 is it not because it has always meddled in politics, always supported rulers in their ambitions, in their land-hunger? Is it not because religion has too often submitted to be “a ‘kept’ priest to bless or ban as the passion or self-interest of its employer dictated?”69 [375]

It is as futile as it is insincere for a Tsar70 to preach peace, when he, or rather his counsellors, are imbued with a hunger for other people’s property, and, hypocrites that they are, hide their real motives under the cloak of religion, calling it, forsooth, the spreading of a Christian civilisation. Every Rationalist, every Freethinker, is an honest advocate of peace.71 He is not so irrational, so immoral I might say, as to propose the settlement of disputes by arbitration, and at the same time to entertain nefarious projects calculated to render this method impracticable. So long as Christian nations remain unmindful of the Tenth Commandment, he acknowledges with sorrow that we must continue armed and ready to do battle; but he looks forward with confidence to the day when there will be such an overwhelming body of men earnestly and sincerely desirous of peace that war will be impossible, simply because the preponderating voice of each and every nation will be against it—will “seek peace and ensue it.” He anticipates a time when men will realise that they are not only citizens of this or that country, but fellow citizens also on the same planet.

An eminent theologian tells us: “Reason is the only faculty we have wherewith to judge concerning anything, even Revelation itself.”72 How is it, then, that Religionist and Rationalist arrive at such contrary conclusions? The explanation is simple enough: the Religionist trusts, the Rationalist distrusts, his [376]emotions. Which is in the right? The survival of religious belief will largely depend upon the view men may ultimately take upon this question. Whether religion be no more than “morality touched by emotion,” as Matthew Arnold defines it,73 or whether all religions are only different ways of expressing a reality which transcends experience and correct expression, we cannot, on that account, accept dogmas that are untrue; we cannot pretend that a supernatural revelation has been vouchsafed to us. We may surmise, as Sir Henry Thompson supposed, that the “eternal and infinite energy behind phenomena” is what we call “God”; but we have to admit that this God is an unknown God, and that all attempts to unravel the mystery that surrounds our own fate are the merest guesses in the dark. Does a surmise—a belief if you will have it so—of this kind afford any religious satisfaction? If this Eternal Energy possesses what we should call a mind, can we worship a Supreme Intelligence

Can we worship the Unknown? Can we, like the Athenians of old, erect altars to the Unknown God? I trow not. The age of ignorance and superstition is slowly, but none the less surely, passing away, never again to return.

Sir Oliver Lodge believes74 in “the ultimate intelligibility of the universe,” and with this opinion many of us will agree. Perhaps our present brains may require considerable improvement before we can grasp [377]the deepest things by their aid, or perhaps they will suffice as they are, and only a further acquisition of knowledge may be required. In any case, one sees no reason why, because we have no acceptable theory of life or of death now, we must therefore be equally ignorant many centuries, or even a single century, hence. On the other hand, it is, of course, quite possible that these mysteries may remain for ever unexplained. It may transpire that Haeckel’s assumption of a monism in the physical world, and his identification of vital force with ordinary physical and chemical forces, are incorrect. It may transpire that Professor le Conte was wrong in regarding vital force as just so much withdrawn from the general fund of chemical and physical forces. Radio-activity and the cyanic theory75 may not furnish a satisfactory solution of the problem of the first appearance of life upon this globe. But one thing, at all events, our present knowledge seems clearly to indicate: the solution of the problem cannot be in accord with the Christian dogmas. Should the secrets of our existence still lie concealed in the womb of time, their birth will be the death, not the renascence, of the dying creeds of to-day.

Meanwhile our present course is clearly defined: we should search out and expose all false premises of belief. Only in this way can we hope to arrive a little nearer to the ultimate truth. Also, what is of much greater consequence, when all that is demonstrably untrue in the world’s beliefs has been pointed out and acknowledged, believers and unbelievers will [378]be in far better accord concerning all that is vital to the well-being of the human race. “We cannot,” as Mr. Trevelyan pertinently remarks,76 “alter the nature of the Unknown by conceiving it to be other than that which it is; but we can get a wrong basis for ethics, and a false sentimental outlook on everything, by reason of false beliefs.”

By all means let those who can, continue to cherish the “larger hope”—why should they not, while all is unknown?—and let the metaphysicians continue to translate their wishes and aspirations into philosophical language; but the guiding spirit in human affairs should be, and one day will be, a scientific humanitarianism working on rational principles for the peace and happiness of all mankind.

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