Allen Pringle

“ Christianity, instead of holding humanity above all creeds, has, without compunction, immolated man by scores of thousands on the bloody altar of creed and dogma. To maintain its creeds intact, Christianity has reddened the surface of the earth with human blood. Therefore, whatever Mr. Wendling may think about the elevation of man above creeds, Christianity does not hold humanity above its creeds.
With respect to the authenticity and inspiration of the Bible, Mr. Wendling's position is extremely dubious. ”

“ Darwin, Huxley, Tyndall, Proctor and the rest are safe. This relentless enemy of Science and liberty, and consequently of mankind, can no longer clutch every young science by the throat and strangle struggling truth, which, crushed to earth has risen again in its might; and history will scarcely repeat itself in the case of Bruno the Atheist, or Galileo the Astronomer, or Roger Bacon the Philosopher, or a thousand other victims of this ruthless "Bourbon of the world of thought"—the Church. ”

“ In a free country all kinds of freedom must be allowed, and Mr. Ingersoll had just as much right to come here and say his say in his own manner, and according to his own discretion, as Mr. Hammond has to come and preach and teach in his way. If men are free to agree with us, they are also free to differ with us; to differ a little, to differ much, to differ altogether. If the Mayor had found a law by which he could prohibit Ingersoll from lecturing against our religious beliefs, I would have started an agitation at once for the repeal of that absurd and antiquated law. ”

“ It is only the anthropomorphism we attack—only the superstitions, assumptions and dogmas. We only attack that which is incredible and absurd—that which "shocks reason." We believe in religion—the Religion of Humanity—to do right—a religion of works instead of faith and creeds, and Bystander himself admits that "religion is carrying a weight which it cannot bear," and that, "unless the credible can be separated from the incredible, the reasonable from that which shocks reason, there will be a total eclipse of faith." ”

“ Wendling grows so eloquent!
The Christian world has been quite long enough teaching an irrational and absurd doctrine about conscience. They not only blunder as to its origin, but as to its nature and functions. Nearly every Christian writer defines conscience as an "inward monitor" to tell us right from wrong; a divine faculty enabling us to "judge between the good and the bad;" a "guide to conduct," &c, &c. In the light of our present mental science this definition of conscience is utterly false. Conscience is not an intelligent faculty at all—it is simply a feeling. ”

“ Who shall count the host of weaker men whose sense of truth has been destroyed in the effort to harmonize impossibilities—whose life has been wasted in the attempt to force the generous new wine of Science into the old bottles of Judaism, compelled by the outcry of the same strong party. ”

“ It is by no means biblical doctrine, however well so humane an idea may fit into Mr. W.'s own mind. Hence, to designate the brotherhood of man the "great central thought of Christianity"—a system which is to consign a majority of mankind to an endless hell of fire and brimstone—is purely gratuitous. To claim benevolent fatherhood or brotherhood for a religion which declares that the road to hell is "broad," and many shall go in thereat, while the way to Heaven is "narrow," and few shall go in thereat, is to play fast and loose with the Bible. ”

“ By modern metaphysics conscience has been relegated from the domain of the intellect to its proper place among the emotions. Hence it decides nothing, judges nothing as between right and wrong, or anything else, for that is a function of intellect. Conscience, instead of being a "guide" or "judge," is but a blind impulse needing itself to be guided. It is simply a feeling for the right—a thirsting for the good—but the intellect must decide what is right; and the nature and character of its decisions will depend upon various circumstances, such as organization, education, &c. ”

“ If, however, barbarism is in reality just the opposite of our most enlightened and highest civilization in Art, Science, Literature and Ethics, it will, I have the presumption to think, be found that those "foolish men"—those "brutalized" Freethinkers—are leading the van of progress forward to a higher civilization, instead of dragging it backward to barbarism. The truth of this is patent everywhere, in every civilized country, and many of our Christian opponents admit it, though Archbishop Lynch may not. ”

“ We take the position that Christianity itself is essentially intolerant and persecuting in spirit; and, we take the New Testament itself to prove it. We take Christ's alleged words as reported there, and Paul's alleged words as reported there, and can thereby abundantly sustain our charge. "He that believeth not shall be damned." "A man that is a heretic after the first and second admonition, reject." What is that but the quintessence of bigotry and intolerance? ”

“ The intellect, however, may be enlightened. Reason, which is the only and ultimate arbiter and guide to conduct, may be enlightened; and we may thus modify, guide and direct the blind impulses of conscience. The truth is, conscience in man, such as it is, is a development—is acquired rather than innate; has been developed by Nature instead of "implanted" by God. The moral sense, without doubt, gradually developed in man as he rose in the scale of intelligence. ”

