CHAPTER LXVI.--RELIGIOUS RECONSTRUCTION; OR, THE MORAL NECESSITY FOR A

SCIENTIFIC BASIS FOR RELIGION.

A philosophical analysis of the human mind, viewed in connection with the practical history of man from the early morning of his existence, fully demonstrates it as an important truth, that individual happiness and the moral welfare of society depend essentially upon the uniform action and harmonious cooperation of all the mental faculties; and that, on the other hand, their individually excessive and inharmonious action constitutes the primary source of nearly all the crime, misery, and discord of society. And it may be well to note here, as another important preliminary truth, that the progressive development of the science of mental philosophy has settled the division of the mental faculties into the following classification: viz.,

1. The animal, which imparts energy and impulsive strength to the whole character, mental and physical. 2. The social, which is the source of family ties and the social and co-operative institutions of society. 3. The moral, which makes us regardful of the happiness and welfare of other beings than ourselves. 4. The intellectual, which is the great pilot-chamber or lighthouse of the whole mind; though it is but recently that discoveries in mental philosophy have fully disclosed this as being its natural and legitimate office. It has thus demonstrated it to be the most important department of the mind. Its position in the cerebrum--occupying, as it does, the superior frontal lobe of the brain--might, however, have suggested this. Now this is no fanciful delineation, no mere ideal mapping of the mind, but has been demonstrated thousands of times, since the discoveries of Gall, to be the true condition and classified analysis of the mental faculties. The religious faculties constituting that department of the mind which often controls our actions anil conduct toward others, and being situated at the apex of the brain,--the point where the most intensified feelings and impulses are supposed to concentrate their misdirection or abnormal exercise, is consequently attended with more direful consequences to society than that of any other portion of the mind. All history demonstrates this as a tragical fact; for religion, more especially, is always born blind. This being a tenable fact, and the religious faculties being awakened to action at an early period of human society,--before the intellectual chambers of the mind were lighted up by the illuminating rays of science, or supplied by a philosophical education and a thorough and untrammeled study of nature's laws,--their natural intensity of feeling, thus uncurbed and unenlightened, drove their honest but dark-minded possessors into the most senseless and childish superstitions, the most absurd doctrines, the most relentless intolerance of belief, and the most bloody and murderous persecutions; thus proving that conscience unenlightened is a very unsafe and a very dangerous moral and religions guide. The popular Christian proverb, that "man can not be too religious," comprehends a very fatal error in moral ethics: for the man who possesses more religion than intellect, or more devotional piety than intellectual cultivation and philosophical enlightenment, is sometimes a more dangerous man to society than the highway robber or the midnight assassin; because, always finding many accomplices to aid him in his direful deeds of bloody persecutions, and frequently being able, also, to invoke the strong arm of the law, his work of defamation and spoliation, if not of open persecution and bloodshed, is wider spread than that of the burglar or the stealthy assassin.

A review of history shows us: 1. That, up to the installation of the era of science, which dates back less than three centuries ago, the world--that is, the Christian world--was literally a vast prison-house of chains, and a theater of butchery and blood,--the result of a practical effort of men, devoutly pious, to "promote the glory of God," and the establishment of a supposed-to-be-true religion. 2. The perpetrators of those tragical deeds upon men and women were, many of them, as religiously honest and conscientious "as ever breathed the breath of life;" and they verily believed they were doing God service in thus punishing and exterminating dissenters and heretics. The very fact that some of these pious persecutors perished themselves at the fiery stake in the conscientious and unflinching maintenance of their principles, shouting "Hallelujah" while the burning fagots consumed their bodies, leaves no possible ground for doubt that a deep religious conviction had actuated them in the work of persecuting and punishing the enemies of their religion, and in attempting to convert the world to its "saving truth" by the sword. Much is said about "conscience," "the internal monitor," "the still, small voice," &c., as a guide for man's moral actions; but, if experience and history ever proved or can prove any thing, they demonstrate most conclusively that conscience unenlightened by the intellectual department of the mind, or a conscience grown up amid the weeds of scientific ignorance, is as dangerous a pilot upon the moral ocean as the helmsman of a ship, in midnight darkness, surrounded by dangerous shoals and resistless whirlpools. Conscience without science or philosophy is a lamp without oil, which consequently, being without light, is more likely to lead us astray than to guide us to the temple of truth. Science is the pilot-lamp by which we discern our way on the pilgrim-voyage of life; while religion is the feeling, the motive-power, which impels us onward. Hence the latter should at all times be subservient to the former, and should be checked and restrained from spontaneous development and exercise until the former is duly installed upon the mental throne as ruler of the moral empire. It is as dangerous to cultivate and stimulate the religious feelings, until the fires of science or practical philosophy have been kindled up in the intellectual chambers to furnish the light necessary to guide them in their impulsive course, as it would be to steam up the boilers of a boat when approaching a precipice in the night, with the pilot asleep upon his hammock, and all the lights extinguished in his chamber. Neither religion nor conscience possesses primordially any light of its own. Both are born blind; and all the light they ever possess is by reflection from the intellectual light-house. Prolific, indeed, of the proof of this statement, are human nature, human experience, and universal history. Let the policy, then, be, in all cases, to cultivate science before religion. The intellectual mind, we repeat, should be thoroughly cultivated and enlightened before the religious feelings are called into action.

Query. Reader, what do you now think of Dr. Cheviot's statement, "The Bible does not contain the _shadow of a shade of error from Genesis to Revelation._"

CONCLUSION.--SEVERAL IMPORTANT POINTS.

