Part 18

The grave and wise Cato the censor will for ever live in that noble freethinking saying--"I wonder," said he, "how one of our priests can forbear laughing when he sees another!" (For contempt of priests is another grand characteristic of a freethinker). This shews that Cato understood the whole mystery of the Roman religion "as by law established." I beg you, sir, not to overlook these last words, "religion as by law established." I translate _hanisfax,_ into the general word, _priest_. Thus I apply the sentence to our priests in England, and, when Dr. Smallridge sees Dr. Atterbury, I wonder how either of them can forbear laughing at the cheat they put upon the people, by making them believe their "religion as by law established."

Cicero, that consummate philosopher, and noble patriot, though he was a priest, and consequently more likely to be a knave; gave the greatest proofs of his freethinking. First, he professed the sceptic philosophy, which doubts of everything. Then, he wrote two treatises;[27] in the first, he shews the weakness of the Stoics' arguments for the being of the Gods: In the latter, he has destroyed the whole revealed religion of the Greeks and Romans (for why should not theirs be a revealed religion as well as that of Christ?) Cicero likewise tells us, as his own opinion, that they who study philosophy, do not believe there are any Gods: He denies the immortality of the soul, and says, there can be nothing after death.

[Footnote 27: "De Natura Deomm." [T. S.] ]

And because the priests have the impudence to quote Cicero in their pulpits and pamphlets, against freethinking; I am resolved to disarm them of his authority. You must know, his philosophical works are generally in dialogues, where people are brought in disputing against one another: Now the priests when they see an argument to prove a God, offered perhaps by a Stoic, are such knaves or blockheads, to quote it as if it were Cicero's own; whereas Cicero was so noble a freethinker, that he believed nothing at all of the matter, nor ever shews the least inclination to favour superstition, or the belief of a God, and the immortality of the soul; unless what he throws out sometimes to save himself from danger, in his speeches to the Roman mob; whose religion was, however, much more innocent and less absurd, than that of popery at least: And I could say more--but you understand me.

Seneca was a great freethinker, and had a noble notion of the worship of the gods, for which our priests would call any man an atheist: He laughs at morning devotions, or worshipping upon Sabbath-days; he says God has no need of ministers and servants, because he himself serves mankind. This religious man, like his religious brethren the Stoics, denies the immortality of the soul, and says, all that is feigned to be so terrible in hell, is but a fable: Death puts an end to all our misery, &c. Yet the priests were anciently so fond of Seneca, that they forged a correspondence of letters between him and St. Paul.

Solomon himself, whose writings are called "the word of God," was such a freethinker, that if he were now alive, nothing but his building of churches could have kept our priests from calling him an atheist. He affirms the eternity of the world almost in the same manner with Manilius,[28] the heathen philosophical poet, (which opinion entirely overthrows the history of the creation by Moses, and all the New Testament): He denies the immortality of the soul, assures us that men die like beasts, and that both go to one place.

[Footnote 28: Marcus Manilius, who probably flourished under Theodosius the Great, was a Latin poet, who wrote a poem entitled "Astronomica." [T.S.] ]

The prophets of the Old Testament were generally freethinkers: you must understand, that their way of learning to prophesy was by music and drinking.[29] These prophets writ against the established religion of the Jews, (which those people looked upon as the institution of God himself,) as if they believed it was all a cheat: that is to say, with as great liberty against the priests and prophets of Israel, as Dr. Tindal did lately against the priests and prophets of our Israel, who has clearly shewn them and their religion to be cheats. To prove this, you may read several passages in Isaiah, Ezekiel, Amos, Jeremiah, &c., wherein you will find such instances of freethinking, that, if any Englishman had talked so in our days, their opinions would have been registered in Dr. Sacheverell's trial, and in the representation of the Lower House of Convocation, and produced as so many proofs of the profaneness, blasphemy, and atheism of the nation; there being nothing more profane, blasphemous, or atheistical in those representations, than what these prophets have spoke, whose writings are yet called by our priests, "the word of God." And therefore these prophets are as much atheists as myself, or as any of my freethinking brethren whom I lately named to you.

