Chapter 12

Christians say a man has a will to choose. So he has. But that is only saying that one human thought will outweigh another. A man thinks with his brain: his brain was made by God.

A tall man can reach higher than a short man. It is not the fault of the short man that he is outreached: he did not fix his own height.

It is the same with the will. A man has a will to jump. He can jump over a five-barred gate; but he cannot jump over a cathedral.

So with his will in moral matters. He has a will to resist temptation, but though he may clear a small temptation, he may fall at a large one.

The actions of a man's will are as mathematically fixed at his birth as are the motions of a planet in its orbit.

God, who made the man and the planet, is responsible for the actions of both.

As the natural forces created by God regulate the influences of Venus and Mars upon the Earth, so must the natural forces created by God have regulated the influences of Eve and the Serpent on Adam.

Adam was no more blameworthy for failing to resist the influence of Eve than the Earth is blameworthy for deviating in its course around the Sun, in obedience to the influences of Venus and Mars.

Without the act of God there could have been no Adam, and therefore no Fall. God, whose act is responsible for Adam's existence, is responsible for the Fall.

_If God is responsible for man's existence, God is responsible for all Man's acts._

If a boy brought a dog into the house and teased it until it bit him, would not his parents ask the boy, "Why did you bring the dog in at all?"

But if the boy had trained the dog to bite, and knew that it would bite if it were teased, and if the boy brought the dog in and teased it until it bit him, would the parents blame the dog?

And if a magician, like one of those at the court of Pharaoh, deliberately made an adder out of the dust, knowing the adder would bite, and then played with the adder until it bit some spectator, would the injured man blame the magician or the adder?

How, then, could God blame Man for the Fall?

But you may ask me, with surprise, as so many have asked me with surprise, "Do you really mean that no man is, under any circumstances, to be blamed for anything he may say or do?"

And I shall answer you that I do seriously mean that no man can, under any circumstances, be justly blamed for anything he may say or do. That is one of my deepest convictions, and I shall try very hard to prove that it is just.

But you may say, as many have said: "If no man can be justly blamed for anything he says or does, there is an end of all law and order, and society is impossible."

And I shall answer you: "No, on the contrary, there is a beginning of law and order, and a chance that society may become civilised."

For it does not follow that because we may not blame a man we may not condemn his acts. Nor that because we do not blame him we are bound to allow him to do all manner of mischief.

Several critics have indignantly exclaimed that I make no difference between good men and bad, that I lump Torquemada, Lucrezia Borgia, Fenelon, and Marcus Aurelius together, and condone the most awful crimes.

That is a mistake. I regard Lucrezia Borgia as a homicidal maniac, and Torquemada as a religious maniac. I do not _blame_ such men and women. But I should not allow them to do harm.

I believe that nearly all crimes, vices, cruelties, and other evil acts are due to ignorance or to mental disease. I do not hate the man who calls me an infidel, a liar, a blasphemer, or a quack. I know that he is ignorant, or foolish, or ill-bred, or vicious, and I am sorry for him.

Socrates, as reported by Xenophon, put my case in a nutshell. When a friend complained to Socrates that a man whom he had saluted had not saluted him in return, the father of philosophy replied: "It is an odd thing that if you had met a man ill-conditioned in body you would not have been angry; but to have met a man rudely disposed in mind provokes you."

This is sound philosophy, I think. If we pity a man with a twist in his spine, why should we not pity the man with a twist in his brain? If we pity a man with a stiff wrist, why not the man with a stiff pride? If we pity a man with a weak heart, why not the man with the weak will? If we do not blame a man for one kind of defect, why blame him for another?

But it does not follow that because we neither hate nor blame a criminal we should allow him to commit crime.

We do not blame a rattlesnake, nor a shark. These creatures only fulfil their natures. The shark who devours a baby is no more sinful than the lady who eats a shrimp. We do not blame the maniac who burns a house down and brains a policeman, nor the mad dog who bites a minor poet. But, none the less, we take steps to defend ourselves against snakes, sharks, lunatics, and mad dogs.

The _Clarion_ does not hate a cruel sweater, nor a tyrannous landlord, nor a shuffling Minister of State, nor a hypocritical politician: it pities such poor creatures. Yet the _Clarion_ opposes sweating and tyranny and hypocrisy, and does its best to defeat and to destroy them.

If a tiger be hungry he naturally seeks food. I do not blame the tiger; but if he endeavoured to make his dinner off our business manager, and if I had a gun, I should shoot the tiger.

We do not hate nor blame the blight that destroys our roses and our vines. The blight is doing what we do: he is trying to live. But we destroy the blight to preserve our roses and our grapes.