1. As this work was announced several years ago, it seems proper to explain the causes of the long delay in its publication. Want of health for completing it, and want of means for publishing it, furnish the true explanation. But by the practical application of a remedy constituting a new and extraordinary discovery in the healing art, the author's health has so far improved as to enable him to resume the work, and re-write nearly the whole of it in a few weeks time. The work advertised embraced but forty pages. The present volume comprises nearly eleven times that number of pages, and includes only two chapters of the original, except the small portion which has been re-written.

2. While "The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors" was designed principally to trace the doctrines, traditions, and miraculous events of the Christian Bible to their primary pagan or Oriental origin, the main object of "The Bible of Bibles" is to expose their logical absurdity, and the evils resulting from their propagation and practical application.

3. The objection is frequently raised in this work against placing the Bible in the hands of children, and also in possession of the heathen. This would, of course, keep it out of our common schools; and the author rejoices in knowing, that, although the Bible was used as a regular school-book in his youthful days, it has been banished as a text-book from nearly every schoolroom throughout the country. This denotes progress.

4. Christian professors regard it as a sufficient refutation of all the arguments and facts designed to prove and demonstrate the immoral influence of the Bible upon society, to assert that Christian countries are superior in morals to those not in possession of their Bible. But many facts cited in this work tend to prove, that, if the assumption were correct, it could not with any show of reason or sense be attributed to the influence of the Bible. It is clearly, if not self-evidently, impossible that such moral or immoral lessons as are derived from the history of such characters as the father and founder of the Jewish nation (Abraham), who is represented as living up to all the commands, all the statutes, and all the laws of God (see Gen. xxvi. 5), while practicing the abominable crimes of treachery, deceit, falsehood, incest or adultery, and polygamy, &c,--I say it is morally impossible for such examples and such lessons to exert other than a demoralizing influence upon society; or that of David, pronounced "the man after God's own heart," while practicing a long catalogue of the most shocking crimes (see chap. xxx). Such cases blasphemously represent God as sanctioning the most atrocious crimes and the most revolting deeds, which is a virtual licence to the whole human race to practice them. If a book containing such lessons does not exert an immoral influence upon society, then human language, when employed in writing Bibles, fails to make its ordinary impression upon the mind. But we will here cite three cogent and incontrovertible historical facts, which will settle the matter at once and for ever, by proving the truth of our oft-repeated proposition, that the Christian Bible, notwithstanding the apparent improvement in morals of most Christian countries in modern times, has, on the whole, tended to demoralize every nation where it has been generally read, believed, and practiced. First, look at the moral condition of the whole Christian world during the period known as "the Dark Ages," and you will see the proof in overwhelming torrents. During that long night of moral darkness and human depravity, which lasted nearly a thousand years, all Christendom was reeking with moral corruption, and practicing the most abominable crimes. Lying, deceit, hypocrisy, moral treason, licentiousness, adultery, fornication, fighting, and drunkenness were the order of the day among all classes, including the clergy and the deacons, simply because the light of science had not reached them, and the Bible was their sole guide in morals and religion. This state of things continued until the introduction of Greek literature dispelled the thick clouds of mental darkness, and arrested the swift tide of moral corruption. Second, the Greeks without our Bible were both morally and intellectually superior to any Christian nation. Third, "the Dark Ages" were brought to a close by the introduction of Greek learning and Greek morals into Christian nations. This dates their first tendency to rise out of the sloughs of heathen barbarism, and their first appearance of moral improvement. And thus the proposition is proved and demonstrated by the facts of history that the Bible continued to demoralize society till its influence was arrested by the dawn of moral and physical science. In no nation has there been any marked improvement in morals with the use of the Bible alone.

5. It will doubtless be regarded as an extraordinary circumstance that so many thousand biblical errors as are disclosed in this work should have passed from age to age unnoticed by the millions of disciples of the Christian faith, and more especially the startling fact that all the cardinal doctrines of the Christian religion are founded in error. But it should be borne in mind that it was regarded and taught as a religious duty to suppress and conceal all such errors, and absolutely wicked, sinful, and dangerous to admit the possibility that the Holy Book can con-tain errors. And this negative policy alone was sufficient to keep them concealed and out of sight.

6. It is stated in chapter thirty that none of 1st. Old Testament writers teach the doctrine of immortality or the doctrine of future rewards and punishments. The proof and a full elucidation of this subject will be found in "The Biography of Satan."

7. It is stated in chapter fifty-five that all human language is more or less ambiguous and uncertain, and in chapter fifty-two that skillful linguists of this age can construct language whose meaning can not be misunderstood; and hence God should have been able to do so when the Bible was written. The first statement refers to language as ordinarily used when the Bible was written, and especially the imperfect Hebrew of the Bible. The last statement implies that with the modern improvements language can be so employed as to leave no doubt of its meaning in any case. Both statements, then, are correct.

8: The author, in abridging citations from history and the Bible, has in some cases deviated from custom in using quotation-marks. This is especially true of chapter twenty-two (on Bible contradictions).

9. It is believed that no errors of any importance can be found in this work, unless some mistakes have been committed in making scriptural references.

10. Each reader of this work is desired to examine carefully and critically the author's exposition of "The Twelve Cardinal Doctrines of the Christian Faith," and report to him his views of that exposition. Those twelve leading doctrines are embraced in the twelve chapters commencing at chapter 33 (on revelation) and ending at chapter 44 (on a personal God).