[Footnote 29: Collins, after making the charge, which has been repeated by all freethinkers down to Thomas Paine, that the prophets acquired their fervour of spirit by the aid of music and wine, allows, nevertheless, that they were great freethinkers, and "writ with as great liberty against the established religion of the Jews, which the people looked on as the institution of God himself as if they looked upon it all to be imposture."--_Discourse_, p. 153, _et sequen._ [S.] ]

Josephus was a great freethinker: I wish he had chosen a better subject to write on, than those ignorant, barbarous, ridiculous scoundrels, the Jews, whom God (if we may believe the priests) thought fit to choose for his own people. I will give you some instances of his freethinking. He says, Cain travelled through several countries, and kept company with rakes and profligate fellows; he corrupted the simplicities of former times, &c., which plainly supposes men before Adam, and consequently that the priests' history of the creation by Moses, is an imposture. He says, the Israelites' passing through the Red Sea, was no more than Alexander's passing at the Pamphilian sea; that as for the appearance of God at Mount Sinai, the reader may believe it as he pleases; that Moses persuaded the Jews he had God for his guide, just as the Greeks pretended they had their laws from Apollo. These are noble strains of freethinking, which the priests knew not how to solve, but by thinking as freely: For one of them says, that Josephus writ this to make his work acceptable to the heathens, by striking out everything that was incredible.

Origen, who was the first Christian that had any learning, has left a noble testimony of his freethinking; for a general council has determined him to be damned; which plainly shews he was a freethinker, and was no saint; for people were only sainted because of their want of learning and excess of zeal; so that all the fathers, who are called saints by the priests, were worse than atheists.

Minutius Felix[30] seems to be a true modern latitudinarian, freethinking Christian; for he is against altars, churches, public preaching, and public assemblies; and likewise against priests; for, he says, there were several great flourishing empires before there were any orders of priests in the world.

[Footnote 30: Marcus Minutius Felix is said to have been born in Africa. He flourished in the third century, and wrote a defence of Christianity, in dialogue form, entitled, "Octavius." The work has been translated into English by Lord Hailes. [T.S.]]

Synesius,[31] who had too much learning and too little zeal for a saint, was for some time a great freethinker; he could not believe the resurrection till he was made a bishop, and then pretended to be convinced by a lying miracle.

[Footnote 31: Synesius of Cyrene, born 379, is the Platonic philosopher who became Bishop of Ptolemais. [T.S.]]

To come to our own country: My Lord Bacon was a great freethinker, when he tells us, that whatever has the least relation to religion, is particularly liable to suspicion; by which he seems to suspect all the facts whereon most of the superstitions (that is to say, what the priests call the religions) of the world are grounded. He also prefers atheism before superstition.

Mr. Hobbes was a person of great learning, virtue, and freethinking, except in the high church politics.

But Archbishop Tillotson is the person whom all English freethinkers own as their head; and his virtue is indisputable for this manifest reason; that Dr. Hickes, a priest, calls him an atheist; says, he caused several to turn atheists, and to ridicule the priesthood and religion. These must be allowed to be noble effects of freethinking. This great prelate assures us, that all the duties of the Christian religion, with respect to God, are no other but what natural light prompts men to, except the two sacraments, and praying to God in the name and mediation of Christ. As a priest and prelate, he was obliged to say something of Christianity; but pray observe, sir, how he brings himself off. He justly affirms that even these things are of less moment than natural duties; and because mothers' nursing their children is a natural duty, it is of more moment than the two sacraments, or than praying to God in the name and by the mediation of Christ. This freethinking archbishop could not allow a miracle sufficient to give credit to a prophet who taught anything contrary to our natural notions: By which it is plain, he rejected at once all the mysteries of Christianity.

I could name one-and-twenty more great men, who were all freethinkers; but that I fear to be tedious: For, 'tis certain that all men of sense depart from the opinions commonly received; and are consequently more or less men of sense, according as they depart more or less from the opinions commonly received; neither can you name an enemy to freethinking, however he be dignified or distinguished, whether archbishop, bishop, priest, or deacon, who has not been either "a crack-brained enthusiast, a diabolical villain, or a most profound ignorant brute."

Thus, sir, I have endeavoured to execute your commands, and you may print this Letter, if you please; but I would have you conceal my name. For my opinion of virtue is, that we ought not to venture doing ourselves harm, by endeavouring to do good.

I am yours, &c.

_I have here given the public a brief, but faithful abstract of this most excellent Essay; wherein I have all along religiously adhered to our author's notions, and generally to his words, without any other addition than that of explaining a few necessary consequences, for the sake of ignorant readers; for, to those who have the least degree of learning, I own they will be wholly useless. I hope I have not, in any single instance, misrepresented the thoughts of this admirable writer. If I have happened to mistake through inadvertency, I entreat he will condescend to inform me, and point out the place, upon which I will immediately beg pardon both of him and the world. The design of his piece is to recommend freethinking, and one chief motive is the example of many excellent men who were of that sect. He produces as the principal points of their freethinking; that they denied the Being of a God, the Torments of Hell, the Immortality of the Soul, the Trinity, Incarnation, the history of the creation by Moses, with many other such "fabulous and blasphemous stories," as he judiciously calls them: And he asserts, that whoever denies the most of these, is the completest freethinker, and consequently the wisest and most virtuous man. The author, sensible of the prejudices of the age, does not directly affirm himself an atheist; he goes no further than to pronounce that atheism is the most perfect degree of freethinking; and leaves the reader to form the conclusion. However, he seems to allow, that a man may be a tolerable freethinker, though he does believe a God; provided he utterly rejects "Providence, Revelation, the Old and New Testament, Future Rewards and Punishments, the Immortality of the Soul," and other the like impossible absurdities. Which mark of superabundant caution, sacrificing truth to the superstition of priests, may perhaps be forgiven, but ought not to be imitated by any who would arrive (even in this author's judgment) at the true perfection of freethinking._

