Charles Bradlaugh

“ I conclude, that every sensible man, every honest man, ought to hold Christianity in abhorrence. 'The great name of Theist, which we can never sufficiently revere,' is the only name we ought to adopt. The only gospel we should read is the grand book of nature, written with God's own hand, and stamped with his own seal. The only religion we ought to profess is, 'to adore God, and act like honest men.' It would be as impossible for this simple and eternal religion to produce evil, as it would be impossible for Christian fanaticism not to produce it.... ”

“ The spirits of the air, the shuddering ghost, The genii of the elements, the powers That give a shape to nature's varied works, Had life and place in the corrupt belief Of thy blind heart—yet still thy youthful hands Were pure of human blood. Then manhood gave Its strength and ardor to thy frenzied brain; Thine eager gaze scanned the stupendous scene, Whose wonders mocked the knowledge of thy pride. Their everlasting and unchanging laws Reproached thine ignorance. Awhile thou stood'st Baffled and gloomy; then thou did'st sum up The elements of all that thou did'st know. ”

“ The race of men, Chosen to my honor, with impunity, May sate the lusts I planted in their heart. Here I command thee hence to lead them on, Until, with hardened feet, their conquering troops Wade on the promised soil through woman's blood, And make my name be dreaded through the land. Yet ever burning flame and ceaseless woe Shall be the doom of their eternal souls, With every soul on this ungrateful earth, Virtuous or vicious, weak or strong,—even all Shall perish, to fulfil the blind revenge Which you, to men, call justice, of their God. ”

“ I know but of one thing that a philosopher should take for granted; and that only because he is forced to it by an irresistible impulse of his nature; and because, without doing so, neither truth nor falsehood could exist for him. He must take for granted the evidence of his senses; in other words, he must believe in the existence of things, as they exist to his senses. I know of no other existence, and can therefore believe in no other: although, reasoning from analogy, I may imagine other existences to be.—This, for instance, I do as respects the Gods. ”

“ With deliberate thoughts, with convulsive passion, the love of Charles Blount passed the bounds of that of a brother; longing to make her his wife, he adored her with the passion he had lavished on the dead. It seemed as if the shade of Eleanora was perpetually prompting him to bestow all his affection on the young and beautiful Eliza. She caressed his children with the pride of an aunt, she traced the image of her sister in the laughing eyes of the merry babes—still she was not happy. How could she be happy? She loved him as a man—as a brother. ”

“ Cause knowledge to extend its salubrious reign, goodness to occupy our souls, serenity to dwell in our bosoms.... Let our eyes, so long either dazzled or blindfolded, be at length fixed upon those objects we ought to seek. Dispel forever those mists of ignorance, those hideous phantoms, together with those seducing chimeras, which only serve to lead us astray. Extricate us from that dark abyss into which we are plunged by superstition, overthrow the fatal empire of delusion, crumble the throne of falsehood, wrest from their polluted hands the power they have usurped. ”

“ If that table were only in the hands of some of our spirit friends of the present day, what brilliant anecdotes might it not rap out—the sparkling wit of Diderot, the good humor of out host, the hospitable and generous D'Holbach, the occasional bitterness of Jean Jacques Rousseau, the cautious expression of opinion by D'Alembert, the agreeable variety of Montesquieu, and the bold enthusiasm of the youthful but hardworking Naigeon! If ever a table were inclined to turn, this table should have been; but perhaps it may be that tables never turn when reason is the ruler of those who sit around. ”

“ We hope that those not previously acquainted with the facts of his life, will find in the present sketch sufficient reason to think and speak otherwise of a man who made the world his country, and the doing good his religion.
"As Euclid near his various writings shone, His pen inspired by glorious truth alone, O'er all the earth diffusing light and life, Subduing error, ignorance, and strife; Raised man to just pursuits, to thinking right, And yet will free the world from woe and falsehood's night; To this immortal man, to Paine 'twas given, To metamorphose earth from hell to heaven." ”

“ Or countless partners of his powers divide His tyranny to weakness: or the smoke Of burning towns, the cries of female helplessness, Unarmed old age, and youth, and infancy, Horribly massacred, ascend to heaven In honor of his name; or, last and worst, Earth groans beneath religion's iron age, And priests dare babble of a God of peace, Even whilst their hands are red with guiltless blood, Murdering the while, uprooting every germ Of truth, exterminating, spoiling all, Making the earth a slaughter-house. ”

“ True philosophy is so useful to every man, that the young should apply to it without delay, and the old should never be weary of the pursuit; for no man is either too young or too old to correct and improve his mind, and to study the art of happiness. Happy are they who possess by nature a free and vigorous intellect, and who are born in a country where they can prosecute their inquiries without restraint: for it is philosophy alone which raises a man above vain fears and base passions, and gives him the perfect command of himself. ”

“ There is an universal tendency among mankind to conceive all beings like themselves, and to transfer to every object those qualities with which they are familiarly acquainted, and of which they are intimately conscious. We find human faces in the moon, armies in the clouds; and, by a natural propensity, it not corrected by experience and reflection, ascribe malice or good will to everything that hurts or pleases us. Hence the frequency and beauty of the prosopopoia in poetry; where trees, mountains, and streams are personified, and the inanimate parts of nature acquire sentiment and passion. ”