“ How is it, if conscience is an "unerring guide" to conduct, implanted by God, that it has guided man, in the name of its author, to let out the life blood of his fellow-creatures in rivers, on account of differences of opinion conscientiously entertained? Does God give one man one sort of conscience and another man another and wholly different sort, leading them in opposite directions, and then prompt the conscience of one to put the other (his fellow) to death for conscience sake and for God's sake? ”

“ Now, may we not indulge the hope, in this age of reason, and land of at least professed liberty, and esoteric freedom of conscience, that every man, be he Catholic or Protestant, will look upon this attempted exercise of medieval bigotry and intolerance with practical disregard, and deserved contempt. As for the Freethinkers, they can afford to smile at the impotent Archbishop, who seems to imagine himself in the ninth instead of the nineteenth century, and in Rome or Spain instead of the Dominion of Canada. ”

“ Therefore, on the evolution philosophy of things, we can reasonably predicate pain, sorrow, and wrong; and are not puzzled at their existence. It is only on the theory of a good God controlling the Universe that we stand dumb with confusion and wonderment in the presence of all this woe, pain, misery, and wrong-with which the world is filled—this terrible "struggle for life," where the-strong prey upon the weak, where animal eats animal, and man eats-man! ”

“ I have a hundred times wished that Jesus Christ, in coming to be incarnated in Judea, had united all the sects under his laws. I have asked myself why, being God, he did not use the rights of his divinity; why, in coming to deliver us from sin, he has left us in sin; why, in coming to enlighten all men, he has left almost all men in darkness. ”

“ Will intelligent Catholics put their necks in a yoke so galling? None but slaves or barbarians would do it. The Archbishop would thus fain make barbarians of his own people, and then he would have the pagans at home without hunting among Freethinkers for them. In his lecture in Napanee, in April last, Col. Ingersoll gave it as his opinion that any man—no matter what Church he belonged to, or what country he lived in—who claimed rights for himself which he denied to others, is a barbarian! Now, according to this definition, who are the barbarians? ”

“ Seeing the logical force of this, he quibbles thus: "We do not say that God has intelligence, but that God is wisdom in form and love in essence, and therefore the infinite source of all intelligence." ”

“ It is not necessary, however, for any observant and thoughtful man to go to any authorities outside his own mind to be convinced of the fallacy of the "Free Will" dogma, for his own observation and reflection will do it. And "Rationalist" can have the same conviction without the aid of science or philosophy,—without even observation or reflection. Let him turn to his Bible, which he champions, and read it, and he will find abundant proof (such as it is) that man's will is not free. ”

“ A Church which from "the beginning of that unhappy contest," as Mosheim tells us, "between faith and reason, religion and philosophy, piety and genius, which increased in succeeding ages, and is prolonged even to our times with a violence which renders it extremely difficult to be brought to a conclusion," to this day, would hold the world in barbarous ignorance if its paralyzed hand could but avail against the resistless march of knowledge and truth! ”

“ The cowardly conduct of the Toronto press, with one or two exceptions, in reference to Ingersoll's lectures, was as astonishing to liberal-minded men as it was deplorable to all, especially in the "Queen City of the West," which is, or ought to be, the centre of intellectual activity and progress in Canada. This exhibition of narrow-minded bigotry on the part of the Toronto press excited (rather unexpectedly to them, no doubt) great surprise and severe animadversion from many quarters. ”

“ Now, Universalism has always been specially odious to the other more evangelical sects, especially the Methodists, who seem positively shocked at the horrid idea that hell may perhaps be ultimately emptied of its human contents and all mankind get into heaven. The Universalists appear to have a good degree of that noble human quality, benevolence, and hence they believe that the God they worship is too good to damn forever any creature he has made. ”

“ But orthodoxy is the Bourbon of the world of thought. It learns not, neither can it forget; and, though at present bewildered and afraid to move, it is as willing as ever to insist that the first chapter of Genesis contains the beginning and the end of sound science; and to visit, with such petty thunderbolts as its half-paralyzed hands can hurl those who refuse to degrade Nature to the level of primitive Judaism."—Lay Sermons, p. ”