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SOME THOUGHTS

ON

FREETHINKING.

WRITTEN IN ENGLAND, BUT LEFT UNFINISHED.

Discoursing one day with a prelate of the kingdom of Ireland, who is a person of excellent wit and learning, he offered a notion applicable to the subject we were then upon, which I took to be altogether new and right. He said, that the difference betwixt a madman and one in his wits, in what related to speech, consisted in this; that the former spoke out whatever came into his mind, and just in the confused manner as his imagination presented the ideas: The latter only expressed such thoughts as his judgment directed him to choose, leaving the rest to die away in his memory; and that, if the wisest man would, at any time, utter his thoughts in the crude indigested manner as they come into his head, he would be looked upon as raving mad. And, indeed, when we consider our thoughts, as they are the seeds of words and actions, we cannot but agree that they ought to be kept under the strictest regulation; and that in the great multiplicity of ideas which one's mind is apt to form, there is nothing more difficult than to select those which are most proper for the conduct of life. So that I cannot imagine what is meant by the mighty zeal in some people for asserting the freedom of thinking; because, if such thinkers keep their thoughts within their own breasts, they can be of no consequence, farther than to themselves. If they publish them to the world, they ought to be answerable for the effects their thoughts produce upon others. There are thousands in this kingdom, who, in their thoughts, prefer a republic, or absolute power of a prince, before a limited monarchy; yet, if any of these should publish their opinions, and go about, by writing or discourse, to persuade the people to innovations in government, they would be liable to the severest punishments the law can inflict; and therefore they are usually so wise as to keep their sentiments to themselves. But, with respect to religion, the matter is quite otherwise: and the public, at least here in England, seems to be of opinion with _Tiberius_, that _Deorum injuriae diis curae_. They leave it to God Almighty to vindicate the injuries done to himself, who is no doubt sufficiently able, by perpetual miracles, to revenge the affronts of impious men. And, it should seem, that is what princes expect from him, though I cannot readily conceive the grounds they go upon; nor why, since they are God's vicegerents, they do not think themselves at least equally obliged to preserve their master's honour as their own; since this is what they expect from those they depute, and since they never fail to represent the disobedience of their subjects, as offences against God. It is true, the visible reason of this neglect is obvious enough: The consequences of atheistical opinions, published to the world, are not so immediate, or so sensible, as doctrines of rebellion and sedition, spread in a proper season. However, I cannot but think the same consequences are as natural and probable from the former, though more remote: And whether these have not been in view among our great planters of infidelity in England, I shall hereafter examine.

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A LETTER

TO

A YOUNG CLERGYMAN,

LATELY ENTERED INTO

HOLY ORDERS.

1719-20.

NOTE.

No stronger proof could be adduced of Swift's genuine and earnest belief in the dignity of a clergyman of the Church than this letter. In spite of the sarcasms which here and there are levelled against the mediocre members of the class, it is evident Swift felt that these might be made worthy teachers and preachers of the doctrines of an institution founded, in his opinion, for the best regulation of mankind. The letter serves also to present us with an outline of a picture of the clergyman of his day; and if this picture be not flattering, it seems faithfully to reflect the social conditions which we know to have prevailed at the time.

The letter was written in the years of quiet which Swift enjoyed between the pamphleteering crusade against the Whigs, when Harley and St. John were in power, and the famous social and political troubles which began with Wood's halfpence.

The text of this letter is practically that of the first edition; but I have collated this with the texts given by Hawkesworth, Scott, the first volume of the "Miscellanies" of 1728, and the second volume of the "Miscellanies" of 1745. In the original edition, and in the reprints published to the time of Faulkner's collected edition, the title reads "A Letter to a Young Gentleman," etc.

[T.S.]

A LETTER TO A YOUNG GENTLEMAN, LATELY ENTER'D INTO HOLY ORDERS

By a Person of QUALITY.

It is certainly known, that the following Treatise was writ in Ireland by the Reverend Dr. Swift, Dean of St. Patrick's in that Kingdom.