So we do not blame an incendiary. But we are quite justified in protecting life and property. Dangerous men must be restrained. In cases where they attempt to kill and maim innocent and useful citizens, as, for instance, by dynamite outrages, they must, in the last resort, be killed.

"But," you may say, "the dynamiter knows it is wrong to wreck a street and murder inoffensive strangers, and yet he does it. Is not that free will? Is he not blameworthy?"

And I answer that when a man does wrong he does it because he knows no better, or because he is naturally vicious.

And I hold that in neither case is he to blame: for he did not make his nature, nor did he make the influences which have operated on that nature.

Man is a creature of Heredity and Environment. He is by Heredity what his ancestors have made him (or what God has made him). Up to the moment of his birth he has had nothing to do with the formation of his character. As Professor Tyndall says, "that was done _for_ him, and not _by_ him." From the moment of his birth he is what his inherited nature, and the influences into which he has been sent without his consent, have made him.

An omniscient being--like God--who knew exactly what a man's nature would be at birth, and exactly the nature of the influences to which he would be exposed after his birth, could predict every act and word of that man's life.

Given a particular nature; given particular influences, the result will be as mathematically inevitable as the speed and orbit of a planet.

Man is what heredity (or God) and environment make him. Heredity gives him his nature. That comes from his ancestors. Environment modifies his nature: environment consists of the operation of forces external to his nature. No man can select his ancestors; no man can select his environment. His ancestors make his nature; other men, and circumstances, modify his nature.

Ask any horse-breeder why he breeds from the best horses, and not from the worst. He will tell you, because good horses are not bred from bad ones.

Ask any father why he would prefer that his son should mix with good companions rather than with bad companions. He will tell you that evil communications corrupt good manners, and pitch defiles.

Heredity decides how a man shall be bred; environment regulates what he shall learn.

One man is a critic, another is a poet. Each is what heredity and environment have made him. Neither is responsible for his heredity nor for his environment.

If the critic repents his evil deeds, it is because something has happened to awake his remorse. Someone has told him of the error of his ways. That adviser is part of his environment.

If the poet takes to writing musical comedies, it is because some evil influence has corrupted him. That evil influence is part of his environment.

Neither of these men is culpable for what he has done. With nobler heredity, or happier environment, both might have been journalists; with baser heredity, or more vicious environment, either might have been a millionaire, a Socialist, or even a Member of Parliament.

We are all creatures of heredity and environment. It is Fate, and not his own merit, that has kept George Bernard Shaw out of a shovel hat and gaiters, and condemned some Right Honourable Gentlemen to manage State Departments instead of planting cabbages.

The child born of healthy, moral, and intellectual parents has a better start in life than the child born of unhealthy, immoral, and unintellectual parents.

The child who has the misfortune to be born in the vitiated atmosphere of a ducal palace is at a great disadvantage in comparison with the child happily born amid the innocent and respectable surroundings of a semi-detached villa in Brixton.

What chance, then, has a drunkard's baby, born in a thieves' den, and dragged up amid the ignorant squalor of the slums?

Environment is very powerful for good or evil. Had Shakespeare been born in the Cannibal Islands he would never have written _As You Like It_; had Torquemada been born a Buddhist he never would have taken to roasting heretics.

But this, you may say, is sheer Fatalism. Well! It seems to me to be _truth_, and philosophy, and sweet charity.

And now I will try to show the difference between this Determinism, which some think must prove so maleficent, and the Christian doctrine of Free Will, which many consider so beneficent.

Let us take a flagrant instance of wrong-doing. Suppose some person to persist in playing "Dolly Grey" on the euphonium, or to contract a baneful habit of reciting "Curfew shall not Ring" at evening parties, the Christian believer in Free Will would call him a bad man, and would say he ought to be punished.

The philosophic Determinist would denounce the offender's _conduct_, but would not denounce the _offender_.

We Determinists do not denounce _men_; we denounce _acts_. We do not blame men; we try to teach them. If they are not teachable we restrain them.

You will admit that our method is different from the accepted method. I shall try to convince you that it is also materially better than the accepted, or Christian, method.

Let us suppose two concrete cases: (1) Bill Sikes beats his wife; (2) Lord Rackrent evicts his tenants.

Let us first think what would be the orthodox method of dealing with these two cases?

What would be the orthodox method? The parson and the man in the street would say Bill Sikes was a bad man, and that he ought to be punished.

The Determinist would say that Bill Sikes had committed a crime, and that he ought to be restrained, and taught better.

You may tell me there seems to be very little difference in the practical results of the two methods. But that is because we have not followed the two methods far enough.