“ There are thousands of Atheists in almost every civilized country, and how is it, if Atheism tends to crime, that you will seldom or never find one in prison for any crime? Buddhism, one of the most ancient religions, long ante-dating Christianity, is essentially Atheistic. It has had, and has now, hundreds of millions of followers, and for pure morality no system of religion has ever equalled it. Webster, the Christian lexicographer, admits that Buddhism was "characterized by admirable humanity and morality." ”

“ It is true that, if philosophers have suffered, their cause has been amply revenged. Extinguished theologians lie about the cradle of every science as the strangled snakes beside that of Hercules; and history records that, whenever science and orthodoxy have been fairly opposed, the latter has been forced to retire from the lists, bleeding and crushed, if not annihilated ”

“ Nature and the affairs of this world, or the least trace of interference by any God or gods. In the primeval ages of ignorance and barbarism the gods were supposed to do everything, from the production of wind, rain, tempest, thunder and lightning, earthquakes, &c, down to dyspepsia and potato-bugs. Science now explains all these things and a thousand others. Indeed, in modern philosophy there is no room for the gods in the Universe, and nothing left for them to do. And there cannot be any room beyond it for them, for "above Nature we cannot rise." ”

“ He then gives us a rehash of Paley's design argument to prove the existence of a God, which he considers conclusive. And, finally, as if conscious of the weakness of the intellectual argument, he takes refuge in the moral argument,—in conscience in man as showing the existence of a personal God with moral attributes. This is the last refuge of the Theist—the dernier ressort of the theologian. Driven utterly from the realm of reason they fly to conscience and to consciousness to establish subjectively what cannot be proved intellectually. ”

“ This we think to be more conceivable and intelligent than the Christian theory that there are two existences—God and the Universe—and that there was a time when there was but one existence, God, and that after an indefinite period of quiescence and "masterly inactivity" He finally created a Universe either out of Himself or out of nothing—either one of which propositions is philosophically absurd. ”

“ If young men of average intellect, and more than average morality, find that the more keenly they study Christianity, the less able they are to accept it, and preach it, then must Christianity be relegated to the dusty lumber-room of worn-out and superseded religious systems. ”

“ In speaking of the condition of the Western Empire the same author proceeds:—"A boundless intolerance of all divergence of opinion was united with an equally boundless toleration of all falsehood and deliberate fraud, that could favor received opinions. Credulity being taught as a virtue, and all conclusions dictated by authority, a deadly torpor sank upon the human mind, which for many centuries almost suspended its action, and was only broken by the scrutinizing, innovating and free-thinking habits that accompanied the rise of the industrial republics in Italy. ”

“ If you mean that God is simply the aggregate, or even the essence, of all intelligence, all love, all good, why this is a mere abstraction, and even an Atheist might accept it; but if you are contending for anything like the Christian's God, as set forth in the Bible, you will have to alter your definitions very materially. ”

“ All seek to explain the great mystery of the universe—some one way, some another—from the rude thaumaturgic fancies of the primitive barbarian up to the abstruse speculations and subtle reasonings of the cultured Pantheist, intellectual Agnostic, and logical Materialist. It is true one may be more reasonable and logical than the rest (as I undoubtedly think is the case) , yet they all occupy the common ground of uncertainty. ”

“ The truth is the burden of the most of the teaching of the day is, to 'die right;' 'make your peace with God in time,' and 'get religion before you die;' thus making religion to mainly consist in one general scramble to get into heaven and keep out of hell. ”

“ Who shall say that human sciences ought to be pursued in such a spirit of freedom that one may be allowed to hold as true their assertions, even when opposed to revealed doctrine, Let him be anathema. ”

“ Further, to talk to-day of "dead inert matter," is to talk the language of an obsolete philosophy of the past; for modern science and philosophy alike agree that matter is not "that mere empty capacity which philosophers have pictured her to be, but the universal mother who brings forth all things as the fruit of her own womb." ”

“ As a sample of "Rationalist's" metaphysical philosophy I give the following:—
"Will and love are identical... Will or love is life. A man cannot think unless he wills to think; and he can only think that which he wills—only that and nothing more. He can only do what he wills and thinks. There is no action which is not the effect of will and its thought. A man wills in order to think," etc. He also tells us that God gave man a will "as free as His own." Matter is spoken of as "mere dead inert matter." ”

“ Woe, woe, woe, to Christianity when Infidels by the force of nature, or the tendency of the age, get ahead of the Church in morals, and in the practical work of Christianity. In some instances they are already far in advance. In the vindication of Truth, Righteousness, and Liberty, they are the pioneers, beckoning to a sluggish Church to follow in the rear. ”