“ In the moment when the peaceful soul of Newton was employed by no business, and agitated by no passion, it was also chance that, drawing him under an apple tree, loosened some of the fruit from the branches, and gave that philosopher the first idea of his system on gravitation: it was really this incident that afterwards made him turn his thoughts to inquire whether the moon does not gravitate towards the earth with the same force as that with which bodies fall on its surface? It is then to chance that great geniuses are frequently obliged for their most happy thoughts. ”

“ The machinery of sects and priesthoods for saving souls and fitting men for heaven, I regard as wasteful and injurious folly, except so far as it may tend to better men and improve their condition here. I have a hope of future life, but whatever is best for this life must be best for another life; whatever is best for the present, must be best for the eternal future. To reveal to men the laws of their own being, and to unfold to them the laws of nature generally, and to bring them into harmony with those laws, is, therefore, with me, the whole business of man. ”

“ There is, first, the immense and prodigious, but terrible mathematical skeleton, which his subtle intellect binds up and throws as calmly into space as we drop a pebble into the water, and whose bones, striking against the wreck of all that is sacred in belief, or bold in speculation, rattle a wild response to our wildest phantasies, and drive us almost to think in despair that thinking is madness; and there is, secondly, the divinest vision of the infinite, and the divinest incense which the intuition of the infinite ever yet poured forth at the altar of creation. ”

“ A theologian, a missionary, or a partisan of any description, is always for conquering like a prince, and there are many more sects than there are sovereigns in the world. To whose guidance shall I submit my mind? Must I be a Christian, be-cause I happened to be born in London, or in Madrid? Must I be a Mussulman, because I was born in Turkey? As it is myself alone that I ought to consult, the choice of a religion is my greatest interest. One man adores God by Mahomet, another by the Grand Lama, and another by the Pope. Weak and foolish men! ”

“ Is virtue in this situation amongst men! Does the education of man infuse into him just, faithful ideas of happiness—true notions of virtue—-dispositions really favorable to the beings with whom he is to live? The examples spread before him, are they suitable to innocence of manners? Are they calculated to make him respect decency, to cause him to love probity, to practice honesty, to value good faith, to esteem equity, to revere conjugal fidelity, to observe exactitude in fulfilling his duties? Religion, which alone pretends to regulate his manners, does it render him sociable? ”

“ A murderer heard His voice in Egypt, one whose gifts and arts Had raised him to his eminence in power, Accomplice of omnipotence in crime, And confidant of the all-knowing one. These were Jehovah's words: "From an eternity of idleness, God, awoke: in seven days toil made earth From nothing; rested, and created man. I placed him in a paradise, and there Planted the tree of evil, so that he Might eat and perish, and my soul procure Wherewith to sate its malice, and to turn, Even like a heartless conqueror of the earth, All misery to my fame. ”

“ The knife of the Socialist is sheathed in vain; no rhapsody can overturn its impassioned teachings. Rhetoric is not needed to embellish the truths he has to portray, for the wild flowers of genius but too frequently hide the yawning chasms in the garden of Logic. It is not to be expected that this book will be read now with the interest with which it was perused two centuries ago; then every statement was impugned, every argument denied, and the very tone of the book called forth an interference from parliament to stop the progress of its heresies. ”

“ The laws, do they never support the strong against the weak, favor the rich against the poor, uphold the happy against the miserable? In short, is it an uncommon spectacle to behold crime frequently justified, often applauded, sometimes crowned with success, insolently triumphing, arrogantly striding over that merit which it disdains, over that virtue which it outrages? Well, then, in societies thus constituted, virtue can only be heard by a very small number of peaceable citizens, a few generous souls, who know how to estimate its value, who enjoy it in secret. ”

“ We conclude with the following:—"Investigate the laws which nature, for our direction, has implanted in our breasts, and form from thence an authentic and immutable code. Nor let this code be calculated for one family, or one nation only, but for the whole with-out exception. Be the legislators of the human race, as ye are the interpreters of their common nature. Show us the line that separates the world of chimeras from that of realities: and teach us, after so many religions of error and delusion, the religion of evidence and truth." ”

“ No passions, therefore, can be supposed to work upon such barbarians, but the ordinary affections of human life; the anxious concern for happiness, the dread of future misery, the terror of death, the thirst of revenge, the appetite for food and other necessaries. Agitated by hopes and fears of this nature, especially the latter, men scrutinize, with a trembling curiosity, the course of future causes, and examine the various and contrary events of human life. And in this disordered scene, with eyes still more disordered and astonished, they see the first obscure traces of divinity.... ”

“ Behold? then, men upon this earth, where the objects of desire are not superabundant, all possessing equal rights to whatever may be agreeable or useful to them, by virtue of the same capacity for enjoyment and suffering. This is a state of nature, which is nothing less than a state of war, the anarchy of the passions, a combat in which every man is arrayed against his neighbor. But this state being opposed to the happiness of the majority of individuals who share it, utility, the offspring of egotism itself, demands its exchange for another, to wit, the social state. ”

“ But it is impossible that perfect happiness can be possessed without the pleasure which attends freedom from pain, and the enjoyment of the good things of life. Pleasure is in its nature good, as pain is in its nature evil; the one is, therefore, to be pursued, and the other to be avoided, for its own sake.—Pleasure, or pain, is not only good, or evil, in itself, but the measure of what is good or evil, in every object of desire or aversion; for the ultimate reason why we pursue one thing, and avoid another, is because we expect pleasure from the former, and apprehend pain from the latter. ”