If you will allow me to follow the two methods further you will, I hope, agree with me that their results will not be identical, but that our results will be immeasurably better.

For the orthodox method is based upon the erroneous dogma that Bill Sikes had a free will to choose between right and wrong, and, having chosen to do wrong, he is a bad man, and ought to be punished.

But the Determinist bases his method upon the philosophical theory that Bill Sikes is what heredity and environment have made him; and that he is not responsible for his heredity, which he did not choose, nor for his environment, which he did not make.

Still, you may think the difference is not effectively great. But it is. For the Christian would blame Bill Sikes, and no one but Bill Sikes. But the Determinist would not blame Sikes at all: he would blame his environment.

Is not that a material difference? But follow it out to its logical results. The Christian, blaming only Bill Sikes, because he had a "free will," would punish Sikes, and perhaps try to convert Sikes; and there his effort would logically end.

The Determinist would say: "If this man Sikes has been reared in a slum, has not been educated, nor morally trained, has been exposed to all kinds of temptation, the fault is that of the social system which has made such ignorance, and vice, and degradation possible."

That is _one_ considerable difference between the results of a good religion and a bad one. The Christian condemns the man--who is a victim of evil social conditions. The Determinist condemns the evil conditions. It is the difference between the methods of sending individual sufferers from diphtheria to the hospital and the method of condemning the drains.

But you may cynically remind me that nothing will come of the Determinists' protest against the evil social conditions. Perhaps not. Let us waive that question for a moment, and consider our second case.

Lord Rackrent evicts his tenants. The orthodox method is well known. It goes no further than the denunciation of the peer, and the raising of a subscription (generally inadequate) for the sufferers.

The Determinist method is different. The Determinist would say: "This peer is what heredity and environment have made him. We cannot blame him for being what he is. We can only blame his environment. There must be something wrong with a social system which permits one idle peer to ruin hundreds of industrious producers. This evil social system should be amended, or evictions will continue."

That Determinist conclusion would be followed by the usual inadequate subscription.

And now we will go back to the point we passed. You may say, in the case of Sikes and the peer, that the logic of the Determinist is sound, but ineffective: nothing comes of it.

I admit that nothing comes of it, and I am now going to tell you _why_ nothing comes of it.

The Determinist cannot put his wisdom into action, because he is in a minority.

So long as Christians have an overwhelming majority who will not touch the drains, diphtheria must continue.

So long as the universal verdict condemns the victim of a bad system, and helps to keep the bad system in full working order, so long will evil flourish and victims suffer.

If you wish to realise the immense superiority of the Determinist principles over the Christian religion, you have only to imagine what would happen if the Determinists had a majority as overwhelming as the majority the Christians now hold.

For whereas the Christian theory of free will and personal responsibility results in established ignorance and injustice, with no visible remedies beyond personal denunciation, the prison, and a few coals and blankets, the Determinist method would result in the abolition of lords and burglars, of slums and palaces, of caste and snobbery. There would be no ignorance and no poverty left in the world.

That is because the Determinist understands human nature, and the Christian does not. It is because the Determinist understands morality, and the Christian does not.

For the Determinist looks for the cause of wrong-doing in the environment of the wrong-doer. While the Christian puts all the wrongs which society perpetrates against the individual, and all the wrongs which the individual perpetrates against his fellows down to an imaginary "free will."

Some Free-Willers are fond of crying out: "Once admit that men are not to be blamed for their actions, and all morality and all improvement will cease." But that is a mistake. As I have indicated above, a good many evils now rife would cease, because then we should attack the evils, and not the victims of the evils. But it is absurd to suppose that we do not detest cholera because we do not detest cholera patients, or that we should cease to hate wrong because we ceased to blame wrong-doers.

Admit the Determinist theory, and all would be taught to do well, and most would take kindly to the lesson. Because the fact that environment is so powerful for evil suggests that it is powerful for good. If man is what he is made, it behoves a nation which desires and prizes good men to be very earnest and careful in its methods of making them.

I believe that I am what heredity and environment made me. But I know that I can make myself better or worse if I try. I know that because I have learnt it, and the learning has been part of my environment.

My claim, as a Determinist, is that it is not so good to punish an offender as to improve his environment. It is good of the Christians to open schools and to found charities. But as a Determinist I am bound to say that there ought to be no such things in the world as poverty and ignorance, and one of the contributory causes to ignorance and poverty is the Christian doctrine of free will.

Take away from a man all that God gave him, and there will be nothing of him left.

Take away from a man all that heredity and environment have given him, and there will be nothing left.

Man is what he is by the act of God, or the results of heredity and environment. In either case he is not to blame.