Dublin, _January the 9th,_ 1719-20.

Sir,

Although it was against my knowledge or advice, that you entered into holy orders, under the present dispositions of mankind toward the Church, yet since it is now supposed too late to recede, (at least according to the general practice and opinion,) I cannot forbear offering my thoughts to you upon this new condition of life you are engaged in.

I could heartily wish that the circumstances of your fortune, had enabled you to have continued some years longer in the university; at least till you were ten years standing; to have laid in a competent stock of human learning, and some knowledge in divinity, before you attempted to appear in the world: For I cannot but lament the common course, which at least nine in ten of those who enter into the ministry are obliged to run. When they have taken a degree, and are consequently grown a burden to their friends, who now think themselves fully discharged, they get into orders as soon as they can; (upon which I shall make no remarks,) first solicit a readership, and if they be very fortunate, arrive in time to a curacy here in town, or else are sent to be assistants in the country, where they probably continue several years, (many of them their whole lives,) with thirty or forty pounds a-year for their support, till some bishop, who happens to be not overstocked with relations, or attached to favourites, or is content to supply his diocese without colonies from England, bestows upon them some inconsiderable benefice, when it is odds they are already encumbered with a numerous family. I should be glad to know what intervals of life such persons can possibly set apart for the improvement of their minds; or which way they could be furnished with books, the library they brought with them from their college being usually not the most numerous, or judiciously chosen. If such gentlemen arrive to be great scholars, it must, I think, be either by means supernatural, or by a method altogether out of any road yet known to the learned. But I conceive the fact directly otherwise, and that many of them lose the greatest part of the small pittance they receive at the university.

I take it for granted, that you intend to pursue the beaten track, and are already desirous to be seen in a pulpit, only I hope you will think it proper to pass your quarantine among some of the desolate churches five miles round this town, where you may at least learn to read and to speak before you venture to expose your parts in a city congregation; not that these are better judges, but because, if a man must needs expose his folly, it is more safe and discreet to do so before few witnesses, and in a scattered neighbourhood. And you will do well if you can prevail upon some intimate and judicious friend to be your constant hearer, and allow him with the utmost freedom to give you notice of whatever he shall find amiss either in your voice or gesture; for want of which early warning, many clergymen continue defective, and sometimes ridiculous, to the end of their lives; neither is it rare to observe among excellent and learned divines, a certain ungracious manner, or an unhappy tone of voice, which they never have been able to shake off.

I should likewise have been glad, if you had applied yourself a little more to the study of the English language, than I fear you have done; the neglect whereof is one of the most general defects among the scholars of this kingdom, who seem not to have the least conception of a style, but run on in a flat kind of phraseology, often mingled with barbarous terms and expressions, peculiar to the nation: Neither do I perceive that any person, either finds or acknowledges his wants upon this head, or in the least desires to have them supplied. Proper words in proper places, make the true definition of a style. But this would require too ample a disquisition to be now dwelt on: however, I shall venture to name one or two faults, which are easy to be remedied, with a very small portion of abilities.

The first is the frequent use of obscure terms, which by the women are called hard words, and by the better sort of vulgar, fine language; than which I do not know a more universal, inexcusable, and unnecessary mistake, among the clergy of all distinctions, but especially the younger practitioners. I have been curious enough to take a list of several hundred words in a sermon of a new beginner, which not one of his hearers among a hundred could possibly understand, neither can I easily call to mind any clergyman of my own acquaintance who is wholly exempt from this error, although many of them agree with me in the dislike of the thing. But I am apt to put myself in the place of the vulgar, and think many words difficult or obscure, which they will not allow to be so, because those words are obvious to scholars, I believe the method observed by the famous Lord Falkland[1] in some of his writings, would not be an ill one for young divines: I was assured by an old person of quality who knew him well, that when he doubted whether a word was perfectly intelligible or no, he used to consult one of his lady's chambermaids, (not the waiting-woman, because it was possible she might be conversant in romances,) and by her judgment was guided whether to receive or reject it. And if that great person thought such a caution necessary in treatises offered to the learned world, it will be sure at least as proper in sermons, where the meanest hearer is supposed to be concerned, and where very often a lady's chambermaid may be allowed to equal half the congregation, both as to quality and understanding. But I know not how it comes to pass, that professors in most arts and sciences are generally the worst qualified to explain their meanings to those who are not of their tribe: a common farmer shall make you understand in three words, that his foot is out of joint, or his collar-bone broken, wherein a surgeon, after a hundred terms of art, if you are not a scholar, shall leave you to seek. It is frequently the same case in law, physic, and even many of the meaner arts.