In one case the result is due to the action of his ancestors and society, in the other to the act of God.

Therefore a man is not responsible for his actions, and cannot sin against God.

_If God is responsible for Man's existence, God is responsible for Man's acts._

A religion built upon the doctrine of Free Will and human responsibility to God is built upon a misconception and must fall.

Christianity is a fabric of impossibilities erected upon a foundation of error.

Perhaps, since I find many get confused on the subject of Free Will from their consciousness of continually exercising the "power of choice," I had better say a few words here on that subject.

You say you have power to choose between two courses. So you have, but that power is limited and controlled by heredity and environment.

If you have to choose between a showy costume and a plain one you will choose the one you like best, and you will like best the one which your nature (heredity) and your training (environment) will lead you to like best.

You think your will is free. But it is not. You may think you have power to drown yourself; but you have not.

Your love of life and your sense of duty are too strong for you.

You might think I have power to leave the _Clarion_ and start an anti-Socialist paper. But I know I have not that power. My nature (heredity) and my training and habit (environment) are too strong for me.

If you knew a lady was going to choose between a red dress and a grey one, and if you knew the lady very well, you could guess her choice before she made it.

If you knew an honourable man was to be offered a bribe to do a dishonourable act, you would feel sure he would refuse it.

If you knew a toper was to be offered as much free whisky as he could drink, you would be sure he would not come home sober.

If you knew the nature and the environment of a man thoroughly well, and the circumstances (_all_ the circumstances) surrounding a choice of action to be presented to him, and if you were clever enough to work such a difficult problem, you could forecast his choice before he made it, as surely as in the case of the lady, the toper, and the honourable man above mentioned.

You have power to choose, then, but you can only choose as your heredity and environment _compel_ you to choose. And you do not select your own heredity nor your own environment.

CHRISTIAN APOLOGIES CHRISTIAN APOLOGIES

Christian apologists make some daring claims on behalf of their religion. The truth of Christianity is proved, they say, by its endurance and by its power; the beneficence of its results testifies to the divinity of its origin.

These claims command wide acceptance, for the simple reason that those who deny them cannot get a hearing.

The Christians have virtual command of all the churches, universities, and schools. They have the countenance and support of the Thrones, Parliaments, Cabinets, and aristocracies of the world, and they have the nominal support of the World's Newspaper Press. They have behind them the traditions of eighteen centuries. They have formidable allies in the shape of whole schools of philosophy and whole libraries of eloquence and learning. They have the zealous service and unswerving credence of millions of honest and worthy citizens: and they are defended by solid ramparts of prejudice, and sentiment, and obstinate old custom.

The odds against the Rationalists are tremendous. To challenge the claims of Christianity is easy: to get the challenge accepted is very hard. Rationalists' books and papers are boycotted. The Christians will not listen, will not reason, will not, if they can prevent it, allow a hostile voice to be heard. Thus, from sheer lack of knowledge, the public accept the Christian apologist's assertions as demonstrated truth.

And the Christians claim this immunity from attack as a triumph of their arms, and a further proof of the truth of their religion. Religion has been attacked before, they cry, and where now are its assailants? And the answer must be, that many of its assailants are in their graves, but that some of them are yet alive, and there are more to follow. But the combat is very unequal. If the Rationalists could for only a few years have the support of the Crowns, Parliaments, Aristocracies, Universities, Schools, and Newspapers of the world; if they could preach Science and Reason twice every Sunday from a hundred thousand pulpits, perhaps the Christians would have less cause for boasting.

But as things are, we "Infidels" must cease to sigh for whirlwinds, and do the best we can with the bellows.

So: the Christians claim that their religion has done wonders for the world; a claim disputed by the Rationalists.

Now, when we consider what Christianity has done, we should take account of the evil as well as the good. But this the Christians are unwilling to allow.

Christians declare that the divine origin and truth of their religion are proved by its beneficent results.

But Christianity has done evil as well as good. Mr. G. K. Chesterton, while defending Christianity in the _Daily News_, said:

Christianity has committed crimes so monstrous that the sun might sicken at them in heaven.

And no one can refute that statement.

But Christians evade the dilemma. When the evil works of their religion are cited, they reply that those evils were wrought by false Christianity, that they were contrary to the teachings of Christ, and so were not the deeds of Christians at all.

_The Christian Commonwealth_, in advancing the above plea as to real and false Christianity, instances the difference between Astrology and Astronomy, and said:

We fear Mr. Blatchford, if he has any sense of consistency, must, when he has finished his tirade against Christianity, turn his artillery on Greenwich Observatory, and proclaim the Astronomer Royal a scientific quack, on account of the follies of star-gazers